Makes sense, keeping potentially fatal genes gender locked ensures you never mix them by mistake. That a really good idea!
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I know other folks have dif approaches but for me I I prefer holding those genes in my gals. Spider, hgw, banana, even luecistic genes. I try to keep them focused in my females so I get that those genes expressed in a single clutch instead of in every clutch the male sires. Even with banana I started with 0.2 and will breed my own male bps for holdback. I donât want to be producing 50% spiders, champagne, hgw, etc. Or all male maker bananas. Or 4-6 gene unidentifiable luecistic bps. Just choices I make for me and mine. I think the spider gene and Tneg albino are the genes most responsible for the boom in the trade from an outlier hobby to a mainstream legitimate business for any of us who dedicate ourselves to it. I canât wait to see what other genes come from these amazing animals over the years
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Everything that you say will be taken with importance, we all have a right to be heard and all of our opinions are very valid no matter if we agree or disagree with some or all posting here, our say matters 
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I have often said that Spider is just the opening play. This is a common tactic with the AR groups, they pick an easy target and then start adding on others through association. We saw it with the Burms in FL, it did not take long for it to go from just Burms to Burms + AfRocks + retics + anacondas + scrubs + tegus + âŠ
IF the pressure from AR groups, and overzealous hobbyists, continues forward with Spider and we see an actual ban on the morph then the others you ask about will begin to fall behind it. And many others besides.
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Likewise, it does not, by default, make it a detriment to the species. Thus lies the founding idea of evolution (and no, I am not implying Spider is the next step in ball python evolution, just talking bigger picture)
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There are some forms of âdwarfismâ that are perfectly viable and stable and have a normal lifespan.
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My Spider female that i bought last spring is doing remarkably well compared to what she was
when She came to me. The heat pack wasnât taped to the foam very well. She was so stressed from the shipping and the heat pack falling down on Her, She was cork screwing and wobbling, and it was
scary. She was very defensive, striking at me all the time.
I gave Her time to settle in to Her new home. It took Her a while to get back to what I would call normal behavior.
She eats every meal, She hardly every gets defensive anymore, I handle Her with no problems now.
She is thriving and doing well. Better than what I thought she would. If you donât want to own or breed Spiders then donât. If you do then that is great. Everyone has their own opinion.
Hope everyone had a Great Christmas and a Happy New Year. May the year 2022 bring you a
worlds first and many happy healthy BP babies.
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Iâm in the pro spider club, are there cases of severe wobble? Yes. Does that make the animal eat less, shed, poop, or pee with any issues? Of course not. Itâs the uneducated people who saw a video of spider wobble by some other uneducated YouTuber who Iâm sure only owns one ball python saying that spiders are bad. Spiders live happy healthy lives just like any other snake. If you keep spiders in tip top husbandry conditions I promise you that you will hardly see a wobble at all from them. Itâs the uneducated people who really **** me off about the gene because they can make some stunning animals. Like others on here I tend to keep them as females and not males
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I completely agree and plus any animal can have issues itâs not just spiders Iâve personally seen more deformed non spider babyâs and failure to thrive than spider babyâs with severe wobble
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I canât imagine what would have happened if people applied the logic they do to spiders to things like albinos when they were first being produced, which, iirc was sensitivity to light and bad eyesight? I feel like a lot of people nit pick any flaw they can find if theyâre against breeding reptiles, spiders (and of course similar morphs with Neuro issues), just happen to have something very obvious, and the average layman is gonna look at it and go âThatâs bad because itâs not normalâ.
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I mean, there is a large difference between the brain being messed up and light sensitivity due to a lack of pigment. However, for most, the way to deal with it is the same. Adjust husbandry. For albinos, lower light solves the problem caused by the lack of pigmentation to absorb excess light. For spiders, you keep things as stress free as possible and generally you are OK. But the neuro issues have the chance to require cull or can have significant QoL issues no matter how your husbandry is, though having it that bad is exceedingly rare. Albinos to my knowledge share the same issue consistantly due to lacking pigmant, so the fix is pretty simple and universal. Less light and youre all right.
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wobble can also occur when a snake of any type is Iâll, has been seriously overheated, or has been exposed to chemicals. I have seen all 3 in the course of watching unboxing, rescue etc videos. If one wasnât the breeder of the snake, it could be difficult to tell the cause of the serious wobble.
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True, chemicals and excess heat can cause neurological issues in just about any species, but is much more so for those who cant thermoregulate outside of the environments you give them.
Of course, I agree completely. I was just wondering how many shocking videos of Spiders with terrible wobble, might be rescues that may have only had miner wobble if bad things had not occurred.
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The trick is people tend not to video tape things when they are going just fine. So the real question is how many snakes have a minor to no wobble that we never hear about or see? Then as you said, factor in bad husbandry, undue stress, and specifically stressing out the animal first to stage a significsnt reactionary wobble.
I think the issue is far less prevelant than it is made out to be, but i dont think all major cases are neglect or falsehoods. There is a higher risk of QoL harming side effects, so its up to the individual if they want to take the risk. I dont think its enough of an issue to warrant a ban, but it is enough where i personally just avoid them to be safe. It also becomes genetic bombs when going for morph stacks that include recessives. You may get very lucky with a stack, but cant breed it because it would be a spider-spider pair.
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VERY IMPORTANT TO NOTE BEFORE CLICKING AND READING THE BELOW:
THIS IS A PRE-PRINT!
IT HAS NOT BEEN PEER REVIEWED!
THE CONCLUSIONS HAVE NOT BEEN SUBJECT TO EVALUATION BY OUTSIDE SCIENTIST!
THERE IS NO GUARANTEE THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL STAND UP TO SCRUTINY
(Also, I have not had a chance to read it yet myself so I am neither endorsing nor condemning it at this time)
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Thanks for that it was an interesting read, I should have spent more time with it, I will later, but first thoughts â
Thatâs an interesting study. if peer reviewed and backed up it could answer a lot. But it makes some logical sense. The differences in inner ear which is crucial for ballance and the statoacoustic organ sound compelling. But its also a very small number of snakes studied, (what was it only 4) so on both the lack repeated findings, and size of the study, we cant say its definitive, but an interesting start. More study is neededâŠ
Separate point - Despite the beauty and potentials, with the Uk ban in some club shows and prejudice from some buyers, is it fair to the snake morph to breed it if we cant sell it easily?
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Seeing this is so funny, as this is an actual note I had written into my phoneâs notepad sometime last year and forgotten about until now
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The sample size is small but the results seem fairly conclusive. The one glaring fault I see, and this is a big deal for me, is this; âdesign bread spider morph snakesâ 
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Why not both? 
Innervation for proper formation of the inner ear requires nerves following the migration pathways of melanocytes
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I would bet good money that is just a matter of ESL
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Oh absolutely!
I look forward to seeing future studies looking at the brain (and actually very much want to do some myself), as well as seeing larger sample sizes and statistics for the inner ear paper
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Iâve got a single gene spider male and Iâve also got a female with spider in her and they eat and function normally as good if not better than some of the other genes that I have . If it wasnât for the stigma attached to the spider name making it hard to sell I wouldnât mind having several of them. IMO you could find problems in anything if you dig hard enough but this just happened to be the gene that caught the attention making some people afraid to keep them. Their may be some extreme cases and that could happen with anything but for the most part the spider gene is definitely worth giving a chance
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