Hey guys.
A few months ago at the last NARBC I picked up a pair of Dbl het Tristripe Pieds, they’re about 4-5 m/o now and I’ve just been feeling discouraged about the odds?
I have a 6% chance of getting a Tristripe Pied and a 19% chance of a Tristripe BUT the problem is both babies are only from a Dh pairing.
I believe they both look het for Tri, I can really see it in the male especially.
I can’t tell if they’re het Pied though, both have very broken tire tracks on their bellies and I know that that method is not 100% accurate but it seems to be often?
I know there’s a thread discussing all this!
Anyways, would you guys keep them and take the chance? I’d feel like such a fool if I breed them in 3 years and NOTHING good comes of it!
Thanks
2 Likes
This is really a personal choice.
Some things to think about is:
Room space
Cost of upkeep
Do you like what you see in them
Would you be happy even if nothing happened
There is no real 100% guarantee when it comes to this. You do have a much better chance of getting what you want with less morphs mixed in and visuals. But this could comes with a much higher cost.
Personally, if I answer “yes” to the above, then I would keep them and see what happens, but that is me. No to any, then I would probably move them.
3 Likes
Were they pos. het or actually double het? I ask because you mention you can’t tell if they’re het pied. If they’re from a reputable breeder then I wouldn’t question that.
And I think the above has some good points as well. It’s all personal preference. And if it’s something you yourself want to try, then go for it! You could always try to grab a visual tri-stripe to make some other combos, or just evaluate where you want your breeding plans to go.
6 Likes
Their parents were both Dbl hets.
I just feel conflicted because I think I was being a bit impulsive despite the odds.
I like the look of Tristripe, the pied version not so much, but I’d much rather be working with Black axanthics lol.
I thought about say selling the male Dbl het and then getting a male visual Tri het Pied but I’m not sure!
2 Likes
I agree with your last statement. To increase your odds I would try get a male visual tri het pied like you said. Also I am sensing you favor the tri stripe morph over the pied, so if cost is a factor maybe just get a male visual tri poss. Het pied. That way you should definitely hit more tri stripes, and if you do hit pied that’s a bonus, but not a huge deal for you sense you aren’t as into the pied morph? Also any female you breed the visual tri male to will be het for tri stripe, much better then poss hets! Just some thoughts for ya.
2 Likes
It’s not that I don’t like Pieds I just really hesitate to work with them as they’re sooooo many people already working with very nice Pied combos.
Maybe, based on the fact that I’m even having these thoughts, I should go through with selling? I’ve never had such apprehension before towards a pairing, even to ones that had similar odds?
Thanks to all of you guys for your help, this community is really the only place I can ask questions like these as my family and friends are reptile ignorant lol.
1 Like
My general rule of thumb if I really NEED to get something and only have one pairing to do it, then it needs to have at least a 1/4 chance per egg for the average female, higher if she’s known to give smaller clutches. Still can always miss it but I’ll feel ok about it.
If your snakes are known 100% DH Tri Pied (came from visual parents) then the odds of the double is 1/16. If your girl lays 7 eggs then there’s about a 35% chance you get it, which is already not great.
Now, if your snakes are truly the product of a DH to DH pairing, they are called 66% het Tri 66% het Pied. Which honestly turns the odds pretty astronomically against you because you might not even have the genes needed in the first place. If your girl lays 7 eggs it’s about 6% chance you will end up getting a Tri Pied - which I wouldn’t bother.
My advice is to get a Visual Tri 100% het Pied. That way you know any babies are 100% Tri, you have a good chance to end up with at least a Visual Tri, and you can test the others for het pied that miss. If you do a Tri 100% het Pied x 66% het Tri 66% het Pied in a 7 egg clutch it’s 26% chance to hit the double. It’s still bad, but compared to 6% there’s at least a shot.
You can also pay $65 and test for het Pied and really reduce the uncertainty by a lot. Downside is they may test negative and you’ll have lost the testing money. Depends how important getting the double visual is to you.
3 Likes
I hope you got a great price on them at least. Those are very long odds. I know personally, I would never try it. I’d need at least one of those genes to be guaranteed for it to be worthwhile.
It’s easy to fall into that trap and think “it’s got to be the one true pair. They will beat the odds.”
But if you’re already discouraged then the best thing to do in my opinion is to move on. If you really do think the pair may be het for tri and want to get that started? Cool! Do it. But if you have doubts already at 5 months? It may be easier to try and find a female that actually IS het tri and sell the female you have or look for a guaranteed het pair. At 5 months old you still would be waiting about just as long for them to be up to size anyway if you found a baby elsewhere.
If you found an older het female you could at least maybe test the male out late in the season.
Edit:
Also you say they were purchased as dbl het but then say after that they are from dbl het parents. I do hope they weren’t actually sold to you as guaranteed dbl hets. Because that’s also poor business practice from the breeder.
6 Likes
The breeder told me they were from Dbl het parents before purchase, but I can be a bit impulsive! I feel so dumb, I should’ve thought about it more before, well you live and you learn!
I think a lot of physiology goes into breeding possible hets. Most breeders seem to be in your camp and worry a lot about them not providing. I’m the other extreme and love the gamble for a shot at something I couldn’t afford to do the “right” way. You can’t win the lottery without a ticket.
That being said the time, work, and feeding budget to get a female to breeding size is significant. Are the het tri-stripe markers pretty good in both? Maybe post some pictures of dorsal for tri-stripe and last half of belly for pied?
If you are leaning towards keeping them the het pied test would be a good investment for either that doesn’t scream het pied. It doesn’t sound like het pied is the most important to you but depending on your feeder costs the test could pay for itself if you decide to sell them sooner rather than later. I tested several I was unsure of this year (thinking het monsoon might interfere with het pied markers) but also have some I didn’t bother to test as very obviously het pied. I’ve proven many many possible hets over the years.
Another thing to consider is that double hets decrease your odds of normals a bit compared to single hets. Sure you could replace one or both with a for sure het tri-stripe and each baby would have 3:4 chance of looking normal. But if these end up being double hets the odds of normal fall to 9:16. Only 3:16 less but something of a consolation if you miss the 1:16 pied tri-stripe for a clutch or three.
4 Likes
Another thing to consider is that MAYBE someone will develop a het tri-stripe test in time to help your decision.
2 Likes
The 1st and 4th pics are the female and the 2nd and 3rd are the male
I don’t have much of any tri-stripe experience so hopefully someone else can give you a better opinion. I think the stripped alien eyes in the male are an indicator of het tri-stripe.
1 Like
I can get more pics if need be
Trust the process bro, like you said it may have been done differently if you could do it again but you’re here now don’t give up without trying first. Assuming you got a decent deal on the pairing because they’re double hets if you do actually hit a double visual you’ll be so over the moon. Like hitting the lottery… but I say go through raise them up and see what that first clutch gives you whenever that day comes, have no expectations just happiness to see your work hatch out. Who knows?.. maybe you hit a tristripe het pied or pied het tristripe. Maybe the double visual?!? And you’re that much closer. The long game is ok too man. You got this.
1 Like
They’re not guaranteed double hets though…
They’re 66% double hets for pied and tri-stripe
For all we know, the male may only be het for tri and the female may be a normal.
It’s a gamble, but if the deal was good enough, it could still be worth a shot.
The downside is even with the right genes in place, bad luck can mean the first clutch if it’s a small one may not hatch a visual. So you would need at least two and ideally prove it with something else that has a guaranteed het or is already visual to up the chance of the visual hatchling
4 Likes
Oh are they not? 
I never look at possible hets for the reason of not wanting to play the gamble. I like sure things thought these were double hets not pos hets. That’s a no no for me.
1 Like
Yeah they are from Dbl het parents, I bought them because they were pretty cheap and because I thought they both looked het Tri-Stripe.
Look at me editing photos on a phone like a millennial (lol, I know it’s terrible but hey they can’t drive my stick shift!).
This is the sum total of my experience with tri-stripe. This male is 100% het tri-strip and also het hypo. I picked him because the alien eyes tend to stripe together forming a single cyclops eye (or a La Forge visor but millennials won’t get that either). I know not all het tri-stripes have this and not all with it are het tri-stripe but I do believe there is a reliable correlation. I think it’s actually the alien eyes that form the dark stripes in a tri-stripe and not the normal pattern higher on the back which may well be involved in genetic stripe.
My hope is that as the most het tri-stripe looking male picked out of a couple clutches of hets he might be most likely to produce possible hets I can pick out and also maybe better quality visuals.
2 Likes
