It’s been pointed out by @darling_geckos that “Jungle” in LG’s on our site is labeled as recessive but that many say it’s line bred. Geckoboa.com agrees (I’m not sure what our original source was).
The old LG wiki (gone now) indicated this was debatable.
Throughout the years many people have thought of the Jungle trait as Line Bred/ Poly Genetic, but recent developments have proven this is not necessarily the case. Many people buy so called Heterozygous Jungle specimens but fail to ever produce Jungle animals. Consequently, some people consider it to be an Incomplete Recessive which means that the Jungle morph works like a recessive trait most of the time but can vary and act as a line bred trait.
Does anyone who knows about LG’s have any evidence that should give us pause before reclassifying it to line bred? If so please provide evidence.
I can’t provide evidence, but through the extensive jungle breedings I’ve done, it seems to be a polygenetic trait, and it also seems that not all jungles are genetically identical. Jungle x jungle seems produce mostly but not 100% jungles. On rare occasions a jungle is produced by non-jungle parents. In other words, it’s complicated and probably governed by multiple genes. Definitely not just a single recessive gene. Line bred would probably be the best way to classify it for the purposes of this site. That’s my two cents.
Also, I don’t use the term ‘linebred,’ because that implies that inbreeding is required, when that’s not true. You can take two unrelated animals and easily produce Bandeds, Jungles, and Aberrants, just as @westridge described. ‘Selectively bred’ is more accurate. This past season I bred two unrelated banded geckos, and they produced Banded, Jungle, and (if I’m recalling correctly) Aberrant offspring as well. Do I need to take pictures of all of them?
I definitely agree that it’s complicated to the point of being subjective. I’ve seen a ton of animals that are mostly banded, except for one band having a definite, irregular wiggle, and people often will ignore that and still call those animals Banded. In leopard geckos, ‘Stripe’ and ‘Patternless Stripe’ are both selectively bred, insofar as I know (not counting Ciphers or Super Snow patterning). Then there’s the hyper /hypo melanism aspect, which is also selectively bred. I feel like I might be missing out on a step of the logic, but all of that suggests, to me, that pattern is definitely way more involved than a simple Mendelian recessive trait.
I am still wearing training wheels myself but I know both of them work with geckos enough to help 90% of the time and not be too proud the other 10% to admit they don’t know.
but I know both of them work with geckos enough to help 90% of the time and not be too proud the other 10% to admit they don’t know.