Hi everyone, just dropping in and posting an update on a baby leo I hatched out a month ago! It has seriously developed beautifully, and I’m already excited to plan new projects around her.
Here she is now (10 grams):
Here she was near hatch (3 grams):
She is definitely a bell albino mack snow, but now my question is whether I can describe it as a lavender and/or tangerine bold stripe? Mom is a bold lavender, while dad is a bold from tangerine lines. What do you think? And what do you think I should be looking for in future males to pair with her? Thanks
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I’m not an expert on Geckos (I don’t even like them) but I gotta tell you that’s a beautiful one you hatched out! It’s crazy to see the difference after only a 7 gram increase!
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That’s an awesome gecko! The morphs I think would all depend on how it ages. Since the possible morphs you mentioned are all polymorphic there’s a big gray area of whether they are or aren’t that morph. I don’t really know much about lavender, I just looked it up and I think that this could be labeled as one if and only if the mom came from JMG lines (who founded the trait). I personally think that it would classify as a bold stripe (I don’t think the stripe needs to go all the way to the neck and/or tail, if it does then it wouldn’t count) and I think it could also be a tangerine, but the tangerine would be covered under the other traits (lavender and snow), so it would appear better as she ages. @mblaney @westridge and @armiyana might know better about the identification.
For a male you want to look for something to compliment those traits. Avoid anything that has any albino or snow other than bell or mack to avoid mixing them. If you want to produce more bell albino’s, get a male that is het or visual for that (depending if you want to produce some or all albinos). If you get a male that also has mack snow you will produce some super snows. If you want super snows get a male with mack snow and if you don’t then avoid it. More importantly, look for high quality lines of traits that you like. If you want to improve the bold stripe in the offspring then look for a male with a high quality stripe. Same with lavender and/or tangerine. If you want to produce more and improve it in the offspring, get a male that displays the trait strongly. Be patient and be picky on what you get. Save up for the male and wait until you find the right one.
I would love to see more pictures of it as it ages.
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Lavender just means the animal has significant amounts of lavender color. The lineage doesn’t matter. This trait can’t really be assigned to an animal until it is older because many babies have lavender and lose it later.
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@welshmorphology also may be able to help with morph
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It’s hard to say, as she’s still just a wee baby, and pattern and coloration change rapidly in early life, as @westridge indicated.
But going on the current appearance alone, I would personally avoid using the labels ‘Tangerine’ or ‘Lavender’ because they are so subjective and they aren’t really the most prevalent/important subjective identifiers for this baby. To me, the Bold and the Stripe/Aberrant (you could go either way) are the most important subjective identifying labels. The Bell Albino and Mack Snow are objective labels (facts, not opinions) that should always be used. So… (I’m sort of thinking out loud here) I would probably label this (absolutely incredibly beautiful) baby as a Bold Stripe Mack Snow Bell Albino. It may not sound exciting, but the looks of this gecko speak for themselves- simply awesome.
For a mate I would probably choose a Bell Albino with a Bold pattern, ideally another Stripe. Personally I’d wait until she’s had more time to grow out before picking a mate. You’ll have a better idea of what you’re working with phenotypically. (Plus that way she’ll have extra time to grow up healthy before breeding, which is a good bonus.)
I definitely overuse parentheses.
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Thanks for the tag @erie-herps ! Progression threads are the best
@de_novo_geckos Thank you for updating! Like mblaney said, tang and lav are very subjective. For example, without knowing the lineage, I would have said Possible hi-yellow bold stripe/jungle/aberrant albino if asked.
The only time I would personally label it as such is if they are high end examples of their morph and even then, it depends on the current markets. For example, the tangerine super hypo carrot tail that I owned in 2007 is now what some breeders consider just a super hypo. At the time she was bright and had a bit of orange blushing on her body, but look at tangs now and they’re reaching towards red.
You could always leave a blurb about being from a certain lineage (look at the black nights for example) but polygenic traits can be tricky to work and the chances of lower expression offspring throwing higher quality babies isn’t as high as if you just went with 2 high qualities. It takes a lot of patience to select and breed for it.
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I don’t know much about morphs, but your gecko is so so so cute
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