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Affects of Inbreeding in Corn Snakes?

VickyChaiTea

VickyChaiTea

Snake enthusiast
I've always wondered... what are the affects of inbreeding in corn snakes, or snakes in general, if any? I have been told that in fish breeding (bettas, specifically) that inbreeding does not have any negative affects, unlike the ones seen in mammals. But what about snakes? Or reptiles in general?

Can anyone share personal experiences with inbreeding and if they saw any negative signs?
 
In breeding in corns at least used to be a big problem in the bloodreds. If I recall correctly they began to have fertility issues, smaller clutches, and an increased number of non-feeders.
 
The efffects of inbreeding in snakes (and to a lesser degree fish) can be seen in every lovely morph on the market. Where do you think all those lovely colors come from?
 
Just what I was about to say. That's usually how you propagate these genes initially.

Other than that, there are probably some minor issues. I think pure bred dogs are a little dumber than mutts due to this as well, but maybe I'm just making that up.
 
Inbreeding doesn't have negative effects per se, only if there are hidden recessive genetic disorders in the original stock.
Swiss webster mice? Probably one of the most inbred varieties ever, selected for their health and productivity. If you get Swiss Websters, don't outcross them!
 
There is merit to both sides of the coin. I think reptiles are pretty resilient to any bad effects from inbreeding. Mammals tho, are pretty sensitive to this.

Would anyone tho, breed sibling f1's and then the f2's, 3's etc. until say 6th generation? I know I wouldn't. I think f2 is as far as I would go and would just get matching or similiar animals from other lines. There is no morph that is so rare that by 2 gens later someone else wouldn't have an unrelated line of the same morph.
 
omni said:
There is merit to both sides of the coin. I think reptiles are pretty resilient to any bad effects from inbreeding. Mammals tho, are pretty sensitive to this.
Click to expand...

Stargazing? A deleterious gene exclusive to mammals. Popped up as a random mutation in the sunkissed line. No resilience there. Inbreeding fixes both good and bad genes, with 'good' being the genes the breeder wants.
 
Abell, I was only talking about negative effects. lol

I know that in order to make a new line/keep a morph going when it first appears you're gonna have to inbreed. Which is the case with any animal. I wasn't aware that stargazing was from inbreeding? I do know if was inherited, though.

Soooo the general consensus is that reptiles are less affected by it than mammals, but there are still some issues that arise? Is there any reason reptiles aren't as affected by it as mammals?
 
Has anyone ever heard of breeding a corn with a Diones Rat Snake? Mike was wondering since we have both now. It will be a couple years before the Rat is ready to breed but just curious
 
I think there are more inbreeding problems out there then is actually mentioned. A person I was once interested in buying some youngsters from was apparently inbreeding quite frantically.
When I was at his house to check out the youngsters I was really shocked to what I was seeing. Almost 50% of all his hatchlings were either mis formed, really small or not eating.
The disfigured snakes had mis formed backbones, heads and weird twisty tails. He hatched them on the proper temperature and humidity.
So the only reason I could really think of was inbreeding. As he freely told me most of the disfigured animals were 11th or 12th generation father/daughter or mother/son inbreeding.

Of course I didn't buy anything :p
 
Hmmm.. never actually heard of that particular hybrid but I'm sure it's possible. Just be sure to label any and all hatchlings accordingly.
 
Wow, cornparadise, really? That's interesting. Maybe inbreeding problems affects reptiles more than we thought and people are just not talking about how it's affected their snakes. Which is kiiiind of what I thought in the first place.
 
I wondered, in the mammal world, breeding Mother to Son is more likely to produce bad things than breeding Daughter to Father. I had someone explain exactly why that was, but don't remember enough of what they said to put it down here. However that made me wonder if the same thing was true in reptiles, as well?
I know with Crested geckos, they have a very high resistance to most of the normal or more obvious signs of inbreeding than even other reptiles.
 
Its usually down to weak genes due to being inbred for many generations.
I think 4 or 5 are usually pretty safe, but dont like topush it after that.
From what I have seen, its usually kinks and bumps, although I have seen eyes missing aswell.
 
cornmorphs said:
Its usually down to weak genes due to being inbred for many generations.
I think 4 or 5 are usually pretty safe, but dont like topush it after that.
From what I have seen, its usually kinks and bumps, although I have seen eyes missing aswell.
Click to expand...

Yes that's what I was trying to say with the back disfigurement. Due to heavy kinks and bumps they tend to move really weird as well.
 
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