Can tail kinks prevent fertility?

[jamay]

Besides decreasing the beauty of a specimen, are than any concerns regarding a kinked tail? Fertility, health issues, etc? Do genetics play a role or is this unknown?

 

[bitsy]

I think I'd come at this from a different angle; was the snake born with a kinked tail? If so, I wouldn't consider breeding from it. A genetic predisposition to kinking isn't really desirable in the gene pool and what might only be a slight deformity in this snake could manifest as something far more serious in subsequent generations.

Maybe best to keep this guy as a pet and look for other potential breeders.

Of course if the tail is kinked due to an injury, that's a different issue. How near the cloaca is the kinking?

 

[wade]

Kinks in the spine are genetic and can be passed to the future generations. Depending on how bad the kink is and where it is, it can effect the snakes ability to breed, digest, and to eliminate waste.

I would avoid kinked snakes when possible. I euthinize kinked babies.

 

[jamay]

I'm just being hypothetical. My snakes don't actually have any kinks. I may be getting a snake with a minor neck kink, however. Has this defect shown to be passed on in following generations? I am sure the vast majority of breeders would avoid breeding kinked snakes and therefore a valid answer may be unknown.

 

[jamay]

Thanks, bitsy and wade!

 

[Roy Munson]

I haven't seen enough evidence to convince me that kinks are hereditary. I'm not saying that they're not, but I'm not convinced.

I'm willing to believe that some kinks ARE hereditary and that others are due to incubation conditions...

 

[Jrgh17]

Another option to consider: If the kink is in the right spot, it could cause the female to be more prone to egg-binding.

 

[wade]

I haven't seen enough evidence to convince me that kinks are hereditary. I'm not saying that they're not, but I'm not convinced.

I'm willing to believe that some kinks ARE hereditary and that others are due to incubation conditions...

Dean, what have you seen or read that leads you to believe this? What conditions have been linked to kinks?

 

[Roy Munson]

Dean, what have you seen or read that leads you to believe this? What conditions have been linked to kinks?

It's not so much what I've seen or read as it is what I HAVEN'T seen or read. I just haven't seen or read enough evidence to convince me. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist-- I just haven't seen it. I've also had kinked offspring from a pairing one season, with none produced from the same pairing in other seasons. The main differences seemed to have been in the incubation conditions.

Personally, I've heard very experienced breeders claim that lavenders are more susceptible or prone to kinking than most morphs. I've seen some support for this in my own breeding, but the sample size has been insufficient for me to draw conclusions from my results alone.

 

[wade]

It's interesting that you should say that. I have only had kinked babies twice and both times it was from the same pair of lavenders. I sold the parents to a pet store and quit breeding lavenders for a few years. I've just this year bought some lav motleys and decided to try again.

 

[Roy Munson]

It's interesting that you should say that. I have only had kinked babies twice and both times it was from the same pair of lavenders. I sold the parents to a pet store and quit breeding lavenders for a few years. I've just this year bought some lav motleys and decided to try again.

I should state that when I use the term "kinked", I'm using it to mean everything from minor spinal bumps (some of which are invisible, but detectable by feel) to hairpin lateral foldovers. I cull anything with a "bend". I've allowed some snakes with 1-3 very minor bumps to survive.

I should have also added that I've never bred a kinked snake, so any kinked hatchlings I've produced came from kink-free parents. I'm not sure exactly what to believe about kinked corns. That's why I'm reluctant to make definitive statements about them. If it's really genetic, and you have a number of kinked/bumpy hatchlings in a clutch, do you divulge this fact to buyers of the unkinked clutchmates, possibly reducing their saleability and value? I've never seen anyone do this. It's a touchy thing. :shrugs:

And back to lavs, I bred a lav-blood to a stripe het lav last season. The clutch was normal-heavy, and it produced 10 normals and 4 lavs that were perfect-- not even a trace of a bump. But there was a severely kinked lav produced as well.

 

[Susielea]

I bred my pair of Reverse Okeetees for the first time in 2006, the female laid a small first clutch of 7 eggs and all eggs looked fertile.

During the incubation time we had a heatwave over here and for 6 to 10 days, about 5 weeks into incubation, I was struggling to keep the temps in the incubator below 90f.
The eggs started hatching after 62 days incubation and 10 days later 4 had still not hatched, so I cut them open as they seemed to be spoiling. I found very kinked babies, dead inside the eggs, two with huge yolk sacks.

I decided I would breed the pair again last year, to see if the kinked babies were due to the high temps or, if this pair were passing on a genetic trait of some kind. The female laid 9 eggs, still a very modest clutch, but I had no trouble keeping the temps stable during incubation this time and all 9 babies hatched out perfect with not a hint of kinking.

So I think what I'm trying to say is, I believe some kinks are due to incubation conditions i.e too high temperatures, but I can't say as to whether this would be passed on to the next generation if those hatchlings were to breed.

Anyone else ever produced hatchlings with minor kinks, that were thought to be from incubation conditions and then grew them up and bred them to see if it was passed on? If you have I would be really interested in the findings of such a project.

Best wishes,

 

[wade]

That is really interesting. I am going to do some reading and see if I can't find out more on this subject. Somebody must have studied it at some point.

The two kinked clutches I had as I said, came from the same pair of Lavenders. It was two years in a row. About 1/3 of the babies had kinks to varying degrees. The parents did not have kinks.

Here is the problem with the incubator idea. Both times I had as many as 10 clutches from other snakes in the incubator with them. Only the lavs kinked.

I think in my case it was definitely genetic. But if it is caused by something I can control, I would want to know about that.

 

[Roy Munson]

Here is the problem with the incubator idea. Both times I had as many as 10 clutches from other snakes in the incubator with them. Only the lavs kinked.

I think in my case it was definitely genetic. But if it is caused by something I can control, I would want to know about that.

With the lavs, you're probably right, and it was genetic. If I recall correctly, the spine and pigment cells are differentiated from the same bunch of base cells, so it shouldn't be surprising to see mutations affecting pigment to affect spinal development as well.

I can see how your overall results may incline you to dismiss or be skepical of the incubation-stress idea. My own results give me mixed conclusions. I'm pretty sure that my Natures Spirit (Casey Hulse) incubator has a hot spot near the heat panel that spikes a bit when the heat is being raised after I've had the door open. This is despite the fact that it is controlled by a Herpstat proportional thermostat. I've spoken with one other breeder who uses the same incubator, and she suspects the same thing with hers. I had a pewter and charcoal clutch in that area, and many of the charcoals were kinked, and only two dome-headed pewters hatched, and they died within a couple of months. Most of my other stuff was fine (except for a few lavs that were adjacent to the alleged hot spot). Now, the charcoal and pewter clutches were sired by the same pewter, so maybe he passed on something funky. I'm repeating the same pairings this year with that male, and I won't be putting anything in the hot spot, so maybe I'll have more data to analyze this season. I also think that moisture has a role. I'm going to be incubating very dry this season, attempting to keep ambient humidity at the proper super-high levels, while keeping the egg surfaces out of contact with liquid or wet material.

But then again, in the old days I used to produce clutches of normals just for fun, and my incubation methods were horrendous. Containers full of sopping wet vermiculite on unregulated human heating pads were par for the course. I had decent hatch rates, and even though I got a weak hatchling here and there, I can't recall hatching any kinked snakes! :shrugs:

 

[wade]

But then again, in the old days I used to produce clutches of normals just for fun, and my incubation methods were horrendous. Containers full of sopping wet vermiculite on unregulated human heating pads were par for the course. I had decent hatch rates, and even though I got a weak hatchling here and there, I can't recall hatching any kinked snakes! :shrugs:

That cracks me up, I remember those days. How did anything survive.

I don't know Dean, but you have given me a lot to think about. I'm going to do a little research and see what I can find. I will also be paying closer attention this summer.