Enigma's pretty but handicapped ?

[pkrtech]

I have been told. So Is breeding them at all ethical ?

"You can't get rid of the neurological trait it is impossible. Any breeder that says you can breed it out is lying or just doesn't know if it can't be. The enigma is not an in bred trait by no means. Ever hear of the neurological disorder in spider ball pythons? Those have been out bred for the past seven years and they still produce just as many neurological problems spiders as they did back when they came out. It is called a variable pentinence trait and the same thing that is causing the disorder is the same thing that makes the gecko look the way it does. Some just have no signs of it and others do but both will produce the equal amount of geckos with the problem. The only way to get them to stop producing enigmas with the disorders is to stop producing any enigmas."

I have to say no it is not ethical and while I was really looking forward to getting one I will no longer no matter how pretty.

 

[Mel&Keith]

That is one opinion. To view many more do an advanced search on the topic. You'll find pages and pages of opinions from people who actually work with the morph and also some who don't.

 

[pkrtech]

that was from someone breeding them.

 

[StinaKSU]

That entire schpeal is just an opinion.... There is no hard evidence that it is in fact the same gene that causes the neurological problem as well as the appearance. Even if it is the same gene......the fact that not ALL specimens show neurological symptoms hint STRONGLY that it is possible to breed it out....however it may be very difficult and take a long time since its likely quite a few genes. With varying levels of neurological effects it means that there is more than one gene involved in the phenotype....with the variation present its likely that there are modifiers and/or other genes affecting the phenotype. It could also be a case of linked genes....where the gene creating the enigma appearance and the gene creating the neurological issues are on loci situated very near to eachother on the same chromosome, making it difficult to separate the 2 from one another.

There is no simple explanation, and there is no way anyone could KNOW whether its impossible or not to eliminate the neurologic problems from the enigma gene pool.

 

[Halley]

"You can't get rid of the neurological trait it is impossible. Any breeder that says you can breed it out is lying or just doesn't know if it can't be.

I don’t believe enough out crossing has been done to confirm that. The Mack / Super Snow trait was connected with poor growth rates at first now it has been fixed (for the most part…) and it wasn’t an in breed trait either.

I have to say no it is not ethical and while I was really looking forward to getting one I will no longer no matter how pretty.

I don’t really think breeding enigmas can be called unethical, unless you call breeding leopard geckos unethical. There actually are NO ethical reasons to breed leopard geckos at all, of any morphs. I think not getting into projects you may love because of the information given to you by one person doesn’t make much sense. I think before making a concrete conclusion you should talk to a few other breeders and get their opinions on the matter. You cannot just take the first pieces of information given to you to be true.

 

[pkrtech]

Halley,

Are you really comparing the concept of breeding healthy reptiles to agreeing in part to breed defective enigmas ?

I would think as a breeder you are trying to produce healthy defective free reptiles that are very pretty however when you cross the line and KNOW that at least some of the hatchling will have problems.

I am sorry but that is a line I personally am not willing to cross.

Just like line breeding (even with the high resistance) if a hatchling is defective then I would say I would hope that breeders would not continue to inbreed those and do some out-crossing hoping to strengthen the line hoping for healthy reptile's which is known to fix the problem.

I think this is the ultimate ethical question considering some of the enigmas are those spectacular of all the morphs and this is over-riding peoples willingness to try to breed the problems out.

With several generations of breeders trying to do this it does not seem to me that it is getting any better.

So at what point do you realize it is not going to be bred out and stop producing these beautiful but defective reptiles.

I just wanted to put the question out. I am sure many breeders will never stop even if they are never bred out just because of the look of them and are willing to produce these problems.

 

[StinaKSU]

Enigmas have not been bred long enough to have any idea if its feasible to breed out the neurological issues. There have only been a couple generations of enigmas and it takes a LOT longer than a couple years/generations to find out the full potential/drawback of ANY genetic variations....

 

[dprince]

EVERY single new leopard gecko morph has had some difficulties. EVERY ONE. If people stopped breeding them just because the first generations had issues, we wouldn't have known the healthy, robust morphs that we do today.

I agree with Christina, it is too soon to tell what will happen with enigmas. Period. And not all of them have "issues." That is from personal experience.

If you personally choose not to breed them, that is certainly your choice.

 

[acpart]

I am unclear about the extent of neurological difficulties in the latest generations. Any updated information?

ALiza

 

[MSMD]

I am not, by any means, boasting of tons of experience with Enigmas. I can, however, tell you that my one Enigma has shown absolutely no signs of any problems or complications what so ever. He acts like a completely normal, healthy leo.

 

[pkrtech]

Prince,
We are talking about choosing to breed a known problem and how many generations to do so till we come to the conclusion that it cannot be bred out.

Most problems can be bred out however multiple experienced breeders I have talked to agree they think it cannot be, so I asked the question.

How many generations of breeding this handicapped morph does it take to become unethical to you. Perhaps it does not, even if it is never bred out.

 

[boutiquegecko]

There are at least two major threads on this discussion alone-with a gazillion opinions and statistics from people who have them-read them.
Many enigmas show absolutely no wierd behavior at all. And some from the very start never showed anything.

 

[Halley]

Enigmas have not been bred long enough to have any idea if its feasible to breed out the neurological issues. There have only been a couple generations of enigmas and it takes a LOT longer than a couple years/generations to find out the full potential/drawback of ANY genetic variations....

EVERY single new leopard gecko morph has had some difficulties. EVERY ONE. If people stopped breeding them just because the first generations had issues, we wouldn't have known the healthy, robust morphs that we do today.

I agree with Christina, it is too soon to tell what will happen with enigmas. Period. And not all of them have "issues." That is from personal experience.

If you personally choose not to breed them, that is certainly your choice.

Pkrtech,

I think these are both very important points.

1. The enigma hasn’t been around long enough to work out the defects, and most breeders haven’t performed much out crossing with wild caught bloodlines, to my knowledge. I think breeding the enigmas to different subs and other WC bloodlines would help diversify the bloodline a tremendous amount, and more likely than not take out the “defects” of the enigma trait.
2. Like Debbie said EVERY new mutation had its problems at first.

Can I just ask you what morphs you are working with now?

 

[Sandra]

pkrtech, I absolutely agree with the opinion of the breeder that you posted. It's a fact that there is no decisive evidence on that yet, but the way it's going it looks like it is so. Those who think that it can be bred out, I'm not going to be the one to try to convince you, there is enough hints out there (and as they say, the blindest ones are not those who don't see but the ones who don't want to). But enigma breeders, you should stop a moment to think about the worst scenario, what will you do if it turns out that the enigma disorder cannot be bred out?

My opinion now: yes, there are handicapped enigmas (I own one extreme at that) but there are also many beautiful, sane, healthy enigmas (I own another). If my enigma with issues hadn't existed, the other one wouldn't have existed either. And by no means it happens in a 50% ratio (more likely in a 10% from what I've seen, but these are baseless statistics), and not all enigmas that show issues do it to the extent that mine does. The ratio of enigmas with issues is "low" (very very high for what would be desirable, but low overall) and many of those enigmas can still have a good quality of life. And I'm still not taking into account the fact that they produce awesome-looking animals. I would think that it's not worth it if all or most enigmas were nuts, but it's not the case.

 

[boutiquegecko]

http://www.geckoforums.net/showthread.php?t=18158&highlight=enigma+abnormalities