mack 'pastel'?

[PacHerp]

I have always thought this mack girl was a bit odd... none of her spots are a true dark black. I'm posting these images to see what you guys think, does she look like a classic mack 'pastel' to you, too? I know there is much debate over the pastels, so I'd like to spark some discussion about them on this thread.

a cool paradox spot

 

[gt3angel]

Wow she is amazing and great show.

 

[fallen_angel]

She does look like a Mack Snow Pastel to me, you should breed her and see if she produces more Pastels. Gazz knows a lot about this subject and was helping me before Here are some pics of our Mack Snow Pastels:

Mack Snow babies produced by the pastel male and a non-pastel female:

and regular Pastels (non-snow) produced from the male:

Many people know my opinion on Pastels, I have debated the topic many times

 

[fallen_angel]

I wonder if the Pastel shows up in Super Snows at all. I can't really tell. Luna and Kathy are from the first two Mack Snow Pastels. Ken now has Luna, so maybe he can help show how she grows and develops..

Luna

Kathy

Zues, possible Pastel (?) from LBS x MS

And what about Pastel in Mack Snow Tremper albinos? I have no clue..
A few produced from the two Mack Snow Pastels first pictured:

 

[fallen_angel]

Pastel in a Tremper albino Super Snow?
Produced from the two Mack Snow Pastels in the beginning:

 

[fallen_angel]

And then what if a super snow carring the pastel gene breeds with a mack snow enigma? I don't know if it would show up or not... so many questions

 

[GroovyGeckos.com]

Nice pics everyone! IME there are indeed "pastels" being produced out of Mack Snow lines. They have a litte bit of a different look to them, than your typical normal. I am not sure if it just comes from the lack of coloring of the Macks, mixing with "normal genes", and simply muting the colors in some... or if is actually a seperate morph. :main_huh:

There can be Pastels, and Mack Snows that appear to also be Pastels. The one SS posted in this thread, makes me think it is also possible to have a Super Snow, that is also a Pastel. It looks very nice! :main_thumbsup:

 

[thestack510]

Luna will be bred to a Tremper Albino Super Snow in order to prove if she is het Tremper first, then I may breed her to a Snow Enigma the next time around. She is a long way off right now, but her handsome suitor is waiting in the wings. She is sooo adorable, thanks again Fallen Angel Geckos. Luna sends her love... with an eye lick and a wink. lol

 

[thestack510]

Pastel in a Tremper albino Super Snow?
Produced from the two Mack Snow Pastels in the beginning:

I would definitely agree that this gecko is pastel in comparison to my own, my male Tremper Albino Super Snow looks very different, a much darker pink, especially in the tail.

 

[Gregg M]

IMO, Pastels are not legit as far as having its own morph status... Nice geckos by the way everyone...

 

[PacHerp]

So, thanks for all the photo posts folks... they are all beautiful animals. but my main intention of this thread is to discuss the animal I posted. thread hijackers!

so anyhow... I tend to agree with Gregg on the pastel issue, I don't see it as a morph in itself, but as a beautiful 'by-product' of the mack snow genetics. The only way I would be able to see it as a true morph would be if you could isolate the 'pastels' being produced by the mack snows and breed them successfully into other morphs and the trait be passed along to the non-mack offspring, and then that trait be passed along and line bred, etc etc.

I hope that makes sense... if not, let me know and I'll try to make better sense of myself.

 

[fallen_angel]

The entire Pastel topic is going to be an ongoing debate until we prove whether or not it successfully mixes with other morphs and what not. IMHO, I think what needs to be done, is all the people that do have pastels, need to get together and share their results with what's going on in their projects so that we can move forward.

Alex Hue has successfully taken two pastels, bred them together, and created 100% pastels in the first generation of offpspring. I think the reason that Pastel isn't incorporated into other morphs is because it can be hard to distinguish. Sometimes, Mack Snow Pastels don't look too different from a non-pastel Mack Snow.. like I said before Britt, yours looks like it could be Mack Snow Pastel, but you would have to breed it to be sure. It's only when the Pastel trait is isolated that you can really tell the difference. That's why I was posting pics of the albinos that came from Pastel parents, to see if anyone thought they looked any different. As Ken mentioned, the albino SS does appear to look lighter, which is what I was thinking as well. Of course, it could darken as it gets older, but it's just something to think about. Dan also noted that the SS looked a little bit different too..

I think that in order to understand more about Pastels, we need to analyze what's going on with the breeding groups that are out there. We need to try breeding a Mack Snow Pastel to something else, try getting the Pastel trait into another morph, and see what happens, if anything..

 

[fallen_angel]

Luna will be bred to a Tremper Albino Super Snow in order to prove if she is het Tremper first, then I may breed her to a Snow Enigma the next time around. She is a long way off right now, but her handsome suitor is waiting in the wings. She is sooo adorable, thanks again Fallen Angel Geckos. Luna sends her love... with an eye lick and a wink. lol

Can't wait to see her babies and we hope that she proves out for you I'd love to see some pics of your SSTA :main_yes:

 

[fallen_angel]

After looking at the Leopard Gecko Wiki (http://leopardgeckowiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Super_Snow_Albino) there are quite a few pics of SSTAs that are lighter like ours. So it doesn't seem like the Pastel gene really shows up at in a SSTA.

 

[eyelids]

Two years ago I would've done a big post on ''Mack Pastels'' and their genetics, but I grew tired of defending the ''morph''... So since the '07 season ended I haven't put the ''MP'' label on any of my geckos... It just brings confusion or nay say... There was something special there though and it can be seen in a lot of the geckos I produce... All of them are descended from this guy...

His first baby...

As an adult...

In her ''green'' phase during last year's breeding season...

I definitely think it's worth figuring out if that's a goal of yours... :main_yes: Personally, I'm more than satisfied with letting my geckos speak for themselves...

 

[eyelids]

''MP'' Crosses...

Blizzard...

Bell...

Malt owns both of them...

I know there is much debate over the pastels, so I'd like to spark some discussion about them on this thread.

my main intention of this thread is to discuss the animal I posted. thread hijackers!

 

[MonteQ's]

Still lovin' that blizzard! You weren't kidding about how the color comes in!

Sorry for the off topic post...

 

[PacHerp]

Mike, sorry to turn your head in confusion -

Thread intention - Spark discussion - talk about the animal I posted - simple as that.

I'm absolutely loving the photos posted so far, especially the really reduced patterned 'lavender' type mack snows, they look very similar to the animal I posted. - I wonder how many people we can get to post their similar looking animals here on this thread.... maybe that will turn the skeptics into believers... who knows! ... myself included. haha.

I've bred her into my ghost lavender bell project, so hopefully we will be able to prove out some of the 'pastel' genetics ... 'technically' speaking, shouldn't I get about 75% 'ghosts' or 'pastels' assuming the mack I posted is a true mack pastel? The pairing was the female x ghost lavender bell...

Time will tell!

Thanks guys for the healthy discussion.

 

[Halley]

Well when talking about the pastel coloring I think it’s simply a fancy marketing name to try and sell the yellow snows as something special when in fact they’re inferior to the white ones.

 

[fallen_angel]

Brittany, I do think your animal is a Mack Snow Pastel.

I too no longer try to debate the Pastels anymore. I think that instead of arguing about it all amongst the two sides, we just need to work with them more to learn more about them.

In response to Nigel:

We do not advertise any of our animals with Pastel except for the normal Pastels. We do not raise the price for them, they sold for $25 each. It's just so the buyer knows, if they are familiar with Pastel, that the animal carries the gene.

Pastel Snows aren't necessarily all that yellow, so I do not understand what you mean by your comment. We had a Mack Snow Pastel that was very high white, and he didn't get sold because of any marketing about being Pastel, he got sold for being a nice Mack Snow. Like I said before, we do not advertise our Snows as Pastel snows, simply because you can't always be sure without breeding them (unless you have Pastel X Pastel, which produces 100% Pastel) and there's no need to change the price because of it. It's just like Mike said, I'm more than satisfied with letting my geckos speak for themselves as well

If someone out there is making more money by putting the name "Pastel" on their site and raising the prices for the animals listed; then yes, that isn't right. But as far as using marketing ploys to make more money, people do that all of the time in this business. Nothing new there.