Mack Snow Quality in Super Snows

[Halley]

I have noticed that some people have better snow enigmas, than others, although they were both most likely created by breeding a super snow to an enigma. This led me to a question. I know that some mack snows are much better than others. Such as these two.

High Quality in my opinion (both of these pictures where taken from http://www.geckosetc.com/index.html )

Then one that almost looks like a normal leopard gecko.

However it seems to be that most super snows look about the same. A white background complimented with black spots. The amount of black spots just seems to be different. So my question is if you breed a mack that looks like the top picture to another one that looks like that, wouldn’t you have better genes in the SS than what you would produce, if you bred one that looks like the bottom one, to another one that looks like a bottom one? I know that the SS from both pairings will look the about the same. But when breed with another morph, that doesn’t contain the mack gene, wouldn’t the mack gene in that individual gecko look better if its parents where ones that looks like the ones from the above picture, compared to a gecko whose parents looked like the gecko in the below picture? Thanks, in advance.

 

[boutiquegecko]

Depends what you're breeding for. Sure if you want to keep the mack as black/white as poss, I'd say breed a nice linebred into it and then linebreed the offspring for whiteness. There's still a chance though when breeding that gecko to a diff morph you will get a tinge of yellow, just maybe not as much?
SS's never have yellow from what I know, so it wouldn't matter what grade of yellow the mack has for the outcome I don't think.
Also a lot of macks are crossed with morphs that have a stronger tang influence, so once again it's about what project you're working on, wether you would care if the mack is very white or not.

 

[Stitch]

...wouldn’t the mack gene in that individual gecko look better if its parents where ones that looks like the ones from the above picture, compared to a gecko whose parents looked like the gecko in the below picture?....

Chances are that you would have whiter looking offspring with genes from the top gecko. I have heard people discuss line breeding the whiter macks snows together to try and keep that white mack look going. I know a lot of people don't like it when the macks get yellow as they age. This may be from outcrossing the macks to non-macks, thus causing the yellowing a they age.

 

[malt_geckos]

IMO not all SS look the same. There is a high quality SS and a lower quality SS. The higher ones IMO have spots in a striped pattern all the way down the body. The lower quality ones have spots in no obvious pattern.

The first one from steve's site is a bold striped MS. He has been crossing them for a long time with bold stripe lines to make that gecko. The next one IMO is not my favorite. I prefer a MS with little to no yellow. It's just a preference.

And yes, if you breed a bold stripe MS to a bold stripe MS, then you will get MSS that are more bold and more striped. Our SS has striped genes and he's held his stipe nicely.

If you breed the ones that look like the bottom to the bottom, then you may not get as nice SS as you would from the top pairing. However, you can't tell with these geckos. We bred a broken reverse stripe to a raptor and just got a hatchling with a perfect reverse stripe....so you really can never tell.

 

[boutiquegecko]

He's a beauty Mel. I'm happy that some pattern difference is being worked into ss's. Something we'll be working on the next season or two. Wouldn't a rev stripe ss be awesome. Or bold stripe even.

 

[paulnj]

Nick, you do know that's stealing by posting that image, though you gave credit to Steve. It's perfectly legal to link to them though.

 

[Halley]

Nick, you do know that's stealing by posting that image, though you gave credit to Steve. It's perfectly legal to link to them though.

Oops, I figured if I gave credit, it was fine. I guess in the future I will just supply a link, instead of posting the actual pictures.

 

[paulnj]

I know this from being a photog in the past and a Mod on a photo site still.... no harm done, but letting you know.

 

[Golden Gate Geckos]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder...

 

[paulnj]

I think Marcia is BEAUTIFUL.....

 

[GroovyGeckos.com]

I have always thought the Macks used will have no effect on the quality of the Super Snows. They just randomly have different patterns, and slightly different color, and that is the only difference. Everyone has a different taste as well.

 

[Halley]

I guess what I’m wondering is if you have a SS created by white macks, like the top one. Then you breed that super snow to an enigma, won't the snow enigmas, have a whiter color to it? Like if the grandparents are white, will the grandchildren also be white? That is what I’m wondering. And then the opposite for the yellow. If a SS is created by yellow mack, like the one on the bottom. Then you breed the SS from that paring to an enigma, wouldn’t the offspring from the SS x enigma have more yellow, then the ones from the first pairing?

 

[fallen_angel]

I agree that there are some SS that look whiter than others, and that could be from breeding whiter Macks.. I am glad that you brought this up, because I was wondering about those snows that look like normals, why anyone would really want them.. But I suppose that it's the gene that matters, since the Snow gene does some pretty amazing things, and normals don't. Some people prefer whiter Macks, and I suppose others don't mind if they have a lot of yellow, depending on what you're working on

To answer your question, though, I would think that even though Supers don't develop yellow, some do have more of a beige tint, or washed out look to them, which (I would think) is definitely a product of the quality of Snows that were used.

 

[Halley]

Okay I guess here are the two scenarios that I want to figure out.

SCENARIO 1

F1 Generation
Very White Mack x Very White Mack
These should in theory produce some super snows

F2 Generation
SS created by breeding two very white macks together x Enigma
These should in theory created some mack snow enigmas

SCENARIO 2

F1 Generation
Yellow Mack x Yellow Mack

F2 Generation
Super Snow from Yellow Mack Pairing x Enigma

So the question is, in the F3 generation will the babies mack color be affected by the F1 generations color, or not?

 

[fallen_angel]

I would think so, yes. I am a firm believer that the yellow-ness on a Mack Snow will carry into other morphs. Take a Mack Snow Patternless, for example. Some are very white, and some aren't. I would consider the whiter/pinker Mack Snow Patternless geckos to be of higher quality as well. Theoretically, I would think that the pureness of the Snow would be an important factor for any Snow combo project.

 

[Halley]

I would think so, yes. I am a firm believer that the yellow-ness on a Mack Snow will carry into other morphs. Take a Mack Snow Patternless, for example. Some are very white, and some aren't. I would consider the whiter/pinker Mack Snow Patternless geckos to be of higher quality as well. Theoretically, I would think that the pureness of the Snow would be an important factor for any Snow combo project.

Okay, I figured that as well, I just wanted some other opinions on it. Thank you everybody for responding.