Temperament

[jemjdragon]

This is just a question out of curiosity. A while back I read about a Russian Scientist, Dmitry Konstantinovich Belyaev, who for sixty years breed silver foxes based on temperament to see if he could make them tamer for the fur trade. What they found was not only were the resulting foxes tamer, they were more dog-like and began showing more dog-like markings in their fur. These foxes even began wagging their tails and barking. Anyways, because their fur developed different markings than what the fur trade wanted, the plan to use them as fur was ruined and in the end these domesticated foxes are now sold as pets.

Anyways onto my question, could leopard geckos or any reptile be bred based on temperament instead of color morphs to create "tame" or "domestic" reptile? Now I am not saying foxes and geckos are anything alike, I know their brain chemistry and development is different and that this is most likely a silly question, but could it be possible to actually produce tamer leopard geckos if temperament is considered in breeding and would this be something to that a breeder or hobbyist should consider pursuing when breeding?

 

[LZRDGRL]

That is an interesting question. I would think it has to do with the brain, and with reptile brains it's simply impossible to achieve "tamed reptiles." Don't they just have the "flight or bite" instinct? Maybe someone who knows more about brain research could answer your question.

Chrissy

 

[sausage]

i saw that program too. it was rele intresting!
all of my breeding geckos were chosen for not only colour but Temperament
too. i cant honisly say i have noticed them to be tamer but as you know this take generaions to appear.

 

[jemjdragon]

I'm not sure if all reptiles have the same instinct of flight or bite. I think in leopard geckos, this process of breeding for temperament would take much longer because we're basically trying to alter the brain patterns. I would love to hear from more about weither it is even possible to alter temperament in leopard geckos if that was the main goal in breeding.

But like it was stated before, it would take generations.
Could this be more possible with any other reptile?

 

[Merriweather]

I think it would depend on if their colour pattern genes also overlay/interact with their fight or flight genes, which might not happen since reptiles are so different from mammals. I saw that too, I thought it was incredibly fascinating. My mother used to (shudder) work in a laboratory, where she was a gopher and would fetch certain animals, and feed them, and monitor charts, etc. They had certain strains of mice, they had an airplane sounding name like C-57s. They were mice bred to be larger to have more mass to test on, but when this happened the mice turned black with long tails, and were terribly vicious. As soon as you would grab one by its tail to transport it, it would already be climbing up its tail to bite the ever living life out of you. She said she hated them, they would just stare from out their cages and gnash their teeth.

 

[StonedFish]

i would think its possible in reptiles, i mean if u can tame a Savannah monitor you are pretty much good lol all joking aside any animal thats around humans enough adapts to them. now whos to say whats tame and whats just a reptile putting up with you lol