Ball Python Breeding
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What's that word?
Below is a list of words commonly used by ball python keepers with simple definitions.
1.0: Means one male zero females
1.1: Means one male one female
3.4.2: Means three males, four females, and two unknown sex
50% het: A possible het resulting from a 100% het bred to a non het.
66% het: A possible het resulting from a 100% het bred to a 100% het.
Allele: One piece of a pair of genes that are on the same locus.
Base morph: A single gene. Ex: pastel, albino
CB: Captive bred. Both parents of the snake were bred in captivity.
CH: Captive hatched. Eggs were collected in the wild and hatched in captivity.
Clutch: Eggs laid by a snake.
Co-dominant: A morph that has been proven different than a normal and when paired together can make a super. Ex: pastel, mojave, cinnamon
Dinker: A snake that has a possibility to carry a new visual gene, but it has not been proven. Ball pythons for sale with this claim can turn out to be a new morph or can turn out not to be genetic.
Dominant: A morph that has been proven different than a normal, but have no super form. Ex: spider, pinstripe
F/T: Frozen thawed rodents for feeding snakes
Gravid: A pregnant snake.
Hemipenes: Part of a male snakes sex organs.
Het/Heterozygous: These carry the gene to make a visual recessive but these genes are not expressed visually.
Import: Can be a captive born snake sent from one country to another, or can be a wild caught snake sent from one country to another.
Lock: Used to described the physical act of a male and female ball python breeding.
Locus: Location of a gene or allele on a DNA strand.
Morph: Visual expression that changes the color or pattern of a snake. Ex: pastel, spider, pied
P/K: Pre killed rodents or freshly killed rodents for feeding snakes.
Popping: Manually everting hemipenes to determine the sex of a snake.
Possible het: A snake that could carry the gene to make a visual recessive based on its parentage, but is unknown until successfully bred.
Probing: Using a stainless steel probe to determine the sex of a snake.
Prospect: Same as dinker.
Rack: Refers to a caging system where bins are stacked vertically or horizontally and temperature and humidity are easily controlled. These also make the best use of the space you have available to keep your snakes.
Recessive: A morph that has been proven different than a normal that needs two copies of the gene to be expressed visually. Ex: pied, albino, genetic stripe
Rheostat: Electronic device that allows temperature to be increased and decreased but is not always accurate.
Super: A combination of two co-dominates results in a super. When a super is bred every baby will be one of the ingredients used to make that super. No normals will be made and the super cannot reproduce itself on its own. Ex: Super pastel when bred to a normal will make all pastels.
Thermostat: Electronic device that controls temperature automatically.
WC: Wild caught. Snakes were collected in the wild.
Wild Type: Refers to normal, regular or classic colored ball pythons.