Hi everyone, so I felt the need to use some factual evidence to dispel some misconceptions on lineage. Let me at first say that lineage is in fact incredibly important, but there is more to inbreeding and lineage than what most people understand. First off, people love to demonize inbreeding, and I would agree that inbreeding is a bad thing. It increases the chance of displaying deleterious mutations which are predominantly loss of function, which usually implies that it is a recessive phenotype, allowing for silent carriers to exist which hides the problem from sight. This is the thing that inbreeding increases the chances of being apparent in offspring. So firstly, let me tell you the five common types of mutations: hypomorph, amorph, antimorph, hypermorph, and neomorph. If you want for me to define these I have plenty of university level resources but would not like to post on here due to possible copyright issues. Pm me for more info. Out of these five, three are usually recessive and two are usually semidominant(not codominant or incompletely dominant, this is different). The last two types can also be dominant, though this is rare. One dominant mutation in humans is Achondroplasia, which is fatal if homozygous. What is apparent is that possible deformities that escape the eye are usually loss of function and therefore recessive. “So what?” “That proves nothing about lineage, in fact by saying there are hidden mutations it makes it worse!” And you would be right. Here comes the part that may be disturbing for everyone. A term called “The inbreeding coefficient,” with most of the details outlined in this article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coefficient_of_relationship. To find the # of common ancestors as described in the equation, you would draw a loop around common ancestors(not the ones that have been independently introduced to the bloodline). What you will notice is that firstly, inbreeding further strictly increases the value of the coefficient which increases the rate of homozygous recessives, a bad thing. “You proved nothing!” Please keep with me till the end. In a population like humans you see a dramatic increase in deleterious effects due to huge variability of the base population. But let us remember where all our geckos came from. Only a couple hundred from the wild, and new breeders every day. Textbook example of a bottleneck effect and proliferation in lack of diversity. In addition, the inbreeding coefficient is not only a coefficient for the rate of negative traits, but phenotypic traits as well that we find attractive. In order to isolate a pattern like pinstripe or a color from such a small population, it is nigh ridiculous to claim that there was no high level of inbreeding to produce that full pinstripe or super harley you now possess. And no one tries to water down their traits to provide genetic diversity, right? Additional inbreedings will not directly cause novel mutations to come up and since already so much inbreeding was done we would have seen evidence of genetic defects that are congenital to a greater degree. Not the case from the evidence I have seen. The huge rate of inbreeding already done to produce the geckos we all have and the lack of any documented congenital defect makes the possibility of having lurking deleterious mutations at all very low. It is by this basis and ground that I assert my position that bashing people for inbreeding geckos is illogical since it is inevitable when the gene pool is so limited but also hypocritical since most geckos from separate bloodlines are in fact highly related. “But didnt you say lineage was super important?” Yes, and here is why: Even though the chances of new congenital mutations arising are incredibly low, and most mutations are somatic anyways, and maybe inbreeding wont summon the dark lord of geckos and drive them to extinction, lineage gives a good idea of POSITIVE hidden traits that geckos may carry. Knowing the grandparents gives a possibility of being a carrier for a good trait that is recessive and people can pay extra on the possibility that a gecko is a carrier of a recessive gene of being crowned(Dont think this is recessive but just an example). So lineage information gives people a chance to know better what genes their gecko may be carrying to pass on. It has barely an effect on health issues because at this point genetic defects would be much better documented if it existed at levels people assume. A gecko with information on possible awesome genes is still going to fetch a higher price and is better to get as a hobbyist, but claiming interbreeding or using geckos from unknown sources is a shortcut to deformities and health problems is incredibly asinine. My two cents+ science. If you want more info pm me I got a ton of resources with which you can calculate recombination frequencies and techniques like Lod scoring which many breeders may find useful. I am open to opinions as long as they remain in the confines of didactical reasoning and not wild assumptions and flaming. I do not intend to interbreed but I think it would help the community if people knew what is actually going on.
Posted on: Fri, 08 Aug 2014 06:26:10 +0000