Well put. Your argument for Spider Balls was very well thought out, and refrained from the emotional responses that this topic usual produces. Personally I disagree with you, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to attack you and resort to the infantile name calling that most discussion on this topic tends to devolve into. Instead I will say that I understand and appreciate your point of view and the fact that even though it is an unpopular opinion among many now days to have, you expressed your opinion without trying to assume some sort of moral high ground and proceeded to explain the scientific method in which you base your opinion on, much of which seems extremely valid, but as you said, there really is not enough data accumulated one way or another. Most of the debate I've seen on the subject was based on pure emotion and not science and as a result it led to the inevitable character assassination and child mentality of name calling when someone on either side of the debate didnt have anything constructive to put forth and felt that their opinion was the only right one and was unwilling to even try to understand the other side of the discussion, and so like Americans seem to do on all topics anymore tried to resort to verbal bullying in order to WIN an argument that without more data is unwinable. Thank you Clint for being an awsome human being who is willing to still act like a mature adult and act rationally instead of reacting emotionally. Your stinkin rad bro!!
I had a Spider Ball before I was aware of the issues surrounding them. It did exhibit a particularly strange behavior in that it would start exploring and slithering up the side of the enclosure, but it would only go up 8 inches or so then would start leaning back and start waving back and forth in the air. He also had minor wobble but it wasn't pronounced. I ended up sending him to live with a keeper/breeder that I knew would take care of him better than I could. My point though is that other than those few issues he was a happy healthy snake, and I believe she did breed him once or twice so by all accounts he was a successful snake. Now, having said that I would never purchase another one from a breeder unless it was a rescue, and I'd never breed it.
While I understand your take on the issue, I respectfully disagree. Regardless of the species, no aesthetic concern should ever trump the well-being of the animal, regardless of how minor the problems may be. In my opinion, morphs with commonly known negative side-effects should never be bred just to give someone the pleasure of looking at or owning something "pretty" or "special". That's something you can do with plants, not sentient creatures capable of suffering.
fair point, however it can also be determined that people should stop having children because in all genetic lines there is a chance of having a genetic issue. Its important to note that most people love the animal not the color: that just a secondary plus. To me spiders are fine as pets because it gives them a chance to have a life. That life would not have been possible in the wild. Same as if current human populations lived in the wild. Most children are not adequate and would die. We need to see the scenario as a mutation that accrued and breed through and is being isolated to hopefully perfect care environments making the morph just as rightful to life as any other morph. Not trying to argue just give you something to ponder and see your point on it.
+Dakota The main point is, with spider balls, all of them have a highly elevated chance of bad wobble. It's in the genes way more than other snakes. I've heard that there have even been attempts to unlink this issue through further breeding and is just isn't happening. To put this back to people, it's like forcing people with ALS to exclusively reproduce with others that have the disorder.
Inda Co oh so plants don’t get the same treatment you know bananas trees were genetically modified for us to have “good food” or “delicious food” plants and trees are just as important as animals
+Leroy 1. Plants don't feel pain 2. Plants don't have brains Thus they are basically equal to bacteriums morally. The issue comes into play the environmental damage that terribly modified plants may have on the environment if let loose.
Obviously here in Australia I can only really relate to the wobble in jaguar carpet Pythons, my concern isn’t the wobble so much as what it represents, the point at which looks could become more important then welfare, it makes me worry that in another 100 years we are going to see the same issues that dogs have, not the issues such as lop ears but traits many breeds have such as epilepsy, inability to give birth naturally and things like that. Dogs to me shouldn’t be an example so much as a warning
@@switchtheflip9422 The one decide their quality of live is the keeper. They are domesticated animals. You buy them to make you happy not to release them in the wild.
@@yulusleonard985 if an animal has tumors covering its body and suffers from near constant seizures, because you bred for certain asthetic traits, the animals quality of life suffers regardless of what you do.
I have a fire spider and I am also a pediatric Occupational therapy practitioner. She goes to work with me and I explain to the kids that she has something similar to their sensory processing disorder where sometimes her body has a difficult time knowing where it is in space just like them sometimes. She has made such a huge impact on the kids she has helped.
I absolutely love this! As a neurodivergent person and also a special ed teacher this is amazing representation for the children. It would have made a huge impact on me as a child to meet an animal like this. Wether you agree on the breeding of them or not, I do believe in giving the ones that are here a good life and make the best of it.
Super late to the party here, but as a neuro divergent myself, you are the kind of educator I needed and never had, and it sounds like the scale baby is in the perfect place. You rock!
@@derpro8125 So the dogs that have genetic issues to the point they slowly choke themselves to death are fine, but the dogs that get a bad rep from the media and people training them to be agressive shouldn't be bred...? Care to explain?
@@derpro8125 idk man Pitbull's are much healthier and there are other pet dogs that are much better than pugs and bulldogs. They can hardly breathe, have terrible joints and can't give birth properly. Much worse than a spider ball. Edit: typeo
As someone who has a genetic disorder that causes me to shake, it's really not a fun life. The shaking can make your muscles hurt very badly. (I've gotten sore arms just from stirring something for too long.) I get that wobble is not quite the same but lack of control over various parts of your body isn't fun. (Also the feeding thing may be related to burning more calories leads to more feeding response? Spiders do move more than a normal BP.)
This is true, but disabilities are hard becusee we are a social species with a lot of responsibility to our society. The society typically isn’t understanding and then tells us people with disabilities we should feel bad becusee they can’t imagine what it’s like. This is not to undermine your pain, but rather to show that society expecting everyone to conform and then telling us mentally to feel bad and guilt us and make us feel like a burden is the problem. Snakes do not have this. Snakes are being taken care of and thus don’t have the same issues. This being said I think breeding animals for how they look is wrong. At least with dogs and cats it has been largely bad.
@@conradkorbol Society isn't what makes me feel bad, its my disorder that causes PHYSICAL PAIN. Not having control over your limbs be it in a major or minor way can be stressful in itself and can be very painful.
Zomb well I don’t have full control in a minor way. I just find I have to be a lot slower and careful about things. I don’t notice unless other people are around me and judging me. Tho I don’t have the physical pain. I can imagine having both being stressful.
The thing that convinces me that spiders aren't stressed or in pain is the eating. Ball pythons will refuse to eat if they're stressed, this is regarded as fact and I've never heard anything from any keeper to suggest that it isn't true. BP are know to be one of the pickiest species of snakes that are commonly kept as pets. They will stress starve themselves to death. Being hungry wouldn't cause them to eat if they were experiencing constant stress. I think that you're missing a major distinction between your condition and a spider's wobble. It sounds like you shake all the time and the overexertion of your muscles cause you pain? (You didn't specify what your condition is so I'm guessing, please correct me if I'm wrong) Spiders only shake when they're holding themselves up. They don't shake when they're at rest or when just moving across the ground. They don't even shake all the time when they're muscles are engaged; for example the spider that Clint is holding is using muscles all along its body to hold onto his arm/hand and it's body is not shaking. Wobble is not uncontrollable muscles spasms. Wobble is a balancing issue.
@@NaraMouse101 I still wonder about the food thing to be honest. I've seen animals in pretty poor condition continue to eat? Idk, it seems like not the best indicator, especially an animal that has lived that way its whole life? And while I do shake MOST of the time, it's significantly worse when I'm moving or holding something or if I haven't eaten recently. But it also affects my ability to balance. (Mine is specifically a neurological disorder, which is what Spiders are believed to have.) I know they aren't the same but I just can't imagine breeding something KNOWING it will have a defect that could or maybe does cause pain/discomfort. I don't know if I'm explaining myself well at all.
We've hurt the majority of dog breeds with it even some that you wouldn't are damaged. German Shepherds for instance don't look like they would have issues by they are incredibly prone to developing hip issues later on in life because we bread them to have a really slopped back because "looked nice". Then there's the more obvious ones like Bulldogs, Basset Hounds, Pugs, Shar Peis, Boxers, Bulk Terriers, French Bulldogs, Dachshunds, and many others who are less noticeable like Cocker Spaniels, Saint Bernards, and many more. I would say adopt dogs whenever possible but if you are really wanting a certain type of dog at least get cross breeds because they suffer from far less issues than pure bred dogs and it doesn't encourage the further degeneration of these breeds. Alternatively but a lot more rare find a working line breeder who basically breed the dogs to what they were before we messed them up and actually were used for work. Finally some breeds are actually still healthy working dog breeds. Basically look into breeds the AKC has and don't adopt any of them. All the responsible breeder societies of a certain breed basically told the AKC to screw off because they didn't want their dogs to be messed up. Jack Russells, English Shepherds, Redbone Coonhounds are all great examples of breeds that have kept their working ability.
@@tymandude1510First of all the breeds you mentioned are AKC breeds. It is easier to get a healthy dog if you can get the dog as a puppy and get access to health records of parents, regardless of it being a mix or registered purebred. Mix breeds are just as likely to inherit bad traits as good ones, so health records are just as important. Good breeders have them and bad ones don't. People making mixed "designer" dogs more often dont. They rely on people thinking that a mixed dog is automatically healthier just like what you said. People should adopt shelter dogs, and I have done so in the past, but you can't know the odds of that dog developing eye or joint problems and that is a risk people take.
Personally, I think that things that risk giving an animal a reduced quality of life should not be intentionally bred. I haven't personally seen enough information regarding spider ball pythons to have a strong opinion either way, but I'll err on the side of caution and would personally not breed them. There are animals with bigger problems, however. Pugs and bulldogs namely, whom, due to human breeding, have severe health issues. Same goes for other animal breeds with similar problems(just mentioned pugs and bulldogs since those were the first that came to mind). Edit: Typo.
TL;DR: Education is important and responsible breeders should always prioritize health over looks; the degree of wobble might vary but when selling a spider, what a wobble is should be fully disclosed in all forms to each potential buyer; Merle genetics in dogs are fascinating and I think, a relevant example. The dog example was an interesting choice! Since I know dogs better than I do ball pythons I like to use them as an example as well. Although, I do not think the comparison in breeding for a friendlier dog was an apt comparison to breeding a spider patterned snake. I think a better comparison would be the breeding of Merle coated Australian shepherds. Merles are a popular and beautiful coat mutation that is common in dog breeds but famous in border collies and Australian shepherds. It is an expensive pattern, with merle dogs usually costing about 50% more than non merle dogs from the same litter. Since it is an incomplete-dominant trait, (irresponsible) breeders breed merle to merle so that they can produce more merle puppies. This results in about a quarter of the puppies being double merle which is termed "lethal whites". These puppies are culled (killed) at birth, or sold to unsuspecting buyers. These lethal whites don't have health issues that would result in early death, but they are usually deaf and blind, which is a hard type of dog for most people to deal with so they end up in shelters where they won't be adopted. This is a lot like the spider market as it is currently. The wobble is not explained to the buyer by irresponsible breeders (who might not care about the degree of wobble when breeding) and the buyer now has a special needs snake that they might not be able to properly care for. I'll add a link to an article with this information, I think you would find merle genetics interesting as there are many more traits associated with merles as well such as a difference in certain pharmacokinetics! (carolinaheartsrescue.org/resources/double-merle-aussies/#targetText=This%20term%20refers%20to%20a,born%20as%20a%20double%20merle.) My father has a dog with both eye and hearing problems due to bad breeding (not a lethal white but a double blue eyed dachshund). He lives a happy life because as a family we were willing to work with his special needs. But I do not think that his breeder was a responsible or ethical breeder. (We bought him about ten years ago and I have learned my lesson about properly researching breeders beforehand). These breeders are doing this simply to make more merles in a litter to make more money and that is absolutely not okay. To me this seems to be an apt reflection of the spider morph, it is mostly being bred purely to make money. After hearing your reasoning I personally still disagree with breeding spiders, although I do now realize that it is more of a gray area than black and white as I originally thought. I believe that the scale of breeding of spiders should at least be scaled down until we know more about what causes a more severe wobble in some snakes than in others (mostly because that seems like a fascinating field of research...). Mostly though, I believe in educating the public and potential buyers so that they can make an informed decision and that breeders should be breeding for a love of a healthy and thriving animal rather than purely for profit due to fancy morphs. Once you have researched your animal, do just as much research on the breeder you choose to buy that animal from!
The lethal white phenomenon is a great example. It was the first thing my mind went to when he mentioned not breeding spiders together. I would like to add though that lethal white can also produce neurological or intestinal defects which do result in early death.
This is old but it seems similar to holland lops with rabbits. Not the same phenotypes, but if you breed two together either half or a fourth of them (I can't remember) will end up being what are called peanuts. It's basically similar to having stillborns or a premie because its the result of two dwarfism genes. Most people who want to avoid having dead rabbit babies will suck up the "pure bred" pride and breed with a normal.
Only read the first paragraph. I think as long as both the buyer and seller are on the same page and has all of the information regarding spiders or any other morphs that cause issues (there are quite a few ) then adults can make an informed decision. Stop judging people and let them make up their own mind.
David Jr you should have read the whole thing. I am not disagreeing with you. I agree that as long as people are able to make a fully informed decision on both sides then it is fair. I personally don’t agree with the breeding of spiders though. I am not judging just outlining the reasons for my opinion.
I don't like spider bp's, their issues are just a deal breaker. I also hold the same opinion on heavily deformed dog breeds, the ones that can't breath/bad skeletons/inability to safely breed... I really just don't like the breeds that couldn't survive without intensive human care... Poor breeding is just a thing i will never enjoy, more power to the people going into it knowing exactly what they're getting into but i would not even with all the knowledge in the world...
The issue isn't the specific dog. Let's take pugs for example. They often have breathing issues. This is not the pug's fault, it's because they are overbred. Personally I think we shouldn't be against pugs, we should be against pug breeders because they are causing more harm to the pug population.
@@elliot6252 The issue with pugs is that they are not supposed to look the way they do or have those breathing issues at all, they have them because people bred them to be like that because "awe that's cute" and it's a case where people value looks > health of an animal. If the breeding of pugs to make them look as such did not harmfully impact their lives, nobody would have an issue with it. It's the same thing with Spider BP. However if breeders were able to find a way to keep that look while also removing the genetic defects of the animal, then that is what we should be striving for.
Hi clint. Very good video as always. As a scientist myself I tend to agree withyour approach on this topic. However, if says the hypothesis of spider ball python developing a wobble, or having it get worse, is in fact linked to poor care of the animal (as seen in many rescues), I do think breeding them becomes a problem. See, in a perfect world where people would always take great care of their animals, I wouldn't have a problem with breeding spider ball pythons. But we both know we arn't living in this world, and they are some spider ball pythons being sold that will be poorly taken care of. That on his own is a problem, but particularly breeding a snake which will end up getting even worse if taken care of poorly is another one. So in the end, to me, in a perfect world yes, i'd totally agree with you, but in this case I have to say I don't. We know some of these snakes will end up having poor care, and the snake's health might get even worse in some cases because of the spider gene, to the point where unlike many snakes, they might do poorly as a rescue after (in the case of really debilitating wobble, which does happen). I think as people who understand the issue, and potential breeders, it is our responsability to ensure the snake's future will be as good as possible, and if there is a chance that bad care will lead to even worse problem because of said gene, I think that's an issue. I do of course understand your stance on this and respect, and I hope I made mine clear. Cheers
That is totally fair. How do you think that this position applies to the vast majority of snake species that are more difficult to keep successfully than are spider ball pythons?
@@yulusleonard985 I actually took rescue here as an example, and assuming the animal actually was taken care of poorly. So I agree it's not a good example because they are a lot of unknown parameters here, by resue I mostly meant animal that have been taken care of poorly in the past, and are now in proper care.
@@ClintsReptiles I'll start by saying that I believe some species of reptiles are way to easily available compared to how difficult it is to provide them with good care, and I know you share this opinion in the case of some monitors as well. It is not a stretch (I think) to say this applies to some species of snakes as well. With that being said, my issues was that spider ball python, when taken care of poorly, will end up being worse than say a "regular" ball python with the same care. That is at least the hypothesis as far as the wobble getting worse in concerned. So that's why in my opinion we shouldn't necessarily breed them,. Altho I should say, we shouldn't breed them AS MUCH. If everytime a spider ball tpython is bred, it's guaranted to be taken care of properly, then breed away! Now if we compare this to other snakes. For example should we be breeding specy of snake A if they're much harder to take care of that specy B. Well, yes and no. What are the other differencies between said snakes? One of the issue many people have with the spider ball python is that the only (or at least) main appeal to them is the pattern/color. So the question becomes: should we be breeding snake A if snake B is similar in all aspects except color/pattern, and B is easier to take care of, or if it's care is not met, it won't suffer as much? I believe the answer to that is yes. But that's assuming it's purely for look. If we take other things into account, then it becomes more complicated. Saying people shouldn't breed a snake because people should just get a ball python instead as it's easier to take care of is obviously wrong. But if someone wanted a particular reptile, that is hard to take care of, and you knew of a specy that is very similar in behavious and appearance, a much easier, wouldn't you strongly recommend the easier one? And in the case, wouldn't it be better is the easier one was overall more available? My problem with this explanation is that it's kind of a problem to have a general consensus on this, even for me, and it should all be a case by case scenario. Kind of a poor answer, but I will say that after watching your video and trying to answer your question, my overall opinion is a bit different. I do still think it's not great spider ball python are bred so much, but i'm not completly against their very existence (unlike some people). I do think in the end we have a pretty similar opinion, and if there was say spectrum of opinion of it, with one side people who are completly against spider ball python (say red side, not calling left and right as I don't want this to be politcal somehow)), and one side that has absolutly no problem with it (blue side), we'd end up being different shades of purple, I'd be a bit more red while you'd be a bit more blue :D. Hope I made myself clear Clint!
110 % respectfully agree.... spider balls are a " special needs" pet every detail of their special needs absolutely NEED to be disclosed and discussed before the purchaser or adoptive home can make a educated decision to bring it Into their home and give it the proper care it needs ....from feeding tips to the proper type enclosure and every single detail it takes to keep a special needs pet healthy ....in my experience most people aren't willing to go that extra mile it takes to care for an animal with special needs.....a spider may take extra time and care to feed because of the wobble ....most folks assume up front you can throw a live mouse in the enclosure and the spider ball will eat ....not the case with most spider balls ....they need more attention and time in most cases need to be fed f/t .....if people aren't educated up front about the special needs especially in feeding the animal ends up starving to death because it does take patience and extra steps to keep spiders and other special needs pets healthy....also certain enclosure types are better than others for a spider ( shoerter is better than taller) in this case....in the end all that may happen as a spider matures absolutely needs to be disclosed up front ....in my opinion you are doing a disservice selling or adopting a spider out to a first time snake owner ..... educate without sugar coating what can and may happen first so that the person interested in getting a snake can make the best educated decision for their home and time they have to give the pet ....as I said before those who will give the extra care and time to a snake or any pet for that matter are few and far between ....people want and expect the " no brainier " pet and if it turned out they don't get the " no brainier" pet they expect their spider to be than therefore they are not properly cared for because people just aren't willing to put the extra time and effort it takes into keeping pets with special needs healthy and happy...then they end up dead,or in the brink of death before rehomed ....when people are buying other various snakes say a retic or a carpet or blood ......they know exactly what they are purchasing UP FRONT before they purchase .... unfortunately this isn't the case with the spider ball people are buying them and selling them without educating on the special needs of the spider and if they do talk about it at all it is way more that sugar coated than what the reality of what can happen
I'm super impressed at how engaging and captivating Clint's presenting is. I just spent 51 minutes and 2 seconds across 3 videos learning about the genetics and moral dilemmas of breeding spider ball pythons and it felt like 10 minutes while still remaining super informing.
Hi Clint I like you and your channel. I thought a lot about writing this comment. I understood your opinion on this topic. But here is my controversial opinion. I am physically disabled. I love my life and I am different. But because you do things differently and you do normal things like eat use the bathroom and sleep and wake up it does not mean you are not suffering. Some suffering may not be visual to people who don't have the condition. This is my opinion and I am not a scientist or a breeder. I don't own any snakes. I am just looking at it from the view of some one who is different. So if you can avoid it then you should avoid it.
My question is how much is physical vs emotional pain. Snakes aren’t social. So I wonder if it’s as bad. Not that I think we should breed snakes for how they look. I think that’s wrong. But as a neurologically impaired person I can’t help but wonder if saying “disability=bad” is self hatred. Roughly half of all the major changes changes have come from people who are handicapped in some way. I think snakes cannot be compared to humans tho.
@@conradkorbol People who don't have a condition don't understand. There are other hardship people don't understand because they haven't struggled with a disability. It's about struggling with basic functions and depending on others to do things. Sometimes despite explaining things people don't understand how to do what you want to do. When you have a condition you suffer illnesses even doctors don't understand. We go through alot especially with able body people. Don't get me wrong please. I love living and I wouldn't change things but I would not wish anybody to struggle especially an animal who can't talk.
MPuzzle World I hear you for sure And if your disability causes you physical pain (not sure if it does) it does make things harder. I know that there are things that are more difficult. I just wonder if a snake has the self doubt and if the world meets there needs if it the same thing? I am not trying to attack you. This issue is complicated and I feel like everyone is trying to simplify it to disability bad or who cares? I think that it’s has to be vastly different if your whole perceived world is accommodating you.
@@conradkorbol exactly. I am not trying to attack Clint either but he made sound like it is a neurological problem it is find he\she eats like a the other snakes goes to the bathroom like the others and acts normal. But Clint doesn't really know if the snake is really okay. I respect his opinion and I am not a scientist or a breeder but if you can't find out ahead that the animal is coming with issues it shouldn't be continued to breed. Because you know that not all humans will know how to care for it. It is normal animals and humans mistreat them.
Surprised to find the comment section isn't a dumpster fire. I've been rather neutral on this subject myself, with the caveat that I wouldn't ever personally want to own a spider morph, but it's good to see a video that shows the other side.
Clint, I've been liking your videos. It's interesting to me that everyone compares this issue to dog breeding. And while YOUR dog has floppy ears (a trait that as you pointed out is very often linked to the domestication process), there are plenty of domestic dog breeds with pointy ears as well. As someone very involved in the dog fancy, any responsible breeder is breeding for structure (the dog is built correctly to do it's intended purpose without breaking down), does the dog have a desireable temperment (because as I'm sure you know temperment is highly influenced by genetics), and we even do genetic testing to test for common genetic health problems so we can avoid them in our dogs. In my breed (beagles) as well as others, there are some issues of epilepsy that pop up in some dogs. We do not have a test for this, but we are working really hard to try and isolate it. But breeders exclude not only that dog from the genepool, but we go back and look at the whole pedigree, and try and see if there are overlaps with dogs used. And we stay away from breeding them. No one would intentionally breed a dog that could produce offspring with epilepsy (another neurological condition) even though the parents can be totally normal, and epileptic dogs can live normal lives and have a good quality of life. (one of my own dogs has seizures, he was a rescue. I love him,he has a great quality of life and only has maybe 2 seizures a year, but I would never wish that on any dog, or any dog owner.) Just because an animal CAN have a good quality of life with a condition, doesn't mean we should be producing it on purpose. We should still love and care for the animal that exsists, provided it's condition isn't so severe it drastically impacts quality of life.... but WHY purposley produce animals with conditions that could potentially cause severe issues?
I cannot imagine what people would say if someone wanted to have human offspring with neurological diseases. I had a spider rescue once that had to be forcefed nearly every single time. It would strike itself when presented with food. I could have curled into a ball and died of sympathy. In the end, it was time to let the spider rest.
I’m against the breeding of spider ball pythons, but I will say that I really appreciate you sharing your opinion of them with us. If we can put the actual issue aside for a moment and look at this from a different angle, I think that the ability to discuss topics respectfully and calmly with others who hold differing opinions is something we should really strive for in our community as reptile keepers, and indeed, in the world in general. 💚
Kate Lillo I agree with u 100%!!!!! I’ve seen so many circumstances of groups of haters for one person or another. This way of discussion with Clint has been so refreshing. I do think one reason is because Clint is very respected plus the way he handled the conversation. I respected him even tho I feel different about it. If u have a person jumping at a snakes face, upsetting it and stressing it out.... they get less respect and ppl want to charge on them. I could never charge On someone who handles and treats reptiles with so much respect 👍🏻 I gotta say, Clint is one awesome guy!!!! There’s nobody else like him ☺️
I really think we need more research into the spider Gene and why the plyotropy manifests the way it does. I personally theorize that the mutation might be altering the way the snake processes B12 and that's either causing the wobble or exacerbating it, but I don't have any data for this aside from watching other snake species with a B12 deficiency exhibit the same behaviors. In the future I would love to own a spider for research purposes, but I'm not nearly funded or connected enough to do any real work.
Very interesting video! Personally, I am still against breeding spider balls, simply because I don't support the idea of intentionally breeding animals with a defect. Sure, a white snake couldn't live in the wild, but it's a pet, so I really don't mind that, but I do believe we should breed healthy animals. However, I found your argument very good and very interesting. I can see where you're coming from and I can agree with a lot of what you said. This actually reminds me of rats, since I am a rat breeder, and rats with red or pink eyes have pretty terrible sight. I never really had an issue with them, but this made me think of how I feel about the whole thing and I will no longer intentionally breed red eyed rats. I know that's very unrelated, haha, but still wanted to mention it.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 what an idiotic arguement. Something that never existed has no clue it ever could've existed. It's not like they are saying they're gonna kill any red eyed rats that they unintentionally breed. They just won't intentionally breed for a defect, which is their own moral choice. That rat doesn't care because it can't care, BECAUSE IT NEVER EXISTED. There's like telling a teenager to have unprotected sex because the baby that might be born from the sex would rather be born to a mother that's immature and not ready for a baby then never be born at all, which is fuckin stupid kuz the baby never existed in the first place and you cant even have known that a baby would've been produced in the first place. 🤦♂️
how do you feel about pugs? they have a genetic defect where their eyes can pop out and have terrible nasal passages creating the snorts and snoring a lot of people find "cute". no disrespect just pointing out there are many captive animals that have "defects" a lot of them are much worse than the spider gene.
The question you should be answering is if you'd rather be a spider ball python or a ball python. Not brushing it off as "I wouldn't want to be a snake in the first place." Is a debilitating neurological condition akin to chronic vertigo at all equatable to altered behaviour and floppy ears in an otherwise healthy dog? No. Is it more appropriate to equate it to chronic arthritis and cancer development in dalmatians, considering the degree of debilitation? I think it is, personally. I respectfully disagree with your conclusions. You say we should breed them because we cannot make an informed decision about the mechanism of spider ball python degeneracy. However, I would argue that because we don't know the mechanism of risk, we should abstain from breeding them until such a time that we do know. Because the issue can give birth to spider ball pythons that clearly suffer with a severe neurological abnormality, it is imperative to understand the mechanism before justifying the further breeding of these animals. When we don't know how big the risk is, and what leads to the risk, it is in my opinion unacceptable to conclude that it's fine to continue on our way. All we know is, that it can happen, and that it happens more often in spider ball pythons than any other snakes we keep. I don't expect a response, this is just my opinion. I'm not hating on your content, I just disagree with your reasoning and the way you draw your conclusions on this issue. And I'd be interested to see what the mechanism is when it's found, and I sincerely hope the mechanisms turns out to be such, that it can be avoided in breeding these snakes ^^
Mechanism of risk. That is a great phrase and I will be using it. I think Clint’s original video on the topic was much better. He made a lot of bad arguments here and only a few good ones, although that may have more to do with bad content editing than him actually being wrong.
Tiffany Lach Many cannot eat on their own, and some get stuck and require help to recover. That sounds pretty debilitating to me. Debilitating just means a dramatic change in ability to thrive normally, and while not every spider is debilitated by this condition, you can’t deny some that are.
I recently made a comment against breeding spiders on a different reptile channel, and was attacked with ad hominems and insults to my intelligence instead of a reasoned argument. My opinion is my opinion and will only change with presented evidence. Although you haven't changed my mind, I want to thank you for your reasoned and well thought out position on spiders. Too many people just resort to attacks on others they disagree with.
Every attempt at an argument on a controversial subject in the comment section be like Person making an argument “heres how i feel and why.” Random person “Your wrong and you stupid!” Person “ok but why?” Random person “because you clearly stupid and your argument sucks,you (insert offensive cuss word)” Person “OK, but why am i wrong?” Radom person “i told you because it sucks (insert offensive cuss word)” Me reading it be like “BRUH!”
Hi Clint, this is Kevin @ NERD. Since I am the originator of the Spider gene I decided to comment. Thank you for a fine video and perspective. I just wanted to chime in that since I do breed the Spider gene I know quite a bit about all things Spider. I feel quite strongly that there has been a fair bit exaggeration regarding the wobble of the Spider gene in general. The idea that a breeder is making Spiders and has to euthanize some of them is outrageous and not something that I know of or see. I literally love the gene and most Spiders I make have a "minor" wobble which I have always found endearing but not something that I saw as a worry for the welfare of the animal. I think the severity of the Spider wobble has been over stated and made to look far more common than what I have seen. In many cases they are showing an animal with problems but the back story of that snake is never clear or even discussed. Seeing a Spider with a really bad wobble is simply RARE! People can make their minds up and claim that a breeder keeps the gene only for the money and I find that troubling. I very much enjoy the Spider gene and love those animals, it is a powerful and wonderful gene that allows me to visually create things I can only sometimes imagine! Great discussion and your words are very level! Kevin
Kevin, I'm honored that you would choose to watch our video, and even moreso given that you don't watch RUclips. Thank you for contributing to the conversation. A lot of people are calling for more research. I agree that this would be wonderful, but it would be expensive and time-consuming and would end with thousands of snakes that were used in the study being euthanized. What you and others like you have done is as close to the perfect study as we're probably going to get. Yes, you may have a financial bias, but sometimes you have to work with the evidence that is available. There is nobody that would know better than you. You could be a total scumbag that has concealed the truth to make an extra $35 per snake selling spiders, but I see no evidence of that. I have respected you for years, and don't imagine that will change anytime soon. Hopefully we get to meet at Tinley.
Hi Kevin. Many thanks and respect from the UK. We keep spiders too and there are certainly a couple in our breeding plan for this and subsequent years. We see very little wobble or disorientation in any of our collection and a lot of good potential. Great to hear your opinion on this video and thanks to Clint for raising the subject. Cheers all!
That's right out of the mouth of the man the myth the legend the evil morph god. If kevin who is an avid animal lover and conservationist says he is ok with the spider gene that's good enough for me. In saying that I've also bred the spider gene for many many years and the wobble has been greatly over exadurated I'd say less than 10% have a noticeable wobble as hatchlings. Now I can't say what the percentage is as they grow because I'm only in contact with a few of the customers but I'd be willing to say with proper care and due diligence the odds are about the same as they grow to adulthood.
Clint said my opinion best. If we did this for money we wouldnt take any risks for the extra $30 spider adds to a snakes value. We work with spider because the animal is awesome and the "risks" are overstated. No one is getting rich off of spiders. Theres way better morphs for making money.
Clint's Reptiles I keep hearing how special spiders are and how so many breeders love them. What exactly is different about spiders besides how they effect patterns? I’m asking for anyone’s opinion that breed or have them. I’m just curious because a lot of breeders love them. Also I’ve seen ppl say the stripe morph will have the same as a spider. Is that true or false?
From somebody who is strongly against the breeding and selling of spiders I just wanna say I love the video and not only respect but appreciate your opinion by supporting it with evidence witnessed on your own spiders
@@ramtrucks721 We’re talking about a breed of snake (ball python, to be specific) with a morph that is named “Spiders”. The name comes from their pattern looking similar to a spider web.
I usually agree with you, but I think we just don’t see eye to eye on this topic. I understand where you’re coming from, but for me it’s a similar situation to breeding pugs. People think pugs are cute and fun, and although you can care for them by taking them to facilities to widen their nostrils, this doesn’t solve the problem. I believe it goes the same for spiders. I’m not going to argue with anyone, because everyone should have their own opinion, but this is a topic I’m pretty uneducated in so I’m sure many people here could tell me about all the things I’m saying wrong. I really want to emphasise that you are a brilliant pet owner, one of the best out there, and I understand and take into consideration every point you make. It’s so easy to come off as rude or close minded in comments, so I desperately want you to know that, despite my disagreement with you, I think you are a brilliant person. But no matter what, I still see it as unnecessary suffering for the sake of making an animal look nice. This is an edit long after this comment was posted, but I think it’s and important point to add on, so if you have already replied to my original comment and now feel you disagree with me, that’s totally fine. I feel like the comparison of dogs isn’t right, it’s as if we found a way to create the most beautiful human, but they have pointed ears or an elongated nose. It wouldn’t physically affect us in any way. With the spider, it’s more like we found how to make the most beautiful human, but every one of them had a limp. It doesn’t necessarily stop them from continuing with their life, but it is debilitating and makes life just that bit harder.
If you see a more knowledgeable person disagreeing with you, it might be a good idea to do some good research and see the sources where their info is coming from!
It's all a spectrum and shouldn't be viewed through an absolutist lens. Our quality of life isn't based on any single condition we have. Snakes don't have inner conversations. They know food water and safety. The wobble in captivity hasn't been proven to cause pain nor prevent them from eating and meeting their survival requirements. It's about good care more than genetics.
Well hi there! I really appreciate the level of polite conversation that has been occurring since the release of our two videos on spider last Saturday. The videos have over 1,600 comments combined. Sorry I have not been able to respond to them all. However, I have been trying to keep up with reading them, and I have noticed a few things that are frequently being misunderstood about what I had to say. I’d like to try to clear them up so that I am not misunderstood. Sorry if I wasn’t sufficiently clear originally. First, this video is why I’m okay with spider ball pythons, not why I think that they are the best and everyone should breed them. There is one good study that I had read before and that is posted many times in the comments. In that study they polled breeders of spiders about the wobble, and then animal welfare researchers gave their analysis. In that analysis, the majority of animal welfare researchers concluded that there wasn’t enough evidence to make a call one way or the other about spider. I am with them. New evidence could sway me one way or the other. Second, my example of the dog is not to say that what we see in dogs and what we see in spiders are the same or are equivalent. It is only to demonstrate that just because a mutation has an impact on behavior, that does not mean that it is “bad”. We have to analyze it further. As far as comparing wobble to autism, I am with you in finding that to be a comparison made in poor taste, and one that is largely not comparable with wobble. They aren’t the same thing. This is actually a misconception that I was hearing a lot that I was trying to clear up. I was only saying that in one aspect it is not entirely inaccurate. You can’t conclude that just because something or someone is different, that this means that they are different in a way that is “bad”. Just for the record, I have never bought a snake because it had spider in it. I have bought snakes that had other genes I was looking for, and after carefully inquiring as to the severity of the wobble, I determined that spider in those snakes was not a deal breaker. I have only produced one clutch of spiders, and I kept all but one of the spider babies. I would have kept them all, but one of my friends really wanted one of them. Many people have been encouraging me to collect the data on spiders myself, well I am. My data set is limited in size because I can’t keep more than a handful of spiders, but the experience that I have first-hand leads me to think that wobble is generally not an issue. My data set is expanded by feedback from Kevin McCurley from NERD (who was the first person to work with spider and has produced thousands over the last couple of decades) and other breeders and keepers that have more experience with spider than I have. They report on a large scale what I have seen on a small scale. Unfortunately, that is all the data we really have at this time. More would be better, and depending on what that data is, it could definitely shift my opinion to either side on this issue. Right now, my position isn’t that breeding spiders is obviously bad or obviously great. They seem to do well in captivity, so I’m open minded and awaiting further evidence. Until then, I see no reason to place any kind of restrictions on the breeding of spider. I am not afraid to breed them myself, but I am highly selective of the individuals that I would consider breeding as I would like to lessen the severity of the wobble through selective breeding as many people have suggested. It may not be possible, but so far so good. If I see aberrations, that would be new evidence that might change my mind. Again, I apologize for not being more clear originally. I did my best, but sometimes it is difficult to see where you aren’t getting your point across until you see the reactions to what you have had to say. Thank you for being such an amazing community and for doing so much to build a culture where we can have respectful and open conversations even about the most controversial of subjects. For those of you that haven't seen the second video, it can be seen here: ruclips.net/video/idf6b7Mleew/видео.html
i'm autistic, and i was actually thinking about this before you brought it up. i don't think people should compare it (mostly because most people don't know anything about autism, and don't know what they're talking about), but you raise an interesting point re: different doesn't mean bad. i'd need to research more on wobble and any other problems with spiders before i came to a conclusion, but yes, the most important point is: are they suffering?
Roisin Rowan that’s what I guess is the only thing we don’t know. I would just think that it would b so stressful. My mom had something that hasn’t been heard of a lot. Tar dive dyskenisia... made her neck muscles flinch a lot and she said it stressed her out so bad and made her feel exhausted. I don’t think we could ever prove if it’s stressful to spiders??? I dunno, I do see breeders having a large percent of the ones feeling they r ok to breed.
Hi, autistic guy here. Please get off the "comparing neurologically disabled snakes to autistic people" bandwagon. We don't all have super powers or special skills, we're not all rain man. We have a common symptom called 'special interests' that drives us to gain knowledge in a specific field of study, which is where a lot of the super power/super knowledge misconception comes from, but not even 1% of us are savants, the vast majority of us are either intellectually disabled or socially maladjusted and that's all. Been a fan of your for ages, but I'm sick of these comparisons being made even in an attempt at positivity, it's offensive and a shitty thing to do and frankly I think you should apologise.
Clint's Reptiles Is this the article you meant? www.researchgate.net/publication/262937861_Neurologic_dysfunction_in_a_ball_python_python_regius_color_morph_and_Implications_for_welfare Because if so you need to reread it. In the abstract they say this study is about proving a need for research into this issue, not about analyzing stress or quality of life in these animals. They polled 13 self selecting breeders (a admittedly tiny and biased sample size), and the data was so poor they couldn’t even analyze it. There is a worrying quote where one of those breeders reported that even severely affected snakes can be bred, which tells me people are breeding highly defective animals without regard to the neurological disorder. They also polled 28 vets and welfare experts, and their near unanimous consensus was that there was a HIGH possibility of impact to quality of life. They did not say there was not enough evidence to assume stress in these animals, they said it was causing harm. The authors noted a large difference of opinion between the two polled groups. Throughout the study, the authors referred to sources that were almost exclusively about dogs, with a few sprinkled in about reptiles that are not snakes. The only direct references to ball pythons with wobble were three RUclips videos. In their conclusion, they determined that there wasn’t enough data to come to a conclusion. It wasn’t because the data was ambiguous, they simply did not have any data. This could barely be referred to a study at all, and I’m guessing it was published simply to raise awareness that this issue exists. I initially assumed you hadn’t included a link to this study because you understood how weak it was. Here are a few important quotes from it: -This article aims to raise awareness in the animal welfare science community of the potential for welfare problems in genetic variant reptiles and to stimulate further research in this field -Quantitative methods of statistical analysis were not employed owing to the low sample sizes achieved; rather qualitative analysis was employed. -Spider offspring that lack the pattern mutation do not express wobble symptoms. Further, unaffected hatchlings may be born to severely affected females and affected offspring born to adults that have never displayed observable clinical signs. -Welfare Scientist Group Respondents (n¼28) typically perceived a moderate to high welfare effect associated with the clinical signs of the wobble condition -Although breeders generally agreed that quality of life was not significantly affected, 89% (25/28)of welfare scientists concluded a moderate to high welfare effect based on the information available.This disparity may reflect biases inherent in the respective groups. -Our historical failure to identify signs of potential welfare compromises in reptiles is probably best explained by their alien morphology and behavior -herpetoculturists implicitly considered [fecundity] demonstrated the absence of effect on quality of life. This may not be the case, as even in stressful situations, sexual activity is likely to be maintained in reptiles where the negative influences of corticosteroids on sexual endocrine function seen in many mammals do not seem to be replicated -A true assessment of effect on quality of life should be based on complete information on the effects of the condition... Further study to quantify any increase in stress experienced during feeding is therefore warranted, to support a robust assessment of the welfare implications of the condition. As for the autism comparison, you missed hard on that one. If you wanted to raise awareness of the inappropriateness of this argument, you should have done that. Instead you said this is a bad argument, now let me show you how it’s a good argument. It is also not ok to lean on the autistic superpower myth, as it is inaccurate and harmful. I don’t think you were trying to be insensitive, but it very much came across that way. Your first video on this subject from a while back was excellent. Your secondary video associated with this one was decent. This video was not. You mislead your viewers by implying there is evidence when there is none. I think you should really consider what the majority of your followers are saying. Since there is no evidence either way, we shouldn’t be risking the welfare of these animals, simply because we like the way they look. If you want to breed them without selling them, or if you want to breed them specifically to study this issue great. However, until we know more, these animals should not be sold disclaimer free for so little money that impulse buying is easy. It also bugs me that you have only liked responses that agree with you, by a vast majority, even though there are many polite, well structured arguments against you. I think it might be time to take a step back and look at your own biases.
I appreciate that you made this video. You're clear and respectful, and I hope the comments are the same. However, as a fellow scientist, I strongly disagree with you. I understand that those who support the breeding of Spider Ball Pythons want very much to explain why it's fine to continue breeding and selling them. But none of the information here, even when it's framed as objective data, is compelling when weighed against the reality that people are knowingly continuing a genetic line that has clearly demonstrated a link to a neurological disorder. The following is only personal observation, but for what it's worth, I worked my way through undergrad and grad school as a veterinary technician - and in many cases, animals will not show signs of distress until their discomfort is at extreme levels. Since human conditions like autism were introduced to the discussion, I'll share a quote from a friend of mine with a circulatory disorder that affects his peripheral vision and balance: "I look normal. I act normal (I think!). But on most days I deal with being miserable for at least part of the time".
Thank you for sharing and sorry to hear about your friend's disorder. I don't mean to joke or offend with what comes next, apologies if it comes across as insensitive but I have to ask...would your friend prefer it if the government or some regulatory body had prevented his parents from mating because they knew that doing so would result in his disorder? Yes he struggles every day, but is his life not worth that struggle? If a snake can convince a human to care for it, feed it, keep it safe from predators, and bring a mate to it in order to perpetuate the species, all by displaying an interesting color pattern coupled with a disorder that in some cases causes some relatively unknown degree of suffering, then should it be allowed to? Who are we to answer this question? So much suffering is experienced by all species, who are we to decide which suffering is allowed and which should be eradicated and at what expense?
@@Bearded_B Wow, comparing humans having kids to humans purposefully breeding other animals with known deformities. So, you believe the animal has an equal say in the matter? They're given the choice to evaluate the risk? As we can't stop all suffering, might as well introduce some more? It's ok they're suffering a bit, cos they can "convince" humans to take care of them?😂😂
It only comes down to one thing, if an animal have a risk of having a lower quality of life due to its potential defeat, more so then the average breed of that animal, why should you even want to breed it other then the specific traits it produces
If you know you'll take care of it sufficiently or that you will make special effort that whoever does own it cares for it properly then there isnt any reason not to.
@@jukesngambits Owning one that already exists is fine, the issue here is people shouldn't continue breeding something KNOWING there is a ginormous likelihood of issues and problems. If you grew apples and knew that if you added X to the soil and there's a 90% chance those apples would make you sick but a 10% chance it wouldn't and they would be fine, any sane person would stop growing them and find a different way.
@@KrissyMeow The demand for these animals comes from people who buy one that already exists. No one pre-orders their python, they go to the shop or breeder and buy one that's already been bred. If no one was willing to buy these animals then no one would breed them, it's simple as that.
@@thisistheaccountname that’s why i don’t get kids. I have really bad genetics, and i end my line. It have reduced my quality of life, so i would not want to get kids knowing that they will get my genes
As someone with both an intense (aka neurodiverse level special interest) in dogs and reptiles, I’ve been really intrigued by the spider ball python discussion. For me, the feeding data would be the deciding factor from an ethical perspective - if the trait has solely physically desirable (to humans) characteristics but undesirable health characteristics, it is unethical - similar to the over breeding of short nosed dogs to the point that they have health issues. However, if there is a behaviorally desirable characteristic that occurs with the physically desirable characteristics (like the floppy eared dog example) and the health characteristic is not necessarily debilitating, it is more of a moral grey area and the goal should be continuing to figure out how to get the desirable behavior and physical appearance while minimizing health effects. Unrelated to the ethics of breeding debate, the fact that the homozygous genotype is fatal means a better human analogy would be hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (though it is recessive, not dominant, but with heterozygous carriers having some health effects). In heterozygous individuals, the gene is associated with a higher risk of certain heart conditions, but in homozygous individuals, it is lethal in infancy. As a neurodiverse person, I’m sick of autism being used in these analogies, because it is not at all a monogenic disorder that follows Mendelian inheritance, in the vast majority of cases (minus things like fragile X and Rett syndrome).
@@malkomalkavianhuh? It’s not behavioral when they always have a wobble (physical defect), studies have found they have defects in their inner ear that helps with their balance/vestibular defects
@@Creative_sea and for some individuals the impact is slight and could just be called a different way of behaving. For some individuals it is more debilitating and means they require more care or their survival is threatened. Perhaps we mean different things by the word behavioural? I was perhaps unclear because I was gently trying to say that ASD is really quite a good comparison, because for some individuals the difference is so small that it could be called a different way of behaving, and for some it is a catastrophic disability which challenges their survival. In trying to be diplomatic maybe I was unfortunately vague. My apologies.
Gonna have to disagree with you on this one. Floppy ears and color changes and playful attitudes are not comparable to spider wobble. Things that are only detrimental in the wild don't really have bearing when it's a pet. Spider wobble doesn't always but can cause problems in captivity, while a pure white python wouldn't last in the wild but is fine in captivity. I'd also agree that certain breeds of dogs shouldn't be bred for similar reasons (eg pugs, shar pei, etc).
It’s the only time I’ve been a little bummed by Clint 😔 I’ve watched so many times at their failed hits at feeding. Just darting all around the mice but not getting it. Just seems pitiful to me??
@@staceyroberts3468 I do not understand why anyone would even attempt to defend creating animals with central nervous system defects because they look cool
I feel like the comparison of the floppy ears is unfair. My floppy-eared dog's quality of life is equal to that of my bat-eared dog. The same cannot be said in many cases for spider ball pythons, as a more agreeable temperament has no real impact on their lives in a domestic setting. The wobble, however, can cause a change in quality of life regardless of whether it's a domestic setting or a wild one. It might not be the worst defect out there, but I'd think of them as the French bulldogs of the snake world. They can seem happy, but they nonetheless have a lower quality of life than a Shiba Inu or a lab. In addition to this, their continued lower quality of life is a direct result of our poor breeding decisions. I feel that the most ethical decision is to no longer breed spiders, brachiocephalic animals, or any other animals with a generally lower quality of life. Continuing to do so strikes me as INCREDIBLY selfish and frankly distasteful.
However, cats with floppy ears, (Scottish Folds), all have a form of arthritis? If I am remembering correctly. Its what causes their floppy ears. So they do suffer for their ears, differently from a cat with straight ears anyway.
Floppy ears is more similar than you might think. I've owned multiple dog breeds and drop ears are far more prone to ear infections and wax buildup than a rose, semi-pricked, or prick ear. They trap debris and dust easily and the lack of air circulation can create humid conditions. Humidity + dust + microbes + ear wax = infections galore. Much like the spider gene, the biggest question is where the line between minor inconvenience to the animal and intentionally creating suffering lies. And that's not something you can truly answer without bringing personal convictions, emotions, and conscience into play. Personally, I tend to side with Clint's view. However at the same time, I'm not too crazy about supporting the ongoing breeding of spiders in the same way I'm not sure I want to buy a dog with large drop ears again. It's a minor, albeit unnecessary inconvenience for the animal that I can live without. However I don't think it's abuse to continue those traits, either, because the vast majority of animals with proper husbandry get on just fine.
Have a Spider myself, I don't know how you've never heard of them being bad feeders. She certainly tries her hardest, but the wobble causes her to miss her strikes repeatedly. Other than that she seems happy, but it definitely takes a little more care to keep her healthy.
I know I'm severely late on this but nobody else has responded, When saying a snake is a good or bad feeder it refers to thier food drive and not to their actual ability to aim well at the food. Your spider seems, from what you said, to have a perfectly fine food drive since she is trying to eat, a stressed snake will often refuse to eat, not ever trying to strike or even come out of wherever their hiding for a meal.
@@sugarmuffin319 What part of that wasn't accurate? The part about good feeders and food drive, or the part where a stressed snake will tend to refuse food? Because both of those are accurate.
After we finished filming this video, the conversation continued for a while: ruclips.net/video/idf6b7Mleew/видео.html This link will take you to that conversation. We were going to release it as a Patreon Extras video (our patrons at Patreon get at least one video like this each week). However, there is a lot of great content in our conversation, and we have decided that it should be available for everyone. So please, if you want to see the rest of this conversation, click the link and enjoy. Thank you again for being the best fans on the internet. I never would have made this video if you all weren't so open-minded and amazing. You're sinkin' rad, and I really appreciate every one of you.
I can respect your opinion. I suppose we still don't know where the wobble comes from, and it makes sense. There are some other defects I've heard of, like those leopard geckos that are more reluctant to eat.
I would argue that if you're going to compare the wobble to a condition in humans, wouldn't it make more sense to compare it to some forms of cerebral palsy? Becuase to my knowledge, cerebral palsy doesn't really effect one's mind, but mainly just inhibits movement in various ways.
At the end of the day, I do believe it comes down to how important asthetics are. Wobbles are a neurological condition that is clearly not desirable. I think that without self regulation now, we are going to end up looking at the equivalent of the Bulldog in the future, and only because of a pattern.
The spider gene reminds me of the frame overo in horses. The frame overo is an incomplete dominant gene like spider is, the heterozygous form creates a white pattern on the horse, with no issues at all, but the homozygous form causes the foal to be born all white and die within 48h because the cells do not migrate from the neural crest to the intestine. So the foal has no digestive process at all. They cannot evacuate the meconium or digest anything... very sad way to die. But people breed them because the heterozygous form is completely fine and very pretty.
I appreciate you making a video to let us know why you don't have an issue with it. My stance however is that I want to in no way endorse intentional breeding of an animal that has an issue that could impact their quality of life for the reason that it looks cool. Take the dog example, a genetic predisposition towards being docile and friendly doesn't take away quality of life. Plenty of breeds do have issues relating to form that give them quality of life issues and I disagree with their breeding as well. I think people should be made aware and the potential severity should be made clear, but each person makes their own choice. And comparing them to people with autism, eh I find that sketchy. Pet snakes live their whole lives in a box, their lives are what we make them. I feel like we have an obligation to make it the best that it can be, including not creating snakes intentionally with the potential for a lesser quality of life. Humans do not live in a box completely controlled by another being, our lives are what we make them. Humans have the brains to make comparative value judgements, they can say they would rather live as they are than normal, that is valid. Snakes can't. There is no trade off here for a positive in any way that benefits the snake's quality of life, there are really only potential negatives for the snake. That is why I find it immoral and even if they are better eaters, I will not be swayed and won't support their breeding. It is okay if people disagree and if others choose to buy them, but they should be aware.
There's limited supporting academic research to wobble in spiders. Which is why many people are not in favor for outright banning them as it could be something as simple as a random mutation that occurs later in life , an enzyme not being used properly, etc. An emotional argument without facts to support your side is just humans personifying something and thinking it is horrible without considering facts. It makes the emotional argument a fallacy by not being willing to change based on evidence
@@hashimrahman51 that data is from breeders reporting if they know of wobble in spider morphs and if they've seen it. That's not an academic study that determines the cause. And wobble is in other morphs so again an academic study and research needs to be done to see it's exact cause. I'm on the side of science proving theories instead of jumping to conclusions that could be wrong and impact other morphs for the same reason
With the dog example, he brought up a good example of a breed that is fine instead of a pug or a bulldog that is known to have breathing issues. He has good points otherwise. I don't know enough about snakes to judge if this is similar to a pug or a golden retriever.
I don’t agree with you but I’ll respect your opinion. I think it’s immoral to breed them just for the sake of the aesthetics I can obviously go into this further and elaborate why I don’t think that we should breed the spider morph but I think this says it all :)
Yeah you shouldn’t purposefully breed something that will be disabled but if you already have one or want to adopt one give it a nice life however don’t breed them or buy from a breeder
Let me pretense this with saying that this isn't an attempt to call you out or anything, it's just an honest question: If you think breeding something due to aesthetics is immoral, then how do you feel about like 50% of all dog breeds that have legitimate medical conditions due to selective breeding for specific physical traits? Edit: I ask this question becuase I feel like people tend to overlook stuff like this in these kind of arguments just because they've been around for so long that people just kind of accept that they are a thing and move on.
@@metalman6698 I personally think we shouldn't have done it. I feel culturally we are only newly becoming conscious of the processes that took place to get some animals to where they are today. I think and like to think that majority of people look back on that in a negative light. Not super negatively, but I don't think it makes people feel good to think back on how and why we have pugs. I just feel like we shouldn't be breeding naturally "useless" and many times seemingly disabled animals for the purpose of having a living painting in a glass box in their house.
I appreciate your take on the spider morph. I still am leaning towards it needing to be regulated more. I’ve seen videos of really bad wobbles from spiders and them corkscrewing constantly and it is heartbreaking. While some are “okay and somewhat normal” is not a justified reason to breed them if a large population of them having severe issues that do hinder their ability to thrive and eat. Self injury is incredibly high in spiders, because they lack the coordination to strike their meals properly and…lach onto themselves. I think until people can do more actual research, breeders should stop pumping them out so much. Breeding at the end of the day is about money, and they will sell what is popular, no matter if some animals they sell have severe debilitating issues. I’m glad not all spiders suffer from this issue, but the genetic components of spiders leaves some of these snakes with difficult lives. I’m completely against the breeding of smushed faced dog breeds (pugs, boxers, bulldogs, etc), because it gives them a lower quality of life. I view this as somewhat of the same issue. Breeders need to do more research, instead of selling breeds/morphs just because they sell fast and for higher prices. Quality of life is really all i care about in these situations.
I appreciate your well thought out argument, however I still disagree. If we are in direct control of the breeding process I see no reason to produce an animal that has a high probably to have a neurological disorder. Aesthetic is not that important. I feel as though the dog comparison is unfair. Dogs were purposely bred to complete tasks whereas snakes are bred to just look a certain way. While in the wild dogs with floppy ears have a disadvantage the truth is those floppy ears allow them to better interact with humans, which was the intended purpose. I don’t see what the intended purpose of the spider ball python is, other than aesthetic.
I'm not saying that spider and dogs are the same, I'm just saying that because a mutation has an impact on the behavior and not only the appearance of an animal, that does not mean that it is "bad". Whether it is bad, good, or neutral still needs to be determined.
Pugs have health issues from nose to tail. And were only bred to be “companion dogs.” Originally for royals in China. (Literally because of how they looked.) I don’t know that much about Spider BP because I’m new to reptiles. But I wanted to point that out. Obviously that wasn’t the comparison made, but it easily could be. Though it probably wouldn’t help to strengthen the argument. I’ve met a lot of pugs who struggle just to breathe.
What data have you seen to support the hypothesis that spiders have a higher probability than any other ball python? I see a ton of people on here really giving him a hard time, but none basing their arguments on any actual data. I mean I can't find anything at all online other than hearsay on forums to support this argument.
@@ClintsReptiles Clint my dude, have you ever had vertigo? Not just dizziness, but actual real VERTIGO? It's horrible. It's physically unpleasant and incredibly distressing, even debilitating.
Although it doesn't change my personal opinion, this does raise several points that I csn see the logic to. It's refreshing to see an argument presented so respectfully. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to learn about other sides of an argument without hostility. It lets us all make more informed decision
This is an older video now, And I have avoided watching it, because I really admire your content, and today I finally got to listen to your opinion...and I really cannot agree with you on it. I come from a family who has done some dog breeding, and comparing neurological issues to something like floppy ears or a "friendly disposition" is really misleading. So, for an example, for the type of dogs we bred, they generally came in 3 color categories, Blue Merle, and Red and Black Tris. Blue Merle were the most expensive color, so most desirable to breed, but there is a problem. Breeding two Blues together would lead to any puppies that survived till birth deaf, and usually blind. They would also have much more white compared to the parents, with a very distinctive look. In my opinion, breeding Spiders is like purposely crossing two Blue Merle, since, while a blind/deaf dog would die in the wild, it would still be able to eat, drink, breed and play in a household, and hey, dogs mostly rely on smell anyway, right? Would it be worth the cost to have such a distinct looking dog? Most people would say definitively not. Spider ball pythons live, eat and breed, sure, but the issues they have are not really something to downplay...many Spider ball pythons cannot even flip themselves over, and will slither on their backs if placed upside down, cannot look about when held, I've seen many struggle to strike prey, sometimes even biting themselves in confusion. I can only imagine them living their life as if they are dizzy constantly, sure, they don't know anything different, so it wouldn't be particularity distressing to them, but it makes just....being a snake harder than it should be on them. Purposely breeding snakes like this, seems wrong to me, since it's only just for a color pattern, there are so many other cool looking ball pythons to breed, Spiders should just be let to fade away.
Im neutral in this argument for spiders and would not breed them myself but when you say, "breeding Spiders is like purposely crossing two Blue Merle" Its more like crossing two spiders, which is highly frowned upon because super spiders will have extreme wobble and most likely lethal. That's why people don't just like you don't cross two Blue Merles together. "many Spider ball pythons cannot even flip themselves over" Almost every single one does, I'd say 99.9% of the time they are perfectly fine and. It's unfortunate to see that 0.1% but still extremely rare. Also, I know this is a older comment but whatever
I agree, a large point missed is whether they can thrive or not. In reality, we would want for all animals to be able to thrive, but the breeding of them creates more animals that cannot thrive. They should not have to require extra attention and care to make sure they can survive as a *pet*. I’m sure if people were asked, if they could take away the neurological problems spiders have, to allow them to thrive.. people would say yes. But then their actions say otherwise.. huh? Doesn’t sit right with me
You should have also shown an example of a Spider that does show the neurological issues heavily. GoHerping has a good example of it in his video and you should definitely check that video out. The "wobble" is so bad that the snake has such issues that often it bites itself while feeding. The issues can get so bad that it heavily effects the snakes quality of life. Also I don't like the "autistic" argument we have resources and more understanding of autism and we can deal with it vs spiders there's not much we can do to help it deal with its neurological issues. If you want to see a good reason why not to breed them definitely check out GoHerping's video on it (Its one of his most viewed videos so it shouldn't be hard to find ) I wish this wasn't such a big thing lol I hope someone can find a way to get rid of the problems in spiders so we don't have to worry about stuff like this but until then I feel like any breeding of spiders should not be for profit but for research/educational purposes. Or just stop completely if we can't find a way to fix the issues they have. I agree they look nice and even though all of them don't turn out badly I think enough do that it can be seen as harmful to continue it. I know that spiders are not inbred but as an example we know that inbreeding in humans can cause genetic defects so we make sure to educate people on that and regulate it heavily. This all goes with other snakes that have common and repeat issues as well like cinnamon's. I am glad that you at least do care about your snakes and you are educating about the issues so thanks for that haha. There's too many breeders out there that just want the large profit they get from this breed and they do not tell people about any of the issues they have so they can make a better decision about getting one.
I have seen his video. That spider is one of the most severe examples I have ever seen. That said, all ball pythons miss and will do that if you place a feeder between their head and their body.
Go Herping is a poorly informed kid with like 3 years on the hobby that has come to some unfortunate conclusions based on his really limited knowledge on the topic. His heart is in th right place, but you can't base your opinion on a single few extreme cases.
The plural of anecdote is not data. That was sort of the whole point of the video. I think it’s incredibly sad how dysfunctional that snaked looked, but the worst example of the condition in a highly edited video by an uniformed teenager is not how we should be making these decisions. I think his heart is truly in the right place, and he may even be right, but it’s not the right way to find out. Also, go herping’s video is extremely popular. Clint is well informed and discussed videos like that in this video. I would assume he saw it, even if he didn’t confirm that here.
1. That kid showed a bad case that was also a rescue, right? So how much of that is just poor keeping? 2. It *IS* a case of inbreeding. Most people on the interwebs snake community just pass genes back and forth.. This always makes bad things worse. Combine that with unscrupulous hack breeders (the majority, you know it's true) chasing those insta clicks and quick clutch dollars. Then, the whole thing snowballs into poor ol Cinnamon being held up as "muh evurdah spahdur pithawn! Alluvem iz bad! REEEEEEE!" with all the NPC followers soaking it up and REEEEEEE-ing till it's "cawmun nawlij" among the well informed #lookatmetooalsostillmoreagain internet consumers who want to be seen as significant on their ego platform of choice. Ego driven sloppiness. Well cared for snakes from clutches with distant parents don't wobble. Now if those snakes are poorly kept? Well, how is that different from any other species or morph being abused till it's damaged? People rail on German Shepherd breeders for hip problems in pups because it's a sign of poor selection in parents. Why is that not the case with snakes? It's not the snake's fault that the breeders won't do what is known to work well to make good snakes.
I must say i don't particularly agree with you. Snakes are often kept in poor conditions due to lack of care or education that's just a sad fact. Spiders being easily accessible and as you mentioned prone to becoming worse with bad care end up having a poor quality of life even after getting rescued if their condition became worse. If we continue ignoring well known issues (in other animals as well) we risk becoming dismissive of worse issues in the future. Having said that your opinions and reasoning do make more sense than a lot of others i have seen so keep up the good work ^^ And could you please make a blood python review? I'm very curious of what you have to say about them!
I’m sorry,maybe it’s just me,but I don’t get why would you breed a snake or a gecko or whatever animal just for a goddamn morph that can led to having neurological issues . Even tho there might be a small possibility of a snake having issues due to their morph, just don’t breed it. There are many other morphs that don’t include issues. I don’t get it . And also I’m kinda sick of people saying “you won’t even notice it” because there are some serious cases. I will still continue to follow you because you give really great informations and you are one of the best reptile tubes out there. But still
Rambo Jambo true, but this is a morph you KNOW will have issues. Some can have it minor and some can be very serious but no matter what ALL spiders have a varying degree of neurological issues because they’re spiders
In family genetics of humans for example where we can have neurological, visual, and mental abnormalities that we can pass down is it unethical for these people to reproduce?
@@andrewl9169 Imo it isn't unethical. There will always be chances of a baby being born with a disability, however it's very different if your purposely breeding them. For example if someone has a genetic disability that affects their quality of life in a negative way, but they decide to reproduce because they themselves are beautiful then it IS unethical. But if someone has a baby that has severe mental issues then it isn't unethical, it's just life.
Thank you, for this video! When I decided I wanted a Ball python, I did my research...what type/size of enclosure, temperature/humidity, lifespan, size, substrate, etc. When I had an enclosure ready, I went online and chose the one that I thought was the most beautiful, a Spider. I didn't know about the "Spider wobble", but found out about it soon after getting him. When I ordered him, I was told he was eating live mice. I offered him a frozen/thawed for his first meal with me and he didn't hesitate to take it. He has been such a good eater, even though he sometimes doesn't quite get it on his first try. I recently decided it was time to make the switch from mice to rats. He refused the first two times I offered a rat, but ate it on the third offering. ☺❤🕷🐍 I've had people make me feel like I should be ashamed for having a Spider bp, but I absolutely love him! Thanks again for this video!
I REALLY appreciate how open minded you are. The fact that you to study and look into the subject shows that's you care. I wish more people could be the same.
Some people with autism are severely disabled and can't even speak. I hate this myth that everyone with autism has a mild condition. Autism can be absolutely debilitating.
Also the myth that everyone with autism has some 'extra ability'. I can also say from experience, would those that do have this give it up to be normal? Some of them, hell yes they would.
I know I'm late to this debate but I have to throw in my two cents. Pretty much everything has already been said and I do appreciate your approach in that it is both scientific and comes from a place of kindness towards animals. But there are a few things that keep sticking out to me in this debate and they seem not to be covered a lot. 1. There is no such thing as a 'perfect' version of an animal, and yes, in pet animals color variations are not an issue as your house is hopefully predator-free. But we are not talking about a healthy animal, we are talking about an animal that is suffering from something akin to, say, epilepsy, Parkinson's, or MS. Sure it could be very mild and thus not affect the snake's life quality much but a number of owners have shown videos of snakes biting themselves by accident during feeding, corkscrewing, not being able to flip over when they are flipped on their back.... I don't think anyone would look at a snake like this and say 'if I were a ball python, THIS is the kind I'd want to be.' (And saying 'I wouldn't want to be any kind' is a cop-out - if you were given a chance between being a 'regular' one and a severely wobbly spider one, I'm pretty sure which you'd choose.) 2. The fact that the double copy of the gene flat out kills the animal before it is born is a.... hint that nature doesn't think this is a great idea? And sure, a good pet is not the same as a good wild animal. But I have a hard time seeing how something that misses its meal and chews on its own body instead is 'a better pet' than something that can just, like, eat a mouse without self harm. 3. Aside from the 'do you breed them' issue, there are issues of are people being informed about what a 'wobble' is, as well as how bad it can get. But people who breed them commercially will never volunteer this information because lots of people would be turned off from buying this snake. You keep saying 'if you are informed it can be a great pet for you' and I strongly agree with that. But what would you do if you sold a baby spider with a slight wobble, explained it as best you could, but then years later the new owners called you in distress because the wobble had gotten severe and the animal was hardly able to stay upright or feed itself and the owners were despondent? 4. When you breed spiders and you get a particularly bad one in a clutch, what would you do with it? What do commercial breeders who breed tons of them do with those who have more than just a funny little wobble? I'm not sure I want to know the answer, I seriously doubt they are all given great and secure homes for their natural lifespan. 5. You said in the other video you never had a bad case of spider wobble in the clutches you raised, but you did receive one as a prize and ended up trading it away later. So.... you entered the draw because you wanted to win the prize (a ball python), but once you had received an animal that was, essentially, severely disabled, you didn't think it had 'different wiring that is possibly a hidden superpower', you felt it wasn't right for you to keep and you traded it away. Something that seems a little difficult to square with risking bringing more of them into the world. I know this is probably a 'TLDR' situation but essentially, I also respect that everything we do as humans is graded on a morality scale and we all sit at different points on that scale. I really appreciate you are leading an open and respectful debate and we should all talk about these things more. But if you wouldn't want to be one, and you wouldn't want to have one..... maybe you shouldn't risk making one either? My two cents.
You hit a lot of the points that really got to me with this video. I enjoy his content but I'm not a fan of the cop-out, waxing philosophical answers that avoid the question altogether, and i'm glad this comment section called him out on it. The floppy ears on a dog = the flipping, self-biting snake part especially.
And almost all of those videos the animal is a rescue , meaning the husbandry was completely out of wack. I have seen a lot more spiders that have little to no wobble then I have of the super screwed up ones.
Regarding your second point - what's your thoughts on Basset hounds and Dachshunds? Both breeds have short-limb dwarfism resulting in their distinctive body shape. Most forms of short-limb dwarfism, including (AFAIK) the forms affecting those two breeds, are lethal in homozygotes.
I think that if all companies who breed and sell spider ball pythons are willing to be as careful as possible to minimize the wobble, that spider ball pythons would not have to be banned. Animals can have defects in the wild as well that are around the same level as a major spider wobble. The minor ones aren’t very serious. Although I still am not for it, that would at least be a solution.
From what I've seen, the times the wobble gets bad seems to be more from something going off in incubation, too much heat, or poor care. High temperatures _will_ cause neurologic damage in _any_ snake, and spider ball pythons may simply be more susceptible to that - meaning they just need to have a bit more mindful care.
There’s no way to do that in the breeding process though. The spider gene carries this inner ear problem that causes them to lose their equilibrium, some more frequently and/or more severely than others. How badly the animal is affected by this defect doesn’t seem to be something that breeders can control one way or the other.
You're kidding; if you actually believe that, you've never seen one with major wobble. Personally, as someone who has seen one miss when going after a pinkie and spend half an hour trying to eat itself because it managed to bounce off the wall of the enclosure and mistake its own stomach for a mouse, it's pretty obvious that animal would not survive in the wild.
Very rare, very interesting lizard. I have recently seen some pics on an esoteric 'conspiracy' based YT channel where these appeared to have pale blue eyes which although very small proportionally looked amazing. However as it was such a site I am not sure whether the images were further doctored for 'reptilian' clickbait reasons or whether they were genuine untouched representative images of at least those specimens under those particular lighting conditions. I think YT channel was The Daily Rabbit hole ( ?) or The Outer Light (?) by some guy called 'Ed'.
My sister has a cat with cerebellar hypoplasia which is basically the cat version of wobble. She a beautiful cat who has an amazing life, isn't stressed or in pain and doesn't know she's any different from any other cat, but would I breed her for her to try to reproduce her unique and beautiful markings? Absolutely not. Even though she loves life and has as good of a life she can have, she does not have the same quality of life as a regular cat. She can't jump, she can't play and hunt like all cats love to do, she can barely walk without falling over and she has knocked most of her teeth out because she can't control her head when eating. She may not know that there's anything wrong with her, but I know her quality of life is worse than her siblings. Personally I would never ever breed a defective animal because they look nice even if we can't make a case for them suffering more or less than any other animal because odds are that defect is just gonna get worse with time. btw, I don't mean to sound rude but comparing spiders wobble, a central nervous system disorder to autism a neurological and developmental disorder isn't a very strong case and as someone with autism I'm really sick of this comparison.
One thing that doesn't sit right with me is that I see mostly breeders defending the continued breeding of spider ball pythons. Breeders are directly profiting from pushing the idea that spider morph's neurological disorders are not that bad. You can make the case that there are some good breeders who will self police and try to breed spiders with the "least amount of wobble" but that's not good enough. Spider morphs sell for a lot of money, that's motivation enough to push the idea that the aesthetic of this morph is more important than it's quality of life, and it is a quality of life issue. There are too many videos of spiders who have trouble feeding, and that's not to mention the horror stories of spiders drowning in their water bowls. The comparison to dog breeding doesn't further your point either, as most people who are informed about the issues that specific breeds face (pugs, bulldogs, and dachshunds for example) are not in favor of the continued breeding of these animals. I don't care that a pug's squished face is cute, I care that they struggle to breathe and their eyeballs are at risk of popping out of their sockets. Aesthetics should never trump the health of an animal. I understand that you have your opinion, but I think that the fact that a majority of your audience disagrees with you says a lot.
I’m shocked that someone as typically knowledgeable as Clint would think that that was a good analogy. Anyone who knows anything about dogs knows that those breeds have a plethora of debilitating health issues.
Hey Clint, I have to say I'm also impressed that people were so willing to hear you out on this... I understand that you have way more experience with reptiles than I do or probably will ever have, but I don't think the 'evidence' your talking about is really evidence it sounds more like your own observations. I've never really seen any studies on this and if there are any you can recommend I'd be glad to go through them. Also im not so convinced that the wobble itself is always causing stress to the snake, but if a snake was to miss a strike and injure itself this would definitely cause stress and I have seen plenty of videos of spiders missing their food when striking when they have a more severe wobble. Adding on to this if the snake only takes live, the wobble is severe enough, and the snake isn't being monitored whilst a live rat is being presented the spider isn't going to have much of a chance to defend itself if the rat fights back. I have no idea if this is the way you feed your snakes and I'm not saying it is but their are breeders on RUclips that do and that suggests even more breeders outside of the platform do the very same thing, and as someone else you were talking to in the comments mentioned even if this isn't a snake problem but more of a people problem that doesn't mean the snake is safe. Sorry for the terrible formatting I'm on mobile.
Normal BP also frequently miss they're food when striking. When feeding any BP the keeper is expected to position the rat so that there aren't any hard objects to either side or directly behind it. It's not just a concern for spiders, it's a general BP husbandry issue. If any snake isn't being monitored or checked on regularly while being fed a live prey item, that's considered bad husbandry. I've never heard anyone argue that point (except when feeding pinkies, which don't bite). It kind of sounds like you're saying "if the husbandry is bad, that would be bad for a spider BP." While true, that seems to me like an issue with someone being misinformed to the detriment of their pet. Any BP in a scenario with the type of owner you describe would be at risk of injury. I agree that a spider would likely be at higher risk but being a spider wouldn't be the root cause of a feeding injury.
Clint is trying to present an argument that vindicates what he is going as correct. He isn't following the evidence to it's conclusion he is picking what he thinks supports his a priori position that spider balls are just great. It's super disappointing.
@@NaraMouse101 I definitely agree that a spider will most likely be fine with good husbandry but so will most snakes... I can link videos of people casually throwing rats into tubs with ball pythons, some of which are spiders... I actually didn't know it was common for a ball pythons to miss a strike, I've cared for snakes other than BP's and their have been bad strikes but never full misses so thanks for that info.
@@spuilloh2637 I certainly can't find any published studies at all never mind ones with merit... It's definitely disappointing and I feel like he's basing this of his own experiences and not considering the overall morality of the morph. He's saying that he will take scientific reasoning above anything else but what scientific reason is there for a spider BP to be more successful? I don't think we know any and without any studies to back that point up it's utterly meritless. There's certainly reasons why they wouldn't be as successful such as a severe wobble causing missed strikes and a higher chance of suffering when poor husbandry such as the reckless live feeding is provided. I think he's probably tried to convince himself that these animal are fine to breed because he wants to keep breeding them, but that's just a guess.
I'm sorry Clint, but in my opinion every single breeder of spiders is just choosing aesthetic over the health of an animal. It's kind of interesting also that you spoke against emotional appeal, then opened with one.
Wyatt Milliken I very much agree with you. People don’t Mary other people with the thought of “oh, if I marry this person than I will have a child with a physical/mental disability. I usually agree with Clint too, but I will consider the health of my animal over all priorities.
This is perhaps the best defense of breeding the Spider Ball Python I have watched to date. It is a difficult gauge to consider when there are certainly some permissible dog breeds that may be infinitely more debilitated than Spider Ball Pythons inflicted with the wobble. You made an outstanding conclusion regarding domestication of these animals which may render those debilitations trivial. I think many may take the dignity approach which is incredibly subjective to begin with. So long as it has been well fed, has sufficient means of play/exercise, and has the capacity to live a full lifespan (provided the animal is not being raised for slaughter) I believe that qualifies for a dignified life as a domesticated animal.
I have to say I feel like the wolf v. Dog argument is invalid. We haven’t domesticated snakes. The breeding of particular dog breeds with issues that impact their quality and length of life would have been better. Pugs are prone to respiratory issues, Dalmatian get arthritis.... spider balls and jungle jags can get wobbles. My jag had a wobble.
I agree, a lot of people use the dog argument but I also disagree with breeding dog breeds that are aesthetic over quality of life and physical conditions
We haven't domesticated snakes, but it is a good comparison. Dogs were bred for looks and temperament, spider ball pythons are being bred for looks and temperament. The wobble is there, it always will be, but the same is for every pure bred dog. German shepherds are very well known for joint and hip issues, and some even at a young age will be unable to really walk or function while most older ones will most likely get hip dysplasia or arthritis, so should we ban GSD? The answer is no, we just need to be careful on how we breed them and keep in mind that it is a thing with them. You could have one from a great breeder and it still gets hip issues. You could have one and never have these issues. But a backyard or puppy mill breeder doesn't care and breeds just for the money. Which can cause a seriously unhealthy dog, as is the same for people who neglect their dogs. A Shepard puppy was left outside on concrete and nothing soft to lay on, it was rescued and needed help learning to walk again cause the concrete messed its joints up. So same for the dogs as with spider ball pythons, it takes careful breeding, understanding, care and the knowledge that it is there and it could happen but they can also live very long happy, functional lives.
I just stumbled over a research regarding this issue. A team around F. Schrenk found structural differences in the inner ear morphology of spider ball pythons that seems to be the reason for the wobble. Reference: Comparative assessment of computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging of the spider morph of Python regius and wild type Python regius to evaluate the morphological correlate of the wobble syndrome (Schrenk 2022)
For me the discussion is about success in captivity. In the context of captivity a BEL isn't hindered in its ability to be a healthy ball python because of that specific characteristic. We breed morphs as exploring genetics, especially for colouration. Spiders have a colouration many find desirable and so wish to perpetuate. This comes with their neurological issues as a package deal. They are known to be 'good eaters' (that is if they aren't hindered by the wobble to the severity that they can't). But that isn't the reason for breeding them, since if the appetite really was the goal people wouldn't be placing emphasis on keeping the colouration despite the neurological issues, they would just go and look for other genes that help with appetite and not the spider genes. I think the reason for rescue pythons perhaps having worse wobble, also has the potential be *due* to them having bad wobble. It could, as we don't know yet, not be caused by the previous situation but be linked to it. If that previous owner wasn't able to care for them as the wobble worsened perhaps that is a factor in their needing to be rescued. It's a case of correlation and causation Success in captivity. I don't care for placing an emphasis on aesthetics for the sake of neurological problems. Issues that snakes have that can be accommodated by a more forgiving environment. The trait of light sensitivity (that appears in albino snakes for example) can be accommodated without compromising on the husbandry of their environment. And BEL don't need to worry about predators, making them able to have equal success in captivity. When the functioning of the snake is impaired in a way that can't be accommodated for and still have a comparable standard of husbandry, then I would not wish to perpetuate that genetically. If it's a mutation that just happens then yeah hat snake deserves the best care we can give it. But to choose to place emphasis and choose breed *for* characteristics like the spider genes, is not the same. Breeding of animals is eugenics. It's selective breeding. For me it is the act of choosing to give a snake wobble. For those who will and have tried to make the arguement of pro-spider by comparing selective breeding in animals to human eugenics, I do have something to say, from the perspective of an autistic person myself. Human eugenics is evil, and *not* comparable to the breeding of animals in terms of eugenics. It is not the same ethically, and humans should not be selectively bred, nor should they be exterminated for their differences. So when those who are *pro-spider* who bring up human eugenics (sometimes with the specific example of autistic people 👀) and say that breeding for spider genes is ok because they deserve life, are making a leap that doesn't really follow. So pro- spider, we are talking about *animals.* Breeding animals... You in this scenario *already are* partaking in eugenics. That's what this is. It's not a very valid comparison to say "human eugenics bad, therefore my specific choices in snake eugenics aren't bad". You can't bring up 'human eugenics wrong because all people deserve life' as a reason for *your choices* in the *eugenics* of snakes therefore being ok? You are *already making choices on the genetic profile of a living thing.* They get to be born and pass on certain genes due to *your* preferences. So... you can choose. You *are choosing* what kind of snake you are bringing into the world. If you were anti-eugenics in animals, you wouldn't be participating at all... *not* bringing up neurodivergent and disabled people as examples for something which for the logic and point of that specific argument is isn't valid. People can disagree. But that is an example of an argument I wish people would understand doesn't make sense. I am curious and open to hearing other points of view, but this specific appeal isn't coherant for the point it tries to make. Thankyou for listening. :)
Yeah, human eugenics doesn't factor into the discussion at all, because humans choose whether or not (and with whom) they want to reproduce, while animals are just doing what a breeder directs them to. The breeders are the ones choosing for the animals, which is why some people have an issue with it. Especially in cases where the animals are producing very unhealthy offspring or can't even give birth without surgery (an issue with some dogs). At that point the breeder is creating suffering, though the spider ball python defect is nowhere NEAR that extreme. The neurological issues of spider ball pythons may be overblown, but it is fair to not want to breed/buy them until we have more data about it. Believing that does not mean you have any problem with humans choosing reproductive partners for themselves, regardless of disability.
Preferring looks over welfare/neurological health of the animal one is breeding/keeping is highly unethical, and morally wrong. The animal must live with what the breeder has given it for the entirety of its life.
I'm also autistic, and resent the way Clint compared a debilitating neurological defect to people with autism. Given a choice, I'd give up any "benefits" of this disability for a neurotypical life. Most autistic people would, because it *sucks* being autistic, no matter which end of the spectrum you are on. That's my take, and I would like Clint to do some more research on autism before making any more claims about it.
I also have austism and I would not trade that away to be a neurotypical person, because I am content with the type of person that I am. Looks also contribute towards a better life, as animals with better aestethics also tend to be more loved and better cared for by their keepers, so breeding for aestethics is not necessarily immoral.
In what way is it ruining the animal’s welfare? His spider looks content. He explained the evidence that spiders actually do better in captivity than regular ball pythons. It seems to me the issue is more of poor ownership, worsening a spider’s condition, rather than the spider being forced to “suffer.” Also, he said himself comparing the spider to human conditions is a terrible idea, but he was trying to give them some credit by saying, “some ways you would compare would be...”
An animal constantly wobbling around and unable to control itself with a constant sense of vertigo sounds pretty wrong to me. You ever heard of enigma leopard geckos? They're identical syndromes, an aesthetic skin color genetically linked inextricably to a neurological syndrome that affects their balance as a dominant trait, except one has legs and the other doesn't. And ES is well known as not a good thing to breed into them. Why should it be different for the spider morphs? Would you condemn a human to a life of constant dizziness and unbalance? Why should it be any different for the animals? We have responsibilities to the animals in our care. Humans have choices in whether or not to spread their own dna around, no matter how messed up it may be. Animals that we have chosen to keep in captivity do not. It's entirely the owners choice whether or not to subject any possible offspring to a lifetime of misery and stress. It's not the snakes fault that it was born that way, but rather those who choose to allow it to continue. Here's a fun fact: there's an IDENTICAL morph called pinstripe, it has the *exact* same aesthetic but also NONE of the wobble. It's also easier to care for an animal that doesn't have a disability, so why people are advocating for a morph with no benefits to the snake when an easy identical problem free morph exists is beyond me. Spiders have wobble. Pinstripes do not. Neurotypical animals are easier to care for and breed and feed than one with constant vertigo. Ipso facto: the choice is clear. The one without a chance to have wobble is clearly the superior choice. There is no reason to advocate spider pythons. Unless, ofc, one is trying to sell them, and is trying to persuade people that they're not as bad as they really are.... But that could never happen... Could it? //Edit for spelling errors and grammar
@@quagmaTV It might seem wrong to you, but you are not a ball python and you cannot empathize with what makes this animal content and "happy". What is most important and contributes to the animal's quality of life as a pet is that it does well in captivity. Spider ball pythons wobbles vary greatly, where some cases are mild. They also do well captivity overall and therefore they're solid pets that can live a good life, meaning there's not really anything wrong with breeding them as long as you know what you're doing when it comes to minimize the wobble.
I get where you're coming from, but I disagree along with many of the others. A wobble isn't healthy for a snake. It makes them dizzy and terrified, they miss when striking, they hit their heads, etc. I saw a juvenile albino python with a wobble and it had scabs on its head and was terrified, constantly in a dizzy strike pose.
@@ClintsReptiles I personally don't support breeding spider ball pythons because of the wobble. Even though I understand your argument and where you're coming from, I don't like the idea of breeding a snake morph as humanly as possible even with the chance of getting a snake that may never be able to live a good life. Kind of like selectively breeding tourrets to get the least amount of symptoms, but there still being a chance of getting someone who can just barely eat brealfast in the morning. That's how I interpret it anyway, also kudos for responding to a comment on such an old video, love your content overall.
Something I’ve noticed with my own spider balls is as the snakes age, the wobble shows itself more. Never noticed a wobble from mine until they reached a certain age. I still love them.
Mason Morphs I’ve noticed my spiders wobble at food time. I have a variety of ages, and spider x morphs each one has a different degree of wobble from essentially none to corkscrewing. My spiders eat better than my pied or Mojave or normal. I love my spider bps. My hidden gene Woma and cinnamon have a slight wobble also.
I want to preface this with a thank you for covering this so thoroughly. As someone who has wobbles/tremors it does make my life harder. It makes me sad when people breed animals that they know will have a high chance of neurological issues, especially since it's so hard to know how they're affecting something that can't talk. I act perfectly normal and don't seem stressed to others, but I'm always kind of in pain from my muscles overacting. It's not fun. I think we need more research into their wobble and stress responses/elevated baseline stress before we can decide the wobble isn't a big deal. I do love that you discuss observing their stress responses and restlessness compared to other ball pythons. It would be good to know if their stress hormones are different. It seems like the wobble is exacerbated by early-life trauma/high stress, from what I've read, but it does make me worried about their quality of life in general.
People really do need to tell the difference between what sort of opinions and arguments are worth discussing. This here is actually one of those, and I wish you and others would take care to make that distinction. Thank you for your video, regardless. It was a very clear look into the complexity of breeding animals such as this.
I appreciate hearing your point of view but I feel like you are comparing apples to oranges when it comes to domestic traits and then traits that produce defects that mess with quality of life. Your dogs floppy ears are not going interfere with his ability to eat or play.
I want saying that they are the same thing. Snakes don't even have external ears 😉 What I'm saying is just because a mutation alters brain function, that does not mean that it is bad. That still needs to be determined.
Except apples and oranges are fruits that have been bred specifically for humans in some regard. And a friendlier wolf with floppier ears WILL do worse in the wild, harder to hunt when you don't hear as well and keep trying to play with your prey.
First off, props for presenting a respectful and well-though out argument. Personally, I've seen enough keepers come forward with examples of severe wobbles that I no longer feel comfortable describing the spider wobble as anything other than variable. While I think it's interesting to theorize that spiders with visibly severe wobbles primarily come from backgrounds of neglect or abuse, I haven't seen nearly enough proof of that myself to reach that conclusion. What do you think about keepers that report their spider's wobble getting increasingly severe with age? I'd be very interested to see a professional, unbiased study carried out to measure the severity of the wobble across different genetic lines and how those wobbles progress throughout time. While I think it's unlikely such a study will occur, a public facebook group for keepers to (respectfully) share their personal experiences with the spider ball python would be an interesting first step. Perhaps moderated/administrated by keepers with opinions on both sides of the spectrum. Ultimately though, my argument is one of pragmatism. I don't think any of us can reasonably claim to have enough actual hard data regarding the spider morph to reach a scientifically justified conclusion. And what is the benefit that outweighs the risk? Personally, I don't think their physical appearance is a compelling enough reason. However, I respect that you can feel differently! Thanks again for approaching the topic with care and for encouraging your supporters and the community to keep the debate polite and constructive.
I have strange relationship with the Spider morph. I brought my Ball Python when my Milksnake passed and when I was at shop I saw they had a Spider Yellowbelly who took my breath away. So I brought her and took home and fell in love with her. Bryce became an irreplaceable part of my life. I started to notice her head wobble more and more and I put it down to new noodles anxiety and it happened more prevalent when feeding coupled with her absolute terrible accuracy when feeding but it did still happen day to day. So I hit the old Internet and did some research and then learnt about the wobble and how it was an actual thing, I was not told about this at all and did ask the store about it and they said they don't breed spider but will get them in ( seems a bit counter intuitive). So after my research and learning more about the gene and wobble I changed my care and husbandary, example being rather then warming the whole mouse just the head to allow her pits to zone in. This didn't have complete success as she has missed and got me before causing some damage but never purposely. Now Bryce is an absolute 'puppy' of a snake. She never does 's' up never gives any kind of warning and just slithers around chill as anything and is an absolute joy but there are feeding issues which can I relent also be BP attributes. I love her to death and couldn't imagine not having her but had I known about the wobble I probably wouldn't have even looked at Spiders and also had I been told once I picked her out probably would have put her back. I want to start breeding snakes in the future but I will not breed Bryce as I don't think we should pass a neurological issue in form in a purposeful way which is my opinion and I wouldn't push that on anyone. Respectful discussions in disagreements and broading mindsets with experience based knowledge is important and does not require insulting or emotion outbursts. I love your channel as it feels so open and honest and everything is put forward so effortlessly professional. If I lived on the US and not the UK coming to your place and meeting you would be a bucket list endeavour.
I’m autistic and I don’t appreciate having my disability used as an analogy or justification for breeding spider ball pythons. We know that spider ball pythons all have a wobble to varying degrees, and breeding them increases the risk of getting snakes that have a lower quality of life. Yes breeding snakes always comes at the risk of random health defects popping up, but we should always try to keep that risk as low as possible. It’s upsetting to me when people compare me as an autistic person to an animal, especially when it’s being done to justify doing something that I don’t endorse.
I still completely disagree, as I think we don’t yet understand the complexity these neurological effects have on the daily lives of snakes. But, I have great respect for you, your opinions, and responsible breeding practices. These discussions are very important so our opinions all evolve! And hopefully this will also help those who do breed ball python’s have better breeding practices.
Im sorry. I will desagree in this one. I have a boa constrictor with neurological issues similar to the spider gene and its just heart breaking, and his cuality of life is oviusly deminished. Its just plain cruel. I also happen to have a genetic desorder called Marfan Syndrome I am super tall and skinny (everyone tells me Im so lucky too look "like a model" ) , but I HURT all the time, and my lungs have collapsed 2 times Im almost blind in one eye and had 2 operations to be able to walk. Im sorry , thers no excuse for morphs with this kind of defects and your arguments dont meke up for it :(
Can I just say that domestication is different from the breeding that goes into reptiles dogs are bred to act a certain way and fit into certain situations reptiles are just about always bred for special color mutations making your argument of “A bad wolf” in my opinion not as valid of a claim
Yeah, snakes still share the behavior of their wild counterparts at birth. If you were to release a juvenile captive bred before it got acclimated to indoor life, into its natural habitat it would do all a wild snake does until it gets eaten for not being camouflaged.
Its not different than shihtzus pugs...its for looks. Should they not be allowed to.live even if an owner is willing to give them a comfy life and care for them properly?
+Yuki We're not saying euthanize existing snakes. We're saying to stop breeding the spider balls, as they have a major issue. If we keep breeding for aesthetic rather than health, are we going to end up with the dog issue again?
@@michaelbonj4090you have missed the point a little here. All he wants you to take from this is that regardless of the trait, behavioral or visual, some traits are better suited in the wild while others are perfect for ONLY attracting a human to take the animal as a pet. Once you grasp this concept, his other points build on this and develop his entire argument further. Far too many people on this thread already had their minds made up and no matter what Clint said, he was never going to change their minds...
Ive seen nothing other than positive results with the Spiders I've owned. It's only when breading is done regardless of detrimental characteristics being a likely result that i take issue. An aside, My mother bought my father a rainbow boa when she was pregnant with me. I was 15 when it passed away. She was a wonderful pet that I used as an educational tool to teach my fellow students that most of what they "knew" about snakes was wrong.
Clint I think the comparison to domestic dogs falls flat. The controversy here is really around the severe end of the neurological issues. It's not about being "not natural" it's about breeding for a disorder that reduces the health, lifespan, and quality of life of the animal. That said, later in the video when you talk about how spiders on average do better in captivity, are better eaters, etc compared to "regular" balls that was much more interesting and convincing. I appreciate your time in making this video. As an aside, when you talk about people "having autism" you're using outdated verbiage. The APA has reclassified all previous Autism DXs (things like aspergers, PDD-NOS, etc) into one, over arching DX "Autism Spectrum Disorder" and so the correct way to say this is to say someone is "on spectrum." This is as of the DSM-V revision. It is also an incorrect stereotype to describe all people on spectrum as having some other "mental superpower" ah la Rain Man. While this is true in many cases it often isn't. I didn't at all think you were trying to be in any way insensitive here but wanted to offer this feedback as my son is on spectrum and I know there's a lot to keep up with ☺️
Im a new viewer and im glad to see that the comment section wasn't filled with rage comments, but ones wanting an explanation and curiosity on others point of view(i learned of the channel thanks to your collaboration with snake discovery)
You don't intentionally breed for autism, like specifically knowing autism will be the result of the breeding. I think that would be unethical. That was a weird comparison.
I always appreciate your factual view on controversial topics. I am lucky enough to have a ball python with the spider gene (leopard bumblebee) and she exhibits no neurological symptoms and has the greatest disposition. Keep up the great content Clint!
Hey Clint. I agree with your assertions and observations for the most part, but there are key points that I cannot agree with. In short, I believe that their suffering is not something that can simply be quantified by lifespan and what anyone PERCEIVES as stress. Furthermore, I believe that no amount of detriment's importance, experienced in a creatures intended environment and caused by a controllable source, should be outweighed by a desire for something that is purely aesthetic. More research needs to be done to discover what degree of detriment these creatures experience throughout their long lifespans. Humanity has almost exclusively erred on the side of reckless adoption of new things without researching consequences or results, and it is something that I think we will continue to do for as long as we exist. It is human nature to be more curious than cautious, especially so when it isn't our hides on the tanning rack. Whether this is good or bad I think is clear. Historically speaking it has cost millions of lives. (Smoking, Drinking, Drugs, Weapons, War) I think until we have things figured out regulations should be created, in some capacity, to prevent the worst of these situations. I would love to have a longer conversation regarding this, but I don't believe the comments section of a RUclips video is the appropriate place. If you are by chance interested, let me know.
Thank you for making this video. It was very informative. You've brought up a lot of interested things that I didnt know about spiders. I'm still not a fan of the idea of breeding them, but now I don't feel quite so harshly towards those who do.
Just to say thanks - in general - for so many really great and helpful reptile vids, beautifully spoken, informative and with obvious love. And in particular that in this video the way Clint speaks about autism is wonderful, and joyful, and as compassionate as the way he speaks about reptiles... which is saying a lot :)
Love this video! Thank you for sharing it, I’m sure it wasn’t 100% easy to make! Spiders are such a controversial topic right now. And while I am against the breeding of them, it’s always always nice to hear what informed people have to say! I have to say that this video is by far the best I’ve seen! I love that this is mostly sparking a really calm and rational conversation between people who disagree! Being on social media, I’ve seen many discussions spiral out because of disgust and anger where constructive communication becomes impossible! So I think videos and conversation starters like this are absolutely a step in the right direction for the reptile community (and globally as well)! Thank you again for this thoughtful and interesting video! I’ll definitely be watching it a few more times!💚🐍
Thank you so much for saying this. If there is one thing I am willing to stand up for, and even take some abuse for, it is polite discourse. If we can't have respectful conversations, what is left for us?
I personally think that this is one of those things that becomes neutral morally. A lot of people are making arguments about the spider being nice looking but damaged, but as you said it fairs better than most other captive snakes. As for them worsening their wobble in poor care, pretty much all snakes will suffer with poor husbandry. Some non spiders can become disabled or even die with poor care. So a good study to really see how spiders fair vs other snakes would have to be “are spiders more likely to become disabled with poor care vs other snakes and to what degree.” That would be difficult to study but without the answer to that question we can’t really know if it’s unethical to breed them. Furthermore should we stop breeding easy to kill reptiles like chameleons just because many of them die early due to poor care? I don’t think so. In the end I think people often lose the ability to be objective with animals because we project on them (when animals do not have the same emotions or cognitive processes as us) and honestly we just think they are cute. I would probably not get a spider, but that is just because I don’t really want one, not for a moral reason.
I completely respect that you have more knowledge, experience, and research, and I very much respect your opinion. However, from the other reptile owners I’ve heard from and the cases I see, many spiders don’t do well in captivity. The wobble can cause them to accidentally bite themselves, struggle to feed well, mobility, it just makes their life harder. I wouldn’t say that we should outlaw a snake that has a chance of a neurological condition, but every spider ball python has that gene, and in my opinion breeding them is breeding snakes that you know could have difficult lives before they even come out of the egg. From my perspective, this isn’t a worth while payoff for a specific scale pattern. To each their own though, thank you for sharing your experience with them!
Thank you for this video!!! The one point of discussion I have not seen AT ALL in this debate is the quality of life for these snakes. When it comes down to it that’s what counts. We, as humans, might not *like* the wobble, and if a person doesn’t want a spider/doesn’t breed them personally that’s perfectly fine. But, if the snake’s quality of life is on par with any other ball python your personal emotional reaction is irrelevant.
Clint, it does seem like you're taking the anecdote that spiders are better eaters and basing your recommendation for them around that. That is surprising since you dismissed the anecdote that a spiders wobble can get dramatically worse to the point that they have trouble eating. That anecdote and the fact that a spider with a bad wobble can crop up in any spider clutch (I believe you acknowledged that in the last video?) makes it difficult for me to support breeding spiders. I agree with your stance that evidence should lead opinion, and I hope we can have more facts to make easier conclusions in the future. Love your work, Clint. Your a great person and an inspiration to animal lovers everywhere.
Clint, I normally enjoy your videos a lot. I don't even have any reptiles and I never will. But your knowledge, excitement and joy is contagious ☺I am especially fascinated by monitor lizards because they seem to have intelligence and individual personalities. However, your argument that the neurological issues of the spider ball python can be compared with the issues that can be expected from your floppy-eared, friendly and playful dog, is perfectly ridiculous, to be honest! I would agree with you, that a lot of modern dog breeders have come up with very unhealthy dogs - like extremely flat-nosed pugs which can hardly get enough air. Since these dog may really suffer throughout their whole lives, breeding with certain lines should be forbidden or at least regulated towards much less extreme traits. However, there is nothing at all wrong with your friendly little floppy-eared mutt! Sure, he might not last very long in the wild - although you would be surprised how well some dogs which turned feral, are doing without human care if they have managed to form a pack. But your doggy evolved the way he did because he belongs to the first domesticated species ever, which evolved many thousand years ago from an ancient wolf population. They separated from wolves because some individuals learned by experience that they have a better chance to survive if they live together with humans - most likely because it was easier and less dangerous to eat food leftovers from human camps than actively hunting down prey. And those so-called camp-wolves or proto-dogs which were friendlier than others had a much better chance of survival because humans may have been more willing to accept their presence and even take actively care of them and their offspings. It's called "survival of the friendliest". There's also an element of "survival of the cutest"☺ And since your doggy is so friendly, cute and playful, he is actually perfectly adapted for living together with humans. It's ridiculous to call this a genetic defect. He may not be able to live and hunt with a pack of wolves anymore, but he is a genius when it's all about reading the body language and facial expressions of you and your family. Even a wolf which was raised by humans will never be able to understand humans as well and adapt as well to family life as your cute dog. Interestingly the floppy ears of canides seem to be part of the domestication package, as the Russian experiments with breeding super friendly foxes have shown. But since neither floppy ears nor playfullness and friendliness create suffering as long as humans take good care of their floppy-eared and friendly best friends, it's perfectly fine and and a very useful adaptation. Btw, floppy ears are very useful for hunting dogs because floppy ears are better protected from sharp twigs and thorns. That's one reason why most hunting dogs have floppy ears. Watch- and guard dogs however need to have better hearing and they have erect ears which can be turned into many directions. I really cannot contribute anything useful to the spider ball python controversy. If their neurological defects create suffering just like the extremely flat muzzles of some pugs, I'd say that they shouldn't be bred and sold. But if the snakes don't suffer physically and just need a little extra help from their human caretakers, it may be ok to breed and buy them. Unfortunately we still know very little about snakes and if they feel joy or if they can suffer. But snakes can definitely feel hunger and pain. If they didn't they wouldn't be able to survive in the wild. So, do spider ballsfeel uncomfortable because of their neurological defects? I have no idea and I guess that we cannot know that for sure. It's possible that we make the mistake of anthropomorphism if we feel sorry for them because of their neurological defects. But I wonder why some snake lovers even want spider ball pythons so much that they are willing to breed and buy snakes which are neurologically compromised. And frankly, some individual experiences with clearly suffering and severely compromised spider ball pythons give me pause! I saw a spider ball python which wasn't able to focus on grabbing it's food because of the wobble, and it finally sank it's teeth into it's own body! I think it's very callous to argue that this snake wasn't suffering!
Everyone has valid opinions! I personally disagree, my boy isn't as some bad as he used to be but he does suffer, he slightly. He has trouble hitting his strikes properly and if he isn't supported he does twist upside down and get stuck. I still adore your content! And I can't wait to see more videos❤❤❤🐍
@@ClintsReptiles He sorts himself out after a few seconds he just needs a bit of help. The shop I worked at ordered him in and I felt sorry for him so I bought him. He was my first snake so I never saw how bad it was until I got another ball python. I don't know anything about the breeder sadly, I got him when I was 17. Thank you for replying though Clint! He's still my precious son and I love him.
@@lukastroutman4600 Now that I'm older and more experienced with snakes I would never get another, unless it was a rescue. I love my boy dearly and he just needs more help when he eats.
You don't like anecdotal evidence but you put your dog and friends as example/metaphor in your video, I'm a bit confused. Also, I would like to point out that so many breed of dogs, if not all, have heatlh problems yet people keep on breeding them and if you were to base their breeding on purely how happy or unstressed they look, no one would see a problem with them but I understand you can't completely compare dogs with snakes. What I'm trying to say is that all of this feels a bit sketchy. Saying emotions shouldn't come into manner seems a little bit manipulative (as well as the thumbnail) considering one should always feel empathy towards sentient beings. It sounds like "facts don't care about your feelings" and, well...
I am just doing my research watching sides of the argument, and I have to say that... after months of watching Clint's Reptiles and loving, admiring the scientific and biological approach to things and the informative videos. I found myself heavily disappointed with the side taken when it comes to breeding spider ball pythons. I have one common boa pet. I don't breed snakes. I breed tropical fish. And I must say... if your batch is a 100 fish, you get few odd fry in man made morphs... they get their fins twisted, guess how they swim... too long to move about comfortably or swiftly, spines shortened creating so called balloon effect... etc... etc. Yes, if i'm determined to keep alive an animal that hardly goes around getting food in their mouth, I can put it in a separate container and bring food to its nose raising it to be a new freak trend in a hobby. But this animal left in a standard set up where you would raise it as its 'more normal' siblings... would never made to any adulthood or further breeding if it's not pushed food in it's face when it's spinning in circles or missing where to strike on regular basis. It's like creating a breed of dogs, cats, hamsters or parrots, that are blind and they smash into things in it's 'sweet way' but food needs to be delivered to their nose, and it's gonna be a 'new cool thing'. Was a massive fan of Clint's Reptiles.... processing what was put in there to justify his breeding of animals that struggle... if you are a snake that doesn't know where to strike... you would be an amazing feeder if something was actually put in your mouth every week. Thank you.
I totally see where we are missing one another. Most spider ball pythons don't have any difficulties at all. Like with your fish, there are a tiny minority that do. Is the minority higher for spider ball pythons than non-spider ball pythons? I don't know. If those issues were common, I would totally agree that we shouldn't breed them.
Clint, I discovered your channel fairly recently and I've been watching a lot of your videos and trying to "Catch up." I'm impressed with so many things about you and your channel. First, you as a person. Your vast knowledge doesn't give you a sense of entitlement or self-righteousness. You show kindness, patience, humility and accountability. With that, if your enthusiasm and positive attitude could be transferred into a usable energy source, I believe you could power a city (by no means a calculated thing). Furthermore, your knowledge, personality and crew have acquired/created this inspiring community that has a wonderfully accepting and welcoming atmosphere. This doesn't happen easily or with luck. You and your channel have created this community and it's amazing. So kudos to you and your team. Now to be more video-specfic: what you've posted must've been nerve-wracking for you considering the controversial nature. You must've struggled with not wanting to offend or scare away your fan base. The fact that you chose to go ahead with it, on its own, is courageous. The fact that you took the resulting criticism and some less polite reactions with such grace is evidence that you're really a fair and understanding person. As for the comparisons you made that had upset some people; I believe the way in which you made the comparisons was harmless. You were clear (from my perspective) that your comparisons weren't direct and that conditions you were comparing a. weren't the same thing, and b. were neutral points, or not of a bad or good status. In my opinion, nothing degrading or dismissive was said. Anyway, thank you for being so informative, open and fair minded, humble, and enthusiastic. I have more respect for you because of your (and your team's) execution and response to this video. I'll be continuing to watch and hopefully signing up on Patreon soon. :)
Thank you for leaving such a thoughtful and considerate comment. I feel like a lot of people have, for one reason or another, misrepresented what I was trying to say with this video. It is so satisfying to hear that you understood what I was saying and also what I wasn't saying with this video. Thank you for taking the time to say what you did. It means a lot.
As someone who works in a scientific field with a focus on observable behavior (ABA) I do think emotions are an important consideration. To not consider emotions would be inhumane and potentially cruel. Not that he said they should never be considered but I hate how scientists sometimes discredit as argument due to it having an emotional component. I'm also curious if Clints autistic friends have aspergers, which while on the spectrum is very different than a lower functioning form of ASD. Some people even say aspergers should be it's own diagnosis. There are plenty of individuals with ASD who will never receive the "superpowers" Clint talks about as they will be early learners their entire lives.
Let's be honest, Autism is a catch all bin for anyone who doesn't fit in the normal box or one of the few special case boxes that have been built. Until doctors actually break it up based on root cause, it will always be a bin of many different human variants/conditions, some disabling, and some gift giving and everything in between.
The question is whose emotions we are talking about and whether they are justified or can and should be changed. The negative emotions of someone abused and the negative emotions of someone who just 'feels' that, say, LGBT people are unnatural and shouldn't exist aren't worth equal consideration. If the emotion goes against the evidence about what is actually beneficial or harmful, the emotion has to yield. A harmful tendency that I have observed is the widespread acceptance of the idea that all emotions/feelings are entitled to being accommodated just by virtue of existing and being felt by someone and regardless of whether they are justified or not - in spite of the fact that this principle obviously leads to absurdities and to things that most or all people wouldn't accept.
This is and always will be the case of "The Garden of Eden." We have all these trees (morphs) that are perfectly fine but we just GOTTA have the fruit of the one tree (spider) that we're not allowed. And to be honest, if I only had my spider bp to go on, I'd call people delusional about the wobble. But I have 2 spiders, and they could not be any further differing than they are. My spinner is rock solid and has not shown a wobble that I've seen and my albino spider is all over the place. They have been side by side in my rack since I got them so they literally have the exact setup and it's been interesting watching them and seeing just how different this morph can manifest itself.
I really like everyone’s open-mindedness on the subject, whether you’re for or against breeding spiders. It’s a big deep breath of fresh air! Keep it up! However, I disagree and I think that we should limit breeding spider ball pythons. Not everyone who knows about the wobble knows how to take care of the wobble. Fallen into the wrong hands can really hurt the animal. Of course that’s with every pet, but even more so with ones that are a bit different.
I got a spider BP for my second one and I had no idea about the wobble, he's now passed away because he refused to eat and drink and wasted away. I didn't know how to help him. I'm against spiders BUT I feel if they are going to sell spiders they should tell the buyers about the wobble first at least
Faulty argument interpretation - you missed the point that was made. Dog friendliness often comes with _floppy ears._ The wobble often comes with being a less picky eater. Floppy ears result in significantly increased risk of ear infections, which are quite painful to the dog - and if left untreated, can go septic, and even if treated, can result in deafness. Thus, friendliness carries with it a chance for increased ear infections, which, due to the nature of infections, comes with an increased chance of infection-related death. The spider gene isn't just a pretty pattern with a wobble - it also causes behavioural characteristics that help the ball python thrive in captivity (eating better, less likely to starvation-strike itself to death, and so forth). Both things sometimes cause suffering (frequent ear infections from the 'friendly' gene making the ears floppy _is suffering)._ Both things also can be beneficial to the animal, with an owner who exercises proper care and supervision to avoid exacerbating a predisposition to specific conditions.
@disillusionistic spider moph royals are worse eaters than wild type royals. The only reason why we see them as better eaters is because the picky ones often starve to death
TL:DR, thank you Clint for calming me down and making some excellent points, points that I think most of the commenters before me missed entirely!! I'm a bit late here, and new to the channel but have some thoughts that I feel like I need to share. I just got my first snake, Christmas gift for my fiance. It is a spider bp and I knew nothing of the controversy until AFTER purchasing. I chose this snake because it was in my $ range and I liked the way it looks. I started researching the morph when I got home and was immediately alarmed after seeing so many opinions against the breeding of spiders as well as the worst case scenario videos.... Then I saw this video that made more sense than any of the others. What I realized while reading that comments is that most people here already have their opinion developed and aren't going to change it. I came in unbiased. Also they seem to be confusing a disorder with suffering... Just because all spiders have a "disorder" does not mean that all spiders suffer. I thought Clint did a good job making this point but I guess when you already have an opinion formed, you are blinded to some things and lose the capacity for critical thinking. And for the dog comparison, Clint was pretty spot on but people again didn't understand this point. In the same way that domesticated dogs who make great pets likely wouldn't do well in the wild because of selective breeding, certain ball python morphs make great pets while at the same time aren't equipped to thrive in the wild. That's the whole point being made by this comparison and I'm not sure how anyone can even begin to argue against it. Its facts. Once you accept this point it's clear that evolutionarily speaking, the spider morph is a pretty successful one indeed, in the sense that mutations that lead to increased populations and the perpetuation of the species are successful mutations. In this context the look of an animal is extremely important. So people saying that breeders are soooo immoral for breeding because of looks don't understand how in the context of a domestic environment, it is more beneficial to the species as a whole to have better looks. If the disorder was so debilitating as some have claimed, the breeders would not breed these due to the increased cost and care required, it wouldn't make economic sense. Additionally the snakes wouldn't breed so successfully if the disorder was so debilitating. I'm no snake expert but everything I have seen, from people on both sides of this argument, say that stressed, suffering snakes don't eat/breed/lay good eggs. What we know for sure is that most spiders have the same life experience as other domestic ball pythons, live as long, eat as much, and reproduce in the same frequency. A smaller number of spiders have severe motor skill issues, as do other morphs/species(including animals other than snakes). Unless more data emerges that shows that the actual degree of suffering experienced by spiders far outweighs the evolutionary benefit, I'm with Clint.
Thank you for taking the time to process the points that I'm actually making. I do find that many people are misunderstanding them in their responses, and I hope it isn't because they were unclear in the video.
Honestly I have not made up my mind about spider ball pythons. I have too many questions. People say they feel unbalanced and their version of nauseous constantly. Which sounds like what would happen to a human if their inner ear gets damaged. So is the behavior associated with this gene the wobble truly a good enough measurement for how bad the neurological issue is in a given snake. Like could there be a snake that does not show a bad wobble but has a very bad sense sense of up or down or is constantly nauseous just does not show it as much as others might. We can only see the effects of the neurological in behavior so what if the neurological issue that goes along with the gene is worse we just don't see it. It just does not follow logically that just because a spiders wobbly is less then the neurological issue is less. Most people assume that is how it is. But what logical or sceintific reason for that is there? It could all just a be correlation. I think some serious research needs to be done comparing what is the difference between a spider ball pythons brain and a normal one. If is neurological we should see some difference in it. Then we would have much more info to make better decisions.
Well, we do see some major differences. Some "wobble" so bad they can barely move in a space a regular boa could, because they flop upside down and can't find their way around objects. "goherping" has a spider ball snake that is an example of this. Pretty clear it's a Neurological issue when it can't differentiate between moving its body up or down.
The way our inner ear functions is very different from a snakes though- a snake that's always feeling physical discomfort I'd expect to behave like a stressed snake. That's probably Clint's best point - not assuming snakes experience these things like we do and instead comparing how these snakes seem to feel to other healthy comfortable snakes. If the snake seems like a comfortable snake, that is more important to its actual state than asking if we would be comfortable
+ZZz Don't you think it'd be better to research rather than assume? I'd like some hard facts on this, but there seems to be nobody who can present any.
+Zzz The major thing I'm feeling from this whole issue though, is, why are we doing this to snakes after we've seen how much we've screwed up dogs? It seems like the mistake is being repeated.
First off, you've got a great approach to talking about this, and it seems to be that a lot of people agree with that part. It's a similar situation to pugs, bulldogs, and other dogs with similar issues (I say as I have a ckc spaniel, and they're prone to heart issues later down the line, but that's a debate to have another day). That being said, I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you on this. I'm coming to this as person who's chronically ill, as a person with an invisible illness. I've had to adjust my life to it all. Just because you can't see the stress or suffering, doesn't mean that it's not there. I've seen multiple examples where the neurological issues associated with spiders make life extremely hard for them (failing to strike food properly, biting one's self, etc). Sure, they can live with assistance, but the quality of their life should be the most important. Some can end up fine or with a slight wobble, but you're taking a chance on them being worse, if breeding. That being said, I know I'm going to get arguments against my hypocrisy with my dog. I'm open to questions and having discourse about it. One hundred percent. She's going to be trained as a therapy/service dog for me soon (we hope). That's the main reason I have her. But with spiders, all I really see to their existence is aesthetics. I do appreciate most of the comments section being civil about this topic as well. Always better than having an absolute dumpster fire of comments.
This is such a good video and I am so happy you made it despite the controversy. I do agree that well bred and well kept spiders seem to thrive. One MAJOR problem is that a lot of people seem to be very uninformed when they get one and aren't prepared for what is essentially a special needs animal and this seem to cause more problems than the health issues alone. Spiders are too common and too freely sold. While I do agree that well bred and well kept spiders seem to do very well and probably are OK to breed I worry that if we accept the spiders it might be the start of a slippery slope. Some people have drawn comparisons to dogs and I think we all agree that if a puppy that had such a short nose that it couldn't breathe or was as deformed as some established breeds like pugs or bulldogs are popped out of a big, healthy dog or even a wolf we would be horrified and either cull the animal or definitely never breed it because it was suffering. But because we've gotten to this point slowly, slowly we've gradually accepted and even intentionally bred for traits that are severely harming the animals and many of these breeds are very popular. My worry isn't so much about the spider itself as if we think the wobble is fine, then maybe this unintended trait is fine and then the next trait is fine and we end up breeding unhealthy animals for the looks. Where do you draw the line? I don't know the answer to that.
So if the homozygous is lethal, then because of incomplete dominance wouldn’t the heterozygous spider gene still be considered bad? Also, I would not want a snake to feel like having what appears to me vertigo half the time. I love your channel Clint, just disagree on this topic.
Yulus Leonard It depends on the severity of the vertigo. I know someone with vertigo bad enough she vomits and often has to lie down on the floor for half an hour. She has lost jobs over it and it has required medical care. She is like a very bad case of wobble. My dad also has vertigo, but only occasionally, and closing his eyes for a bit fixes it. One would choose that 15% more handsome deal, the other wouldn’t. The question is, how common is one compared to the other? What is the mechanism determining that risk? Can we actually determine those answers?
I am here a long time after this video. I am a dog trainer and I can’t even begin to list the amount of dogs that are full of breed specific issues. I recently got a fire spider at a show not knowing this problem and mine has yet to show more than a minor wobble. She has had tremendous stress from the RI has and all the vet trips, antibiotics and not being able to shake it. The wobble has not worsened as far as I can tell. This video has helped me so much. Not because I am looking to feel better, I went to get a tarantula and came home with a spider. I turned into a 2 yr old holding her not because of her morph, just because I because a child with animals LOL. I wouldn’t buy her again, only due to the venue and her likely coming into my care sick. The spider gene in my limited care is so much less a problem then that infection and the incredible difficulty with treatment. Thank you Clint. Your channel has been so helpful for me.
I personaly think that its wrong to breed spider ball pythons because of the problems they can have, and I think that people should not breed them, however I also think that it wronge to belittle someones opinion, so even though I disagree with you I'm not say that your wrong Thanks for reading this, have a good day!
Well put. Your argument for Spider Balls was very well thought out, and refrained from the emotional responses that this topic usual produces. Personally I disagree with you, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to attack you and resort to the infantile name calling that most discussion on this topic tends to devolve into. Instead I will say that I understand and appreciate your point of view and the fact that even though it is an unpopular opinion among many now days to have, you expressed your opinion without trying to assume some sort of moral high ground and proceeded to explain the scientific method in which you base your opinion on, much of which seems extremely valid, but as you said, there really is not enough data accumulated one way or another. Most of the debate I've seen on the subject was based on pure emotion and not science and as a result it led to the inevitable character assassination and child mentality of name calling when someone on either side of the debate didnt have anything constructive to put forth and felt that their opinion was the only right one and was unwilling to even try to understand the other side of the discussion, and so like Americans seem to do on all topics anymore tried to resort to verbal bullying in order to WIN an argument that without more data is unwinable. Thank you Clint for being an awsome human being who is willing to still act like a mature adult and act rationally instead of reacting emotionally. Your stinkin rad bro!!
Thank you so much for this comment! It is so refreshing to hear voices of reason in such unreasonable times.
I agree with you the video was very well thought ought and had good evidence to back up his reasonings
you’re*
I had a Spider Ball before I was aware of the issues surrounding them. It did exhibit a particularly strange behavior in that it would start exploring and slithering up the side of the enclosure, but it would only go up 8 inches or so then would start leaning back and start waving back and forth in the air. He also had minor wobble but it wasn't pronounced. I ended up sending him to live with a keeper/breeder that I knew would take care of him better than I could. My point though is that other than those few issues he was a happy healthy snake, and I believe she did breed him once or twice so by all accounts he was a successful snake. Now, having said that I would never purchase another one from a breeder unless it was a rescue, and I'd never breed it.
@@Itsmoraka thank you. It was killing me.
While I understand your take on the issue, I respectfully disagree. Regardless of the species, no aesthetic concern should ever trump the well-being of the animal, regardless of how minor the problems may be. In my opinion, morphs with commonly known negative side-effects should never be bred just to give someone the pleasure of looking at or owning something "pretty" or "special". That's something you can do with plants, not sentient creatures capable of suffering.
Totally fair. Thank you for sharing and for taking the time to listen and disagree politely :)
fair point, however it can also be determined that people should stop having children because in all genetic lines there is a chance of having a genetic issue. Its important to note that most people love the animal not the color: that just a secondary plus. To me spiders are fine as pets because it gives them a chance to have a life. That life would not have been possible in the wild. Same as if current human populations lived in the wild. Most children are not adequate and would die. We need to see the scenario as a mutation that accrued and breed through and is being isolated to hopefully perfect care environments making the morph just as rightful to life as any other morph. Not trying to argue just give you something to ponder and see your point on it.
+Dakota
The main point is, with spider balls, all of them have a highly elevated chance of bad wobble. It's in the genes way more than other snakes. I've heard that there have even been attempts to unlink this issue through further breeding and is just isn't happening. To put this back to people, it's like forcing people with ALS to exclusively reproduce with others that have the disorder.
Inda Co oh so plants don’t get the same treatment you know bananas trees were genetically modified for us to have “good food” or “delicious food” plants and trees are just as important as animals
+Leroy
1. Plants don't feel pain
2. Plants don't have brains
Thus they are basically equal to bacteriums morally. The issue comes into play the environmental damage that terribly modified plants may have on the environment if let loose.
Obviously here in Australia I can only really relate to the wobble in jaguar carpet Pythons, my concern isn’t the wobble so much as what it represents, the point at which looks could become more important then welfare, it makes me worry that in another 100 years we are going to see the same issues that dogs have, not the issues such as lop ears but traits many breeds have such as epilepsy, inability to give birth naturally and things like that.
Dogs to me shouldn’t be an example so much as a warning
Very good points. I'll give them some sincere consideration. Thank you.
Yea but they are domesticated animal. They exist because human exist.
@@yulusleonard985 so it's OK to breed them to have poor quality of life? I think I'm missing your point.
@@switchtheflip9422 The one decide their quality of live is the keeper. They are domesticated animals. You buy them to make you happy not to release them in the wild.
@@yulusleonard985 if an animal has tumors covering its body and suffers from near constant seizures, because you bred for certain asthetic traits, the animals quality of life suffers regardless of what you do.
I have a fire spider and I am also a pediatric Occupational therapy practitioner. She goes to work with me and I explain to the kids that she has something similar to their sensory processing disorder where sometimes her body has a difficult time knowing where it is in space just like them sometimes. She has made such a huge impact on the kids she has helped.
I absolutely love this! As a neurodivergent person and also a special ed teacher this is amazing representation for the children. It would have made a huge impact on me as a child to meet an animal like this. Wether you agree on the breeding of them or not, I do believe in giving the ones that are here a good life and make the best of it.
The definition of swag 😎
You have it
Awwwww
Super late to the party here, but as a neuro divergent myself, you are the kind of educator I needed and never had, and it sounds like the scale baby is in the perfect place. You rock!
😍 I love this!!
Breeding pugs and bulldogs should be frowned upon to be honest.
I agree
Add king Charles cavilier spaniels as well...
I think they're pretty good dog breeds if you want a pet, so I disagree. I do frown upon breeding pit bulls, though.
@@derpro8125 So the dogs that have genetic issues to the point they slowly choke themselves to death are fine, but the dogs that get a bad rep from the media and people training them to be agressive shouldn't be bred...? Care to explain?
@@derpro8125 idk man Pitbull's are much healthier and there are other pet dogs that are much better than pugs and bulldogs. They can hardly breathe, have terrible joints and can't give birth properly. Much worse than a spider ball.
Edit: typeo
As someone who has a genetic disorder that causes me to shake, it's really not a fun life. The shaking can make your muscles hurt very badly. (I've gotten sore arms just from stirring something for too long.) I get that wobble is not quite the same but lack of control over various parts of your body isn't fun. (Also the feeding thing may be related to burning more calories leads to more feeding response? Spiders do move more than a normal BP.)
This is true, but disabilities are hard becusee we are a social species with a lot of responsibility to our society. The society typically isn’t understanding and then tells us people with disabilities we should feel bad becusee they can’t imagine what it’s like.
This is not to undermine your pain, but rather to show that society expecting everyone to conform and then telling us mentally to feel bad and guilt us and make us feel like a burden is the problem.
Snakes do not have this. Snakes are being taken care of and thus don’t have the same issues.
This being said I think breeding animals for how they look is wrong. At least with dogs and cats it has been largely bad.
@@conradkorbol Society isn't what makes me feel bad, its my disorder that causes PHYSICAL PAIN. Not having control over your limbs be it in a major or minor way can be stressful in itself and can be very painful.
Zomb well I don’t have full control in a minor way. I just find I have to be a lot slower and careful about things. I don’t notice unless other people are around me and judging me.
Tho I don’t have the physical pain. I can imagine having both being stressful.
The thing that convinces me that spiders aren't stressed or in pain is the eating. Ball pythons will refuse to eat if they're stressed, this is regarded as fact and I've never heard anything from any keeper to suggest that it isn't true. BP are know to be one of the pickiest species of snakes that are commonly kept as pets. They will stress starve themselves to death. Being hungry wouldn't cause them to eat if they were experiencing constant stress.
I think that you're missing a major distinction between your condition and a spider's wobble. It sounds like you shake all the time and the overexertion of your muscles cause you pain? (You didn't specify what your condition is so I'm guessing, please correct me if I'm wrong) Spiders only shake when they're holding themselves up. They don't shake when they're at rest or when just moving across the ground. They don't even shake all the time when they're muscles are engaged; for example the spider that Clint is holding is using muscles all along its body to hold onto his arm/hand and it's body is not shaking. Wobble is not uncontrollable muscles spasms. Wobble is a balancing issue.
@@NaraMouse101 I still wonder about the food thing to be honest. I've seen animals in pretty poor condition continue to eat? Idk, it seems like not the best indicator, especially an animal that has lived that way its whole life?
And while I do shake MOST of the time, it's significantly worse when I'm moving or holding something or if I haven't eaten recently. But it also affects my ability to balance. (Mine is specifically a neurological disorder, which is what Spiders are believed to have.) I know they aren't the same but I just can't imagine breeding something KNOWING it will have a defect that could or maybe does cause pain/discomfort.
I don't know if I'm explaining myself well at all.
Don’t let snake breeding turn into dog breeding. We have hurt so many dogs that way
*coughs in pug and basset hound*
We've hurt the majority of dog breeds with it even some that you wouldn't are damaged. German Shepherds for instance don't look like they would have issues by they are incredibly prone to developing hip issues later on in life because we bread them to have a really slopped back because "looked nice".
Then there's the more obvious ones like Bulldogs, Basset Hounds, Pugs, Shar Peis, Boxers, Bulk Terriers, French Bulldogs, Dachshunds, and many others who are less noticeable like Cocker Spaniels, Saint Bernards, and many more.
I would say adopt dogs whenever possible but if you are really wanting a certain type of dog at least get cross breeds because they suffer from far less issues than pure bred dogs and it doesn't encourage the further degeneration of these breeds. Alternatively but a lot more rare find a working line breeder who basically breed the dogs to what they were before we messed them up and actually were used for work.
Finally some breeds are actually still healthy working dog breeds. Basically look into breeds the AKC has and don't adopt any of them. All the responsible breeder societies of a certain breed basically told the AKC to screw off because they didn't want their dogs to be messed up. Jack Russells, English Shepherds, Redbone Coonhounds are all great examples of breeds that have kept their working ability.
@@tymandude1510First of all the breeds you mentioned are AKC breeds. It is easier to get a healthy dog if you can get the dog as a puppy and get access to health records of parents, regardless of it being a mix or registered purebred. Mix breeds are just as likely to inherit bad traits as good ones, so health records are just as important. Good breeders have them and bad ones don't. People making mixed "designer" dogs more often dont. They rely on people thinking that a mixed dog is automatically healthier just like what you said.
People should adopt shelter dogs, and I have done so in the past, but you can't know the odds of that dog developing eye or joint problems and that is a risk people take.
Big this
Should humans with hereditary conditions be precluded from breeding?
Personally, I think that things that risk giving an animal a reduced quality of life should not be intentionally bred. I haven't personally seen enough information regarding spider ball pythons to have a strong opinion either way, but I'll err on the side of caution and would personally not breed them. There are animals with bigger problems, however. Pugs and bulldogs namely, whom, due to human breeding, have severe health issues. Same goes for other animal breeds with similar problems(just mentioned pugs and bulldogs since those were the first that came to mind).
Edit: Typo.
TL;DR: Education is important and responsible breeders should always prioritize health over looks; the degree of wobble might vary but when selling a spider, what a wobble is should be fully disclosed in all forms to each potential buyer; Merle genetics in dogs are fascinating and I think, a relevant example.
The dog example was an interesting choice! Since I know dogs better than I do ball pythons I like to use them as an example as well. Although, I do not think the comparison in breeding for a friendlier dog was an apt comparison to breeding a spider patterned snake. I think a better comparison would be the breeding of Merle coated Australian shepherds. Merles are a popular and beautiful coat mutation that is common in dog breeds but famous in border collies and Australian shepherds. It is an expensive pattern, with merle dogs usually costing about 50% more than non merle dogs from the same litter. Since it is an incomplete-dominant trait, (irresponsible) breeders breed merle to merle so that they can produce more merle puppies. This results in about a quarter of the puppies being double merle which is termed "lethal whites". These puppies are culled (killed) at birth, or sold to unsuspecting buyers. These lethal whites don't have health issues that would result in early death, but they are usually deaf and blind, which is a hard type of dog for most people to deal with so they end up in shelters where they won't be adopted. This is a lot like the spider market as it is currently. The wobble is not explained to the buyer by irresponsible breeders (who might not care about the degree of wobble when breeding) and the buyer now has a special needs snake that they might not be able to properly care for. I'll add a link to an article with this information, I think you would find merle genetics interesting as there are many more traits associated with merles as well such as a difference in certain pharmacokinetics! (carolinaheartsrescue.org/resources/double-merle-aussies/#targetText=This%20term%20refers%20to%20a,born%20as%20a%20double%20merle.)
My father has a dog with both eye and hearing problems due to bad breeding (not a lethal white but a double blue eyed dachshund). He lives a happy life because as a family we were willing to work with his special needs. But I do not think that his breeder was a responsible or ethical breeder. (We bought him about ten years ago and I have learned my lesson about properly researching breeders beforehand). These breeders are doing this simply to make more merles in a litter to make more money and that is absolutely not okay. To me this seems to be an apt reflection of the spider morph, it is mostly being bred purely to make money. After hearing your reasoning I personally still disagree with breeding spiders, although I do now realize that it is more of a gray area than black and white as I originally thought. I believe that the scale of breeding of spiders should at least be scaled down until we know more about what causes a more severe wobble in some snakes than in others (mostly because that seems like a fascinating field of research...). Mostly though, I believe in educating the public and potential buyers so that they can make an informed decision and that breeders should be breeding for a love of a healthy and thriving animal rather than purely for profit due to fancy morphs. Once you have researched your animal, do just as much research on the breeder you choose to buy that animal from!
The lethal white phenomenon is a great example. It was the first thing my mind went to when he mentioned not breeding spiders together. I would like to add though that lethal white can also produce neurological or intestinal defects which do result in early death.
I've never heard about merle dogs having that issue! Perfect example. I'll keep that in mind when I adopt dogs in the future
This is old but it seems similar to holland lops with rabbits. Not the same phenotypes, but if you breed two together either half or a fourth of them (I can't remember) will end up being what are called peanuts. It's basically similar to having stillborns or a premie because its the result of two dwarfism genes. Most people who want to avoid having dead rabbit babies will suck up the "pure bred" pride and breed with a normal.
Only read the first paragraph. I think as long as both the buyer and seller are on the same page and has all of the information regarding spiders or any other morphs that cause issues (there are quite a few ) then adults can make an informed decision.
Stop judging people and let them make up their own mind.
David Jr you should have read the whole thing. I am not disagreeing with you. I agree that as long as people are able to make a fully informed decision on both sides then it is fair. I personally don’t agree with the breeding of spiders though. I am not judging just outlining the reasons for my opinion.
I don't like spider bp's, their issues are just a deal breaker. I also hold the same opinion on heavily deformed dog breeds, the ones that can't breath/bad skeletons/inability to safely breed... I really just don't like the breeds that couldn't survive without intensive human care...
Poor breeding is just a thing i will never enjoy, more power to the people going into it knowing exactly what they're getting into but i would not even with all the knowledge in the world...
Same reason I will never own a chihuahua or pug
The issue isn't the specific dog. Let's take pugs for example. They often have breathing issues. This is not the pug's fault, it's because they are overbred. Personally I think we shouldn't be against pugs, we should be against pug breeders because they are causing more harm to the pug population.
this is a answer I truly respect so many people say spider gene is terrible. then have no problems with pugs or French bull dogs.
@@elliot6252 The issue with pugs is that they are not supposed to look the way they do or have those breathing issues at all, they have them because people bred them to be like that because "awe that's cute" and it's a case where people value looks > health of an animal.
If the breeding of pugs to make them look as such did not harmfully impact their lives, nobody would have an issue with it. It's the same thing with Spider BP.
However if breeders were able to find a way to keep that look while also removing the genetic defects of the animal, then that is what we should be striving for.
@@chadachi3970 I agree completely.
Hi clint. Very good video as always.
As a scientist myself I tend to agree withyour approach on this topic. However, if says the hypothesis of spider ball python developing a wobble, or having it get worse, is in fact linked to poor care of the animal (as seen in many rescues), I do think breeding them becomes a problem.
See, in a perfect world where people would always take great care of their animals, I wouldn't have a problem with breeding spider ball pythons. But we both know we arn't living in this world, and they are some spider ball pythons being sold that will be poorly taken care of. That on his own is a problem, but particularly breeding a snake which will end up getting even worse if taken care of poorly is another one.
So in the end, to me, in a perfect world yes, i'd totally agree with you, but in this case I have to say I don't. We know some of these snakes will end up having poor care, and the snake's health might get even worse in some cases because of the spider gene, to the point where unlike many snakes, they might do poorly as a rescue after (in the case of really debilitating wobble, which does happen). I think as people who understand the issue, and potential breeders, it is our responsability to ensure the snake's future will be as good as possible, and if there is a chance that bad care will lead to even worse problem because of said gene, I think that's an issue.
I do of course understand your stance on this and respect, and I hope I made mine clear.
Cheers
That is totally fair. How do you think that this position applies to the vast majority of snake species that are more difficult to keep successfully than are spider ball pythons?
Rescue animals are not good example because it depends on the previous keeper.
@@yulusleonard985 I actually took rescue here as an example, and assuming the animal actually was taken care of poorly. So I agree it's not a good example because they are a lot of unknown parameters here, by resue I mostly meant animal that have been taken care of poorly in the past, and are now in proper care.
@@ClintsReptiles
I'll start by saying that I believe some species of reptiles are way to easily available compared to how difficult it is to provide them with good care, and I know you share this opinion in the case of some monitors as well. It is not a stretch (I think) to say this applies to some species of snakes as well.
With that being said, my issues was that spider ball python, when taken care of poorly, will end up being worse than say a "regular" ball python with the same care. That is at least the hypothesis as far as the wobble getting worse in concerned. So that's why in my opinion we shouldn't necessarily breed them,. Altho I should say, we shouldn't breed them AS MUCH. If everytime a spider ball tpython is bred, it's guaranted to be taken care of properly, then breed away!
Now if we compare this to other snakes. For example should we be breeding specy of snake A if they're much harder to take care of that specy B. Well, yes and no. What are the other differencies between said snakes?
One of the issue many people have with the spider ball python is that the only (or at least) main appeal to them is the pattern/color. So the question becomes: should we be breeding snake A if snake B is similar in all aspects except color/pattern, and B is easier to take care of, or if it's care is not met, it won't suffer as much?
I believe the answer to that is yes. But that's assuming it's purely for look.
If we take other things into account, then it becomes more complicated. Saying people shouldn't breed a snake because people should just get a ball python instead as it's easier to take care of is obviously wrong.
But if someone wanted a particular reptile, that is hard to take care of, and you knew of a specy that is very similar in behavious and appearance, a much easier, wouldn't you strongly recommend the easier one? And in the case, wouldn't it be better is the easier one was overall more available?
My problem with this explanation is that it's kind of a problem to have a general consensus on this, even for me, and it should all be a case by case scenario.
Kind of a poor answer, but I will say that after watching your video and trying to answer your question, my overall opinion is a bit different. I do still think it's not great spider ball python are bred so much, but i'm not completly against their very existence (unlike some people).
I do think in the end we have a pretty similar opinion, and if there was say spectrum of opinion of it, with one side people who are completly against spider ball python (say red side, not calling left and right as I don't want this to be politcal somehow)), and one side that has absolutly no problem with it (blue side), we'd end up being different shades of purple, I'd be a bit more red while you'd be a bit more blue :D.
Hope I made myself clear Clint!
110 % respectfully agree.... spider balls are a " special needs" pet every detail of their special needs absolutely NEED to be disclosed and discussed before the purchaser or adoptive home can make a educated decision to bring it Into their home and give it the proper care it needs ....from feeding tips to the proper type enclosure and every single detail it takes to keep a special needs pet healthy ....in my experience most people aren't willing to go that extra mile it takes to care for an animal with special needs.....a spider may take extra time and care to feed because of the wobble ....most folks assume up front you can throw a live mouse in the enclosure and the spider ball will eat ....not the case with most spider balls ....they need more attention and time in most cases need to be fed f/t .....if people aren't educated up front about the special needs especially in feeding the animal ends up starving to death because it does take patience and extra steps to keep spiders and other special needs pets healthy....also certain enclosure types are better than others for a spider ( shoerter is better than taller) in this case....in the end all that may happen as a spider matures absolutely needs to be disclosed up front ....in my opinion you are doing a disservice selling or adopting a spider out to a first time snake owner ..... educate without sugar coating what can and may happen first so that the person interested in getting a snake can make the best educated decision for their home and time they have to give the pet ....as I said before those who will give the extra care and time to a snake or any pet for that matter are few and far between ....people want and expect the " no brainier " pet and if it turned out they don't get the " no brainier" pet they expect their spider to be than therefore they are not properly cared for because people just aren't willing to put the extra time and effort it takes into keeping pets with special needs healthy and happy...then they end up dead,or in the brink of death before rehomed ....when people are buying other various snakes say a retic or a carpet or blood ......they know exactly what they are purchasing UP FRONT before they purchase .... unfortunately this isn't the case with the spider ball people are buying them and selling them without educating on the special needs of the spider and if they do talk about it at all it is way more that sugar coated than what the reality of what can happen
Snakes can't wear shoes? Learn something everyday
Always happy to inform. They can wear a shoe. In fact, if they get loose in your house, I recommend looking in your shoes...
@@ClintsReptiles lol. Great video as always
😂
This made me laugh
The can wear a sock on their tail.
I'm super impressed at how engaging and captivating Clint's presenting is. I just spent 51 minutes and 2 seconds across 3 videos learning about the genetics and moral dilemmas of breeding spider ball pythons and it felt like 10 minutes while still remaining super informing.
Same
Hi Clint I like you and your channel. I thought a lot about writing this comment. I understood your opinion on this topic. But here is my controversial opinion. I am physically disabled. I love my life and I am different. But because you do things differently and you do normal things like eat use the bathroom and sleep and wake up it does not mean you are not suffering. Some suffering may not be visual to people who don't have the condition. This is my opinion and I am not a scientist or a breeder. I don't own any snakes. I am just looking at it from the view of some one who is different. So if you can avoid it then you should avoid it.
Thank you for sharing. I really appreciate your thoughts and opinions.
My question is how much is physical vs emotional pain. Snakes aren’t social. So I wonder if it’s as bad. Not that I think we should breed snakes for how they look. I think that’s wrong.
But as a neurologically impaired person I can’t help but wonder if saying “disability=bad” is self hatred.
Roughly half of all the major changes changes have come from people who are handicapped in some way.
I think snakes cannot be compared to humans tho.
@@conradkorbol People who don't have a condition don't understand. There are other hardship people don't understand because they haven't struggled with a disability. It's about struggling with basic functions and depending on others to do things. Sometimes despite explaining things people don't understand how to do what you want to do. When you have a condition you suffer illnesses even doctors don't understand. We go through alot especially with able body people. Don't get me wrong please. I love living and I wouldn't change things but I would not wish anybody to struggle especially an animal who can't talk.
MPuzzle World I hear you for sure
And if your disability causes you physical pain (not sure if it does) it does make things harder.
I know that there are things that are more difficult.
I just wonder if a snake has the self doubt and if the world meets there needs if it the same thing?
I am not trying to attack you. This issue is complicated and I feel like everyone is trying to simplify it to disability bad or who cares? I think that it’s has to be vastly different if your whole perceived world is accommodating you.
@@conradkorbol exactly. I am not trying to attack Clint either but he made sound like it is a neurological problem it is find he\she eats like a the other snakes goes to the bathroom like the others and acts normal. But Clint doesn't really know if the snake is really okay. I respect his opinion and I am not a scientist or a breeder but if you can't find out ahead that the animal is coming with issues it shouldn't be continued to breed. Because you know that not all humans will know how to care for it. It is normal animals and humans mistreat them.
Surprised to find the comment section isn't a dumpster fire. I've been rather neutral on this subject myself, with the caveat that I wouldn't ever personally want to own a spider morph, but it's good to see a video that shows the other side.
I'm glad the comments are pretty chill!
I'm just glad comments haven't been removed yet
BlairPhoenix Clint just inspires intellectual, respectful conversation. It’s wonderful
I expected it to be chaos but it's pretty controlled.
The most chaos is an inner argument in a comment thread about pitbulls XD
Clint, I've been liking your videos. It's interesting to me that everyone compares this issue to dog breeding.
And while YOUR dog has floppy ears (a trait that as you pointed out is very often linked to the domestication process), there are plenty of domestic dog breeds with pointy ears as well.
As someone very involved in the dog fancy, any responsible breeder is breeding for structure (the dog is built correctly to do it's intended purpose without breaking down), does the dog have a desireable temperment (because as I'm sure you know temperment is highly influenced by genetics), and we even do genetic testing to test for common genetic health problems so we can avoid them in our dogs.
In my breed (beagles) as well as others, there are some issues of epilepsy that pop up in some dogs. We do not have a test for this, but we are working really hard to try and isolate it. But breeders exclude not only that dog from the genepool, but we go back and look at the whole pedigree, and try and see if there are overlaps with dogs used. And we stay away from breeding them. No one would intentionally breed a dog that could produce offspring with epilepsy (another neurological condition) even though the parents can be totally normal, and epileptic dogs can live normal lives and have a good quality of life. (one of my own dogs has seizures, he was a rescue. I love him,he has a great quality of life and only has maybe 2 seizures a year, but I would never wish that on any dog, or any dog owner.)
Just because an animal CAN have a good quality of life with a condition, doesn't mean we should be producing it on purpose. We should still love and care for the animal that exsists, provided it's condition isn't so severe it drastically impacts quality of life.... but WHY purposley produce animals with conditions that could potentially cause severe issues?
Bravo, well said
I cannot imagine what people would say if someone wanted to have human offspring with neurological diseases. I had a spider rescue once that had to be forcefed nearly every single time. It would strike itself when presented with food. I could have curled into a ball and died of sympathy. In the end, it was time to let the spider rest.
This comment deserves more credit
Period!
Do you have a website for your beagles?
I’m against the breeding of spider ball pythons, but I will say that I really appreciate you sharing your opinion of them with us.
If we can put the actual issue aside for a moment and look at this from a different angle, I think that the ability to discuss topics respectfully and calmly with others who hold differing opinions is something we should really strive for in our community as reptile keepers, and indeed, in the world in general. 💚
I can't heart this comment enough times!
Yeah, we should...
We should also stop breeding retarded snakes.
Totally agree with you! Sometimes this community can be very harsh
Kate Lillo I agree with u 100%!!!!! I’ve seen so many circumstances of groups of haters for one person or another. This way of discussion with Clint has been so refreshing. I do think one reason is because Clint is very respected plus the way he handled the conversation. I respected him even tho I feel different about it. If u have a person jumping at a snakes face, upsetting it and stressing it out.... they get less respect and ppl want to charge on them. I could never charge On someone who handles and treats reptiles with so much respect 👍🏻 I gotta say, Clint is one awesome guy!!!! There’s nobody else like him ☺️
Mrs B. 😆😆
I really think we need more research into the spider Gene and why the plyotropy manifests the way it does. I personally theorize that the mutation might be altering the way the snake processes B12 and that's either causing the wobble or exacerbating it, but I don't have any data for this aside from watching other snake species with a B12 deficiency exhibit the same behaviors. In the future I would love to own a spider for research purposes, but I'm not nearly funded or connected enough to do any real work.
Very interesting hypothesis. Let me know how it goes!
I think I will as well. I think itd be fun to study, even if I dont go anywhere with it
I do biochem research! We should apply for a grant
Ooh, that would be awesome!
A fun project that supports the reptile hobby
Very interesting video! Personally, I am still against breeding spider balls, simply because I don't support the idea of intentionally breeding animals with a defect. Sure, a white snake couldn't live in the wild, but it's a pet, so I really don't mind that, but I do believe we should breed healthy animals. However, I found your argument very good and very interesting. I can see where you're coming from and I can agree with a lot of what you said. This actually reminds me of rats, since I am a rat breeder, and rats with red or pink eyes have pretty terrible sight. I never really had an issue with them, but this made me think of how I feel about the whole thing and I will no longer intentionally breed red eyed rats. I know that's very unrelated, haha, but still wanted to mention it.
"my life is kind of crappy so I wish I was never born"
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 what an idiotic arguement. Something that never existed has no clue it ever could've existed. It's not like they are saying they're gonna kill any red eyed rats that they unintentionally breed. They just won't intentionally breed for a defect, which is their own moral choice. That rat doesn't care because it can't care, BECAUSE IT NEVER EXISTED. There's like telling a teenager to have unprotected sex because the baby that might be born from the sex would rather be born to a mother that's immature and not ready for a baby then never be born at all, which is fuckin stupid kuz the baby never existed in the first place and you cant even have known that a baby would've been produced in the first place. 🤦♂️
how do you feel about pugs? they have a genetic defect where their eyes can pop out and have terrible nasal passages creating the snorts and snoring a lot of people find "cute". no disrespect just pointing out there are many captive animals that have "defects" a lot of them are much worse than the spider gene.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 Yeah, exactly, don't breed animals that are going to struggle because of a defect that can't be bred out.
@@neo-filthyfrank1347 what is your point here?
The question you should be answering is if you'd rather be a spider ball python or a ball python. Not brushing it off as "I wouldn't want to be a snake in the first place." Is a debilitating neurological condition akin to chronic vertigo at all equatable to altered behaviour and floppy ears in an otherwise healthy dog? No. Is it more appropriate to equate it to chronic arthritis and cancer development in dalmatians, considering the degree of debilitation? I think it is, personally.
I respectfully disagree with your conclusions. You say we should breed them because we cannot make an informed decision about the mechanism of spider ball python degeneracy. However, I would argue that because we don't know the mechanism of risk, we should abstain from breeding them until such a time that we do know. Because the issue can give birth to spider ball pythons that clearly suffer with a severe neurological abnormality, it is imperative to understand the mechanism before justifying the further breeding of these animals. When we don't know how big the risk is, and what leads to the risk, it is in my opinion unacceptable to conclude that it's fine to continue on our way. All we know is, that it can happen, and that it happens more often in spider ball pythons than any other snakes we keep.
I don't expect a response, this is just my opinion.
I'm not hating on your content, I just disagree with your reasoning and the way you draw your conclusions on this issue.
And I'd be interested to see what the mechanism is when it's found, and I sincerely hope the mechanisms turns out to be such, that it can be avoided in breeding these snakes ^^
Haitaka123 well said
Thanks you for stating most of my problems with the reasoning of the video. Well said.
Mechanism of risk. That is a great phrase and I will be using it. I think Clint’s original video on the topic was much better. He made a lot of bad arguments here and only a few good ones, although that may have more to do with bad content editing than him actually being wrong.
It's not a debilitating condition. They eat sleep move and drink.
Tiffany Lach Many cannot eat on their own, and some get stuck and require help to recover. That sounds pretty debilitating to me. Debilitating just means a dramatic change in ability to thrive normally, and while not every spider is debilitated by this condition, you can’t deny some that are.
I recently made a comment against breeding spiders on a different reptile channel, and was attacked with ad hominems and insults to my intelligence instead of a reasoned argument. My opinion is my opinion and will only change with presented evidence. Although you haven't changed my mind, I want to thank you for your reasoned and well thought out position on spiders. Too many people just resort to attacks on others they disagree with.
Every attempt at an argument on a controversial subject in the comment section be like
Person making an argument “heres how i feel and why.”
Random person “Your wrong and you stupid!”
Person “ok but why?”
Random person “because you clearly stupid and your argument sucks,you (insert offensive cuss word)”
Person “OK, but why am i wrong?”
Radom person “i told you because it sucks (insert offensive cuss word)”
Me reading it be like “BRUH!”
I've seen atrocious neurological issues in them first hand. No evidence will change my mind
Hi Clint, this is Kevin @ NERD. Since I am the originator of the Spider gene I decided to comment. Thank you for a fine video and perspective. I just wanted to chime in that since I do breed the Spider gene I know quite a bit about all things Spider. I feel quite strongly that there has been a fair bit exaggeration regarding the wobble of the Spider gene in general. The idea that a breeder is making Spiders and has to euthanize some of them is outrageous and not something that I know of or see. I literally love the gene and most Spiders I make have a "minor" wobble which I have always found endearing but not something that I saw as a worry for the welfare of the animal. I think the severity of the Spider wobble has been over stated and made to look far more common than what I have seen. In many cases they are showing an animal with problems but the back story of that snake is never clear or even discussed. Seeing a Spider with a really bad wobble is simply RARE! People can make their minds up and claim that a breeder keeps the gene only for the money and I find that troubling. I very much enjoy the Spider gene and love those animals, it is a powerful and wonderful gene that allows me to visually create things I can only sometimes imagine! Great discussion and your words are very level! Kevin
Kevin, I'm honored that you would choose to watch our video, and even moreso given that you don't watch RUclips. Thank you for contributing to the conversation. A lot of people are calling for more research. I agree that this would be wonderful, but it would be expensive and time-consuming and would end with thousands of snakes that were used in the study being euthanized. What you and others like you have done is as close to the perfect study as we're probably going to get. Yes, you may have a financial bias, but sometimes you have to work with the evidence that is available. There is nobody that would know better than you. You could be a total scumbag that has concealed the truth to make an extra $35 per snake selling spiders, but I see no evidence of that. I have respected you for years, and don't imagine that will change anytime soon. Hopefully we get to meet at Tinley.
Hi Kevin. Many thanks and respect from the UK. We keep spiders too and there are certainly a couple in our breeding plan for this and subsequent years. We see very little wobble or disorientation in any of our collection and a lot of good potential. Great to hear your opinion on this video and thanks to Clint for raising the subject. Cheers all!
That's right out of the mouth of the man the myth the legend the evil morph god. If kevin who is an avid animal lover and conservationist says he is ok with the spider gene that's good enough for me. In saying that I've also bred the spider gene for many many years and the wobble has been greatly over exadurated I'd say less than 10% have a noticeable wobble as hatchlings. Now I can't say what the percentage is as they grow because I'm only in contact with a few of the customers but I'd be willing to say with proper care and due diligence the odds are about the same as they grow to adulthood.
Clint said my opinion best. If we did this for money we wouldnt take any risks for the extra $30 spider adds to a snakes value. We work with spider because the animal is awesome and the "risks" are overstated. No one is getting rich off of spiders. Theres way better morphs for making money.
Clint's Reptiles I keep hearing how special spiders are and how so many breeders love them. What exactly is different about spiders besides how they effect patterns? I’m asking for anyone’s opinion that breed or have them. I’m just curious because a lot of breeders love them. Also I’ve seen ppl say the stripe morph will have the same as a spider. Is that true or false?
From somebody who is strongly against the breeding and selling of spiders I just wanna say I love the video and not only respect but appreciate your opinion by supporting it with evidence witnessed on your own spiders
Same I don’t quite agree but I understand
God bless😇😇
We talking about spiders or snakes?
@@ramtrucks721 We’re talking about a breed of snake (ball python, to be specific) with a morph that is named “Spiders”. The name comes from their pattern looking similar to a spider web.
@@Thurston86 context sweety, doubt we are talking about tarantulas right now.
@ed the wrong person lol
I usually agree with you, but I think we just don’t see eye to eye on this topic. I understand where you’re coming from, but for me it’s a similar situation to breeding pugs. People think pugs are cute and fun, and although you can care for them by taking them to facilities to widen their nostrils, this doesn’t solve the problem. I believe it goes the same for spiders. I’m not going to argue with anyone, because everyone should have their own opinion, but this is a topic I’m pretty uneducated in so I’m sure many people here could tell me about all the things I’m saying wrong. I really want to emphasise that you are a brilliant pet owner, one of the best out there, and I understand and take into consideration every point you make. It’s so easy to come off as rude or close minded in comments, so I desperately want you to know that, despite my disagreement with you, I think you are a brilliant person. But no matter what, I still see it as unnecessary suffering for the sake of making an animal look nice.
This is an edit long after this comment was posted, but I think it’s and important point to add on, so if you have already replied to my original comment and now feel you disagree with me, that’s totally fine.
I feel like the comparison of dogs isn’t right, it’s as if we found a way to create the most beautiful human, but they have pointed ears or an elongated nose. It wouldn’t physically affect us in any way. With the spider, it’s more like we found how to make the most beautiful human, but every one of them had a limp. It doesn’t necessarily stop them from continuing with their life, but it is debilitating and makes life just that bit harder.
Totally fair. Thank you for sharing.
If you see a more knowledgeable person disagreeing with you, it might be a good idea to do some good research and see the sources where their info is coming from!
@@davidls187
This isn't a topic of pure science though, is it bub?
DragonFang 409 I think you made your point very well and very respectfully! Well done!
It's all a spectrum and shouldn't be viewed through an absolutist lens. Our quality of life isn't based on any single condition we have. Snakes don't have inner conversations. They know food water and safety. The wobble in captivity hasn't been proven to cause pain nor prevent them from eating and meeting their survival requirements. It's about good care more than genetics.
Well hi there!
I really appreciate the level of polite conversation that has been occurring since the release of our two videos on spider last Saturday. The videos have over 1,600 comments combined. Sorry I have not been able to respond to them all. However, I have been trying to keep up with reading them, and I have noticed a few things that are frequently being misunderstood about what I had to say. I’d like to try to clear them up so that I am not misunderstood. Sorry if I wasn’t sufficiently clear originally.
First, this video is why I’m okay with spider ball pythons, not why I think that they are the best and everyone should breed them. There is one good study that I had read before and that is posted many times in the comments. In that study they polled breeders of spiders about the wobble, and then animal welfare researchers gave their analysis. In that analysis, the majority of animal welfare researchers concluded that there wasn’t enough evidence to make a call one way or the other about spider. I am with them. New evidence could sway me one way or the other.
Second, my example of the dog is not to say that what we see in dogs and what we see in spiders are the same or are equivalent. It is only to demonstrate that just because a mutation has an impact on behavior, that does not mean that it is “bad”. We have to analyze it further.
As far as comparing wobble to autism, I am with you in finding that to be a comparison made in poor taste, and one that is largely not comparable with wobble. They aren’t the same thing. This is actually a misconception that I was hearing a lot that I was trying to clear up. I was only saying that in one aspect it is not entirely inaccurate. You can’t conclude that just because something or someone is different, that this means that they are different in a way that is “bad”.
Just for the record, I have never bought a snake because it had spider in it. I have bought snakes that had other genes I was looking for, and after carefully inquiring as to the severity of the wobble, I determined that spider in those snakes was not a deal breaker. I have only produced one clutch of spiders, and I kept all but one of the spider babies. I would have kept them all, but one of my friends really wanted one of them. Many people have been encouraging me to collect the data on spiders myself, well I am. My data set is limited in size because I can’t keep more than a handful of spiders, but the experience that I have first-hand leads me to think that wobble is generally not an issue. My data set is expanded by feedback from Kevin McCurley from NERD (who was the first person to work with spider and has produced thousands over the last couple of decades) and other breeders and keepers that have more experience with spider than I have. They report on a large scale what I have seen on a small scale. Unfortunately, that is all the data we really have at this time. More would be better, and depending on what that data is, it could definitely shift my opinion to either side on this issue. Right now, my position isn’t that breeding spiders is obviously bad or obviously great. They seem to do well in captivity, so I’m open minded and awaiting further evidence. Until then, I see no reason to place any kind of restrictions on the breeding of spider. I am not afraid to breed them myself, but I am highly selective of the individuals that I would consider breeding as I would like to lessen the severity of the wobble through selective breeding as many people have suggested. It may not be possible, but so far so good. If I see aberrations, that would be new evidence that might change my mind.
Again, I apologize for not being more clear originally. I did my best, but sometimes it is difficult to see where you aren’t getting your point across until you see the reactions to what you have had to say. Thank you for being such an amazing community and for doing so much to build a culture where we can have respectful and open conversations even about the most controversial of subjects.
For those of you that haven't seen the second video, it can be seen here: ruclips.net/video/idf6b7Mleew/видео.html
Clint's Reptiles you need to pin this comment!!!
i'm autistic, and i was actually thinking about this before you brought it up. i don't think people should compare it (mostly because most people don't know anything about autism, and don't know what they're talking about), but you raise an interesting point re: different doesn't mean bad. i'd need to research more on wobble and any other problems with spiders before i came to a conclusion, but yes, the most important point is: are they suffering?
Roisin Rowan that’s what I guess is the only thing we don’t know. I would just think that it would b so stressful. My mom had something that hasn’t been heard of a lot. Tar dive dyskenisia... made her neck muscles flinch a lot and she said it stressed her out so bad and made her feel exhausted. I don’t think we could ever prove if it’s stressful to spiders??? I dunno, I do see breeders having a large percent of the ones feeling they r ok to breed.
Hi, autistic guy here. Please get off the "comparing neurologically disabled snakes to autistic people" bandwagon.
We don't all have super powers or special skills, we're not all rain man. We have a common symptom called 'special interests' that drives us to gain knowledge in a specific field of study, which is where a lot of the super power/super knowledge misconception comes from, but not even 1% of us are savants, the vast majority of us are either intellectually disabled or socially maladjusted and that's all.
Been a fan of your for ages, but I'm sick of these comparisons being made even in an attempt at positivity, it's offensive and a shitty thing to do and frankly I think you should apologise.
Clint's Reptiles Is this the article you meant? www.researchgate.net/publication/262937861_Neurologic_dysfunction_in_a_ball_python_python_regius_color_morph_and_Implications_for_welfare
Because if so you need to reread it. In the abstract they say this study is about proving a need for research into this issue, not about analyzing stress or quality of life in these animals. They polled 13 self selecting breeders (a admittedly tiny and biased sample size), and the data was so poor they couldn’t even analyze it. There is a worrying quote where one of those breeders reported that even severely affected snakes can be bred, which tells me people are breeding highly defective animals without regard to the neurological disorder. They also polled 28 vets and welfare experts, and their near unanimous consensus was that there was a HIGH possibility of impact to quality of life. They did not say there was not enough evidence to assume stress in these animals, they said it was causing harm. The authors noted a large difference of opinion between the two polled groups. Throughout the study, the authors referred to sources that were almost exclusively about dogs, with a few sprinkled in about reptiles that are not snakes. The only direct references to ball pythons with wobble were three RUclips videos. In their conclusion, they determined that there wasn’t enough data to come to a conclusion. It wasn’t because the data was ambiguous, they simply did not have any data. This could barely be referred to a study at all, and I’m guessing it was published simply to raise awareness that this issue exists. I initially assumed you hadn’t included a link to this study because you understood how weak it was. Here are a few important quotes from it:
-This article aims to raise awareness in the animal welfare science community of the potential for welfare problems in genetic variant reptiles and to stimulate further research in this field
-Quantitative methods of statistical analysis were not employed owing to the low sample sizes achieved; rather qualitative analysis was employed.
-Spider offspring that lack the pattern mutation do not express wobble symptoms. Further, unaffected hatchlings may be born to severely affected females and affected offspring born to adults that have never displayed observable clinical signs.
-Welfare Scientist Group Respondents (n¼28) typically perceived a moderate to high welfare effect associated with the clinical signs of the wobble condition
-Although breeders generally agreed that quality of life was not significantly affected, 89% (25/28)of welfare scientists concluded a moderate to high welfare effect based on the information available.This disparity may reflect biases inherent in the respective groups.
-Our historical failure to identify signs of potential welfare compromises in reptiles is probably best explained by their alien morphology and behavior
-herpetoculturists implicitly considered [fecundity] demonstrated the absence of effect on quality of life. This may not be the case, as even in stressful situations, sexual activity is likely to be maintained in reptiles where the negative influences of corticosteroids on sexual endocrine function seen in many mammals do not seem to be replicated
-A true assessment of effect on quality of life should be based on complete information on the effects of the condition... Further study to quantify any increase in stress experienced during feeding is therefore warranted, to support a robust assessment of the welfare implications of the condition.
As for the autism comparison, you missed hard on that one. If you wanted to raise awareness of the inappropriateness of this argument, you should have done that. Instead you said this is a bad argument, now let me show you how it’s a good argument. It is also not ok to lean on the autistic superpower myth, as it is inaccurate and harmful. I don’t think you were trying to be insensitive, but it very much came across that way.
Your first video on this subject from a while back was excellent. Your secondary video associated with this one was decent. This video was not. You mislead your viewers by implying there is evidence when there is none. I think you should really consider what the majority of your followers are saying. Since there is no evidence either way, we shouldn’t be risking the welfare of these animals, simply because we like the way they look. If you want to breed them without selling them, or if you want to breed them specifically to study this issue great. However, until we know more, these animals should not be sold disclaimer free for so little money that impulse buying is easy. It also bugs me that you have only liked responses that agree with you, by a vast majority, even though there are many polite, well structured arguments against you. I think it might be time to take a step back and look at your own biases.
I appreciate that you made this video. You're clear and respectful, and I hope the comments are the same. However, as a fellow scientist, I strongly disagree with you. I understand that those who support the breeding of Spider Ball Pythons want very much to explain why it's fine to continue breeding and selling them. But none of the information here, even when it's framed as objective data, is compelling when weighed against the reality that people are knowingly continuing a genetic line that has clearly demonstrated a link to a neurological disorder. The following is only personal observation, but for what it's worth, I worked my way through undergrad and grad school as a veterinary technician - and in many cases, animals will not show signs of distress until their discomfort is at extreme levels. Since human conditions like autism were introduced to the discussion, I'll share a quote from a friend of mine with a circulatory disorder that affects his peripheral vision and balance: "I look normal. I act normal (I think!). But on most days I deal with being miserable for at least part of the time".
Thank you for sharing and sorry to hear about your friend's disorder. I don't mean to joke or offend with what comes next, apologies if it comes across as insensitive but I have to ask...would your friend prefer it if the government or some regulatory body had prevented his parents from mating because they knew that doing so would result in his disorder? Yes he struggles every day, but is his life not worth that struggle?
If a snake can convince a human to care for it, feed it, keep it safe from predators, and bring a mate to it in order to perpetuate the species, all by displaying an interesting color pattern coupled with a disorder that in some cases causes some relatively unknown degree of suffering, then should it be allowed to? Who are we to answer this question?
So much suffering is experienced by all species, who are we to decide which suffering is allowed and which should be eradicated and at what expense?
@@Bearded_B Wow, comparing humans having kids to humans purposefully breeding other animals with known deformities.
So, you believe the animal has an equal say in the matter? They're given the choice to evaluate the risk?
As we can't stop all suffering, might as well introduce some more?
It's ok they're suffering a bit, cos they can "convince" humans to take care of them?😂😂
@@Bearded_BI have autism and I can personally say I'm really glad nobody decided to 'eradicate my suffering' on my behalf before I was born.
It only comes down to one thing, if an animal have a risk of having a lower quality of life due to its potential defeat, more so then the average breed of that animal, why should you even want to breed it other then the specific traits it produces
If you know you'll take care of it sufficiently or that you will make special effort that whoever does own it cares for it properly then there isnt any reason not to.
@@jukesngambits Owning one that already exists is fine, the issue here is people shouldn't continue breeding something KNOWING there is a ginormous likelihood of issues and problems. If you grew apples and knew that if you added X to the soil and there's a 90% chance those apples would make you sick but a 10% chance it wouldn't and they would be fine, any sane person would stop growing them and find a different way.
@@KrissyMeow The demand for these animals comes from people who buy one that already exists. No one pre-orders their python, they go to the shop or breeder and buy one that's already been bred. If no one was willing to buy these animals then no one would breed them, it's simple as that.
Then we should apply the same logic to human breeding.
@@thisistheaccountname that’s why i don’t get kids. I have really bad genetics, and i end my line. It have reduced my quality of life, so i would not want to get kids knowing that they will get my genes
As someone with both an intense (aka neurodiverse level special interest) in dogs and reptiles, I’ve been really intrigued by the spider ball python discussion. For me, the feeding data would be the deciding factor from an ethical perspective - if the trait has solely physically desirable (to humans) characteristics but undesirable health characteristics, it is unethical - similar to the over breeding of short nosed dogs to the point that they have health issues. However, if there is a behaviorally desirable characteristic that occurs with the physically desirable characteristics (like the floppy eared dog example) and the health characteristic is not necessarily debilitating, it is more of a moral grey area and the goal should be continuing to figure out how to get the desirable behavior and physical appearance while minimizing health effects.
Unrelated to the ethics of breeding debate, the fact that the homozygous genotype is fatal means a better human analogy would be hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (though it is recessive, not dominant, but with heterozygous carriers having some health effects). In heterozygous individuals, the gene is associated with a higher risk of certain heart conditions, but in homozygous individuals, it is lethal in infancy. As a neurodiverse person, I’m sick of autism being used in these analogies, because it is not at all a monogenic disorder that follows Mendelian inheritance, in the vast majority of cases (minus things like fragile X and Rett syndrome).
Agreed. As an autistic person i was offended by the comparison. Autism is a behavioral difference, not a deadly disease.
For some spider ball pythons the wobble is just a behavioural difference, for some it means that they need a lot more care to survive.
@@malkomalkavianhuh? It’s not behavioral when they always have a wobble (physical defect), studies have found they have defects in their inner ear that helps with their balance/vestibular defects
@@Creative_sea and for some individuals the impact is slight and could just be called a different way of behaving. For some individuals it is more debilitating and means they require more care or their survival is threatened.
Perhaps we mean different things by the word behavioural?
I was perhaps unclear because I was gently trying to say that ASD is really quite a good comparison, because for some individuals the difference is so small that it could be called a different way of behaving, and for some it is a catastrophic disability which challenges their survival. In trying to be diplomatic maybe I was unfortunately vague. My apologies.
HOCM is autosomal dominant.
Gonna have to disagree with you on this one. Floppy ears and color changes and playful attitudes are not comparable to spider wobble. Things that are only detrimental in the wild don't really have bearing when it's a pet. Spider wobble doesn't always but can cause problems in captivity, while a pure white python wouldn't last in the wild but is fine in captivity. I'd also agree that certain breeds of dogs shouldn't be bred for similar reasons (eg pugs, shar pei, etc).
that is a good point man
It seems super disingenuous for him to even compare the two.
@Patrick O'Brien *Perfectly Stated
It’s the only time I’ve been a little bummed by Clint 😔 I’ve watched so many times at their failed hits at feeding. Just darting all around the mice but not getting it. Just seems pitiful to me??
@@staceyroberts3468 I do not understand why anyone would even attempt to defend creating animals with central nervous system defects because they look cool
I feel like the comparison of the floppy ears is unfair. My floppy-eared dog's quality of life is equal to that of my bat-eared dog.
The same cannot be said in many cases for spider ball pythons, as a more agreeable temperament has no real impact on their lives in a domestic setting. The wobble, however, can cause a change in quality of life regardless of whether it's a domestic setting or a wild one. It might not be the worst defect out there, but I'd think of them as the French bulldogs of the snake world. They can seem happy, but they nonetheless have a lower quality of life than a Shiba Inu or a lab. In addition to this, their continued lower quality of life is a direct result of our poor breeding decisions.
I feel that the most ethical decision is to no longer breed spiders, brachiocephalic animals, or any other animals with a generally lower quality of life. Continuing to do so strikes me as INCREDIBLY selfish and frankly distasteful.
Came to the comments to talks about pugs and other similar with dogs. Thank you for also thinking of that comparison.
Thank you
Very well said! I agree 100%.
However, cats with floppy ears, (Scottish Folds), all have a form of arthritis? If I am remembering correctly. Its what causes their floppy ears. So they do suffer for their ears, differently from a cat with straight ears anyway.
Floppy ears is more similar than you might think. I've owned multiple dog breeds and drop ears are far more prone to ear infections and wax buildup than a rose, semi-pricked, or prick ear. They trap debris and dust easily and the lack of air circulation can create humid conditions. Humidity + dust + microbes + ear wax = infections galore. Much like the spider gene, the biggest question is where the line between minor inconvenience to the animal and intentionally creating suffering lies. And that's not something you can truly answer without bringing personal convictions, emotions, and conscience into play.
Personally, I tend to side with Clint's view. However at the same time, I'm not too crazy about supporting the ongoing breeding of spiders in the same way I'm not sure I want to buy a dog with large drop ears again. It's a minor, albeit unnecessary inconvenience for the animal that I can live without. However I don't think it's abuse to continue those traits, either, because the vast majority of animals with proper husbandry get on just fine.
Have a Spider myself, I don't know how you've never heard of them being bad feeders. She certainly tries her hardest, but the wobble causes her to miss her strikes repeatedly. Other than that she seems happy, but it definitely takes a little more care to keep her healthy.
I know I'm severely late on this but nobody else has responded, When saying a snake is a good or bad feeder it refers to thier food drive and not to their actual ability to aim well at the food. Your spider seems, from what you said, to have a perfectly fine food drive since she is trying to eat, a stressed snake will often refuse to eat, not ever trying to strike or even come out of wherever their hiding for a meal.
@@OneTruePeanut nnnnnnot accurate
@@sugarmuffin319 What part of that wasn't accurate? The part about good feeders and food drive, or the part where a stressed snake will tend to refuse food? Because both of those are accurate.
After we finished filming this video, the conversation continued for a while:
ruclips.net/video/idf6b7Mleew/видео.html
This link will take you to that conversation. We were going to release it as a Patreon Extras video (our patrons at Patreon get at least one video like this each week). However, there is a lot of great content in our conversation, and we have decided that it should be available for everyone. So please, if you want to see the rest of this conversation, click the link and enjoy. Thank you again for being the best fans on the internet. I never would have made this video if you all weren't so open-minded and amazing. You're sinkin' rad, and I really appreciate every one of you.
Love the thumbnail for this video.
Wait... to Da Godman's statement, I have a neurologic disorder, but that doesn't mean I have brain damage.
❤️❤️
I can respect your opinion. I suppose we still don't know where the wobble comes from, and it makes sense. There are some other defects I've heard of, like those leopard geckos that are more reluctant to eat.
I would argue that if you're going to compare the wobble to a condition in humans, wouldn't it make more sense to compare it to some forms of cerebral palsy? Becuase to my knowledge, cerebral palsy doesn't really effect one's mind, but mainly just inhibits movement in various ways.
At the end of the day, I do believe it comes down to how important asthetics are. Wobbles are a neurological condition that is clearly not desirable. I think that without self regulation now, we are going to end up looking at the equivalent of the Bulldog in the future, and only because of a pattern.
The spider gene reminds me of the frame overo in horses. The frame overo is an incomplete dominant gene like spider is, the heterozygous form creates a white pattern on the horse, with no issues at all, but the homozygous form causes the foal to be born all white and die within 48h because the cells do not migrate from the neural crest to the intestine. So the foal has no digestive process at all. They cannot evacuate the meconium or digest anything... very sad way to die. But people breed them because the heterozygous form is completely fine and very pretty.
I appreciate you making a video to let us know why you don't have an issue with it. My stance however is that I want to in no way endorse intentional breeding of an animal that has an issue that could impact their quality of life for the reason that it looks cool. Take the dog example, a genetic predisposition towards being docile and friendly doesn't take away quality of life. Plenty of breeds do have issues relating to form that give them quality of life issues and I disagree with their breeding as well. I think people should be made aware and the potential severity should be made clear, but each person makes their own choice.
And comparing them to people with autism, eh I find that sketchy. Pet snakes live their whole lives in a box, their lives are what we make them. I feel like we have an obligation to make it the best that it can be, including not creating snakes intentionally with the potential for a lesser quality of life. Humans do not live in a box completely controlled by another being, our lives are what we make them. Humans have the brains to make comparative value judgements, they can say they would rather live as they are than normal, that is valid. Snakes can't. There is no trade off here for a positive in any way that benefits the snake's quality of life, there are really only potential negatives for the snake. That is why I find it immoral and even if they are better eaters, I will not be swayed and won't support their breeding.
It is okay if people disagree and if others choose to buy them, but they should be aware.
There's limited supporting academic research to wobble in spiders. Which is why many people are not in favor for outright banning them as it could be something as simple as a random mutation that occurs later in life , an enzyme not being used properly, etc. An emotional argument without facts to support your side is just humans personifying something and thinking it is horrible without considering facts. It makes the emotional argument a fallacy by not being willing to change based on evidence
@@hashimrahman51 that data is from breeders reporting if they know of wobble in spider morphs and if they've seen it. That's not an academic study that determines the cause. And wobble is in other morphs so again an academic study and research needs to be done to see it's exact cause. I'm on the side of science proving theories instead of jumping to conclusions that could be wrong and impact other morphs for the same reason
With the dog example, he brought up a good example of a breed that is fine instead of a pug or a bulldog that is known to have breathing issues. He has good points otherwise. I don't know enough about snakes to judge if this is similar to a pug or a golden retriever.
I don’t agree with you but I’ll respect your opinion. I think it’s immoral to breed them just for the sake of the aesthetics
I can obviously go into this further and elaborate why I don’t think that we should breed the spider morph but I think this says it all :)
Perfect. And hopefully you saw that I find that position totally respectable.
Yeah you shouldn’t purposefully breed something that will be disabled but if you already have one or want to adopt one give it a nice life however don’t breed them or buy from a breeder
They need to sell first.
Let me pretense this with saying that this isn't an attempt to call you out or anything, it's just an honest question:
If you think breeding something due to aesthetics is immoral, then how do you feel about like 50% of all dog breeds that have legitimate medical conditions due to selective breeding for specific physical traits?
Edit: I ask this question becuase I feel like people tend to overlook stuff like this in these kind of arguments just because they've been around for so long that people just kind of accept that they are a thing and move on.
@@metalman6698 I personally think we shouldn't have done it. I feel culturally we are only newly becoming conscious of the processes that took place to get some animals to where they are today. I think and like to think that majority of people look back on that in a negative light. Not super negatively, but I don't think it makes people feel good to think back on how and why we have pugs.
I just feel like we shouldn't be breeding naturally "useless" and many times seemingly disabled animals for the purpose of having a living painting in a glass box in their house.
I appreciate your take on the spider morph. I still am leaning towards it needing to be regulated more. I’ve seen videos of really bad wobbles from spiders and them corkscrewing constantly and it is heartbreaking. While some are “okay and somewhat normal” is not a justified reason to breed them if a large population of them having severe issues that do hinder their ability to thrive and eat. Self injury is incredibly high in spiders, because they lack the coordination to strike their meals properly and…lach onto themselves. I think until people can do more actual research, breeders should stop pumping them out so much. Breeding at the end of the day is about money, and they will sell what is popular, no matter if some animals they sell have severe debilitating issues. I’m glad not all spiders suffer from this issue, but the genetic components of spiders leaves some of these snakes with difficult lives. I’m completely against the breeding of smushed faced dog breeds (pugs, boxers, bulldogs, etc), because it gives them a lower quality of life. I view this as somewhat of the same issue. Breeders need to do more research, instead of selling breeds/morphs just because they sell fast and for higher prices. Quality of life is really all i care about in these situations.
I appreciate your well thought out argument, however I still disagree. If we are in direct control of the breeding process I see no reason to produce an animal that has a high probably to have a neurological disorder. Aesthetic is not that important.
I feel as though the dog comparison is unfair. Dogs were purposely bred to complete tasks whereas snakes are bred to just look a certain way. While in the wild dogs with floppy ears have a disadvantage the truth is those floppy ears allow them to better interact with humans, which was the intended purpose. I don’t see what the intended purpose of the spider ball python is, other than aesthetic.
I'm not saying that spider and dogs are the same, I'm just saying that because a mutation has an impact on the behavior and not only the appearance of an animal, that does not mean that it is "bad". Whether it is bad, good, or neutral still needs to be determined.
Pugs have health issues from nose to tail. And were only bred to be “companion dogs.” Originally for royals in China. (Literally because of how they looked.) I don’t know that much about Spider BP because I’m new to reptiles. But I wanted to point that out. Obviously that wasn’t the comparison made, but it easily could be. Though it probably wouldn’t help to strengthen the argument. I’ve met a lot of pugs who struggle just to breathe.
What data have you seen to support the hypothesis that spiders have a higher probability than any other ball python? I see a ton of people on here really giving him a hard time, but none basing their arguments on any actual data. I mean I can't find anything at all online other than hearsay on forums to support this argument.
@@ClintsReptiles Clint my dude, have you ever had vertigo? Not just dizziness, but actual real VERTIGO? It's horrible. It's physically unpleasant and incredibly distressing, even debilitating.
Although it doesn't change my personal opinion, this does raise several points that I csn see the logic to. It's refreshing to see an argument presented so respectfully. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to learn about other sides of an argument without hostility. It lets us all make more informed decision
This is an older video now, And I have avoided watching it, because I really admire your content, and today I finally got to listen to your opinion...and I really cannot agree with you on it.
I come from a family who has done some dog breeding, and comparing neurological issues to something like floppy ears or a "friendly disposition" is really misleading.
So, for an example, for the type of dogs we bred, they generally came in 3 color categories, Blue Merle, and Red and Black Tris. Blue Merle were the most expensive color, so most desirable to breed, but there is a problem. Breeding two Blues together would lead to any puppies that survived till birth deaf, and usually blind. They would also have much more white compared to the parents, with a very distinctive look. In my opinion, breeding Spiders is like purposely crossing two Blue Merle, since, while a blind/deaf dog would die in the wild, it would still be able to eat, drink, breed and play in a household, and hey, dogs mostly rely on smell anyway, right? Would it be worth the cost to have such a distinct looking dog? Most people would say definitively not.
Spider ball pythons live, eat and breed, sure, but the issues they have are not really something to downplay...many Spider ball pythons cannot even flip themselves over, and will slither on their backs if placed upside down, cannot look about when held, I've seen many struggle to strike prey, sometimes even biting themselves in confusion. I can only imagine them living their life as if they are dizzy constantly, sure, they don't know anything different, so it wouldn't be particularity distressing to them, but it makes just....being a snake harder than it should be on them. Purposely breeding snakes like this, seems wrong to me, since it's only just for a color pattern, there are so many other cool looking ball pythons to breed, Spiders should just be let to fade away.
Im neutral in this argument for spiders and would not breed them myself but when you say, "breeding Spiders is like purposely crossing two Blue Merle" Its more like crossing two spiders, which is highly frowned upon because super spiders will have extreme wobble and most likely lethal. That's why people don't just like you don't cross two Blue Merles together. "many Spider ball pythons cannot even flip themselves over" Almost every single one does, I'd say 99.9% of the time they are perfectly fine and. It's unfortunate to see that 0.1% but still extremely rare. Also, I know this is a older comment but whatever
I agree, a large point missed is whether they can thrive or not. In reality, we would want for all animals to be able to thrive, but the breeding of them creates more animals that cannot thrive. They should not have to require extra attention and care to make sure they can survive as a *pet*. I’m sure if people were asked, if they could take away the neurological problems spiders have, to allow them to thrive.. people would say yes. But then their actions say otherwise.. huh? Doesn’t sit right with me
Your entire comment is misleading.
The only real difference is the tens of thousands of years of selective breeding that we haven't yet done to spider ball pythons.
You should have also shown an example of a Spider that does show the neurological issues heavily. GoHerping has a good example of it in his video and you should definitely check that video out. The "wobble" is so bad that the snake has such issues that often it bites itself while feeding. The issues can get so bad that it heavily effects the snakes quality of life. Also I don't like the "autistic" argument we have resources and more understanding of autism and we can deal with it vs spiders there's not much we can do to help it deal with its neurological issues. If you want to see a good reason why not to breed them definitely check out GoHerping's video on it (Its one of his most viewed videos so it shouldn't be hard to find ) I wish this wasn't such a big thing lol I hope someone can find a way to get rid of the problems in spiders so we don't have to worry about stuff like this but until then I feel like any breeding of spiders should not be for profit but for research/educational purposes. Or just stop completely if we can't find a way to fix the issues they have. I agree they look nice and even though all of them don't turn out badly I think enough do that it can be seen as harmful to continue it. I know that spiders are not inbred but as an example we know that inbreeding in humans can cause genetic defects so we make sure to educate people on that and regulate it heavily. This all goes with other snakes that have common and repeat issues as well like cinnamon's. I am glad that you at least do care about your snakes and you are educating about the issues so thanks for that haha. There's too many breeders out there that just want the large profit they get from this breed and they do not tell people about any of the issues they have so they can make a better decision about getting one.
I have seen his video. That spider is one of the most severe examples I have ever seen. That said, all ball pythons miss and will do that if you place a feeder between their head and their body.
My normal looks like a spider when she eats
Go Herping is a poorly informed kid with like 3 years on the hobby that has come to some unfortunate conclusions based on his really limited knowledge on the topic.
His heart is in th right place, but you can't base your opinion on a single few extreme cases.
The plural of anecdote is not data. That was sort of the whole point of the video. I think it’s incredibly sad how dysfunctional that snaked looked, but the worst example of the condition in a highly edited video by an uniformed teenager is not how we should be making these decisions. I think his heart is truly in the right place, and he may even be right, but it’s not the right way to find out. Also, go herping’s video is extremely popular. Clint is well informed and discussed videos like that in this video. I would assume he saw it, even if he didn’t confirm that here.
1. That kid showed a bad case that was also a rescue, right? So how much of that is just poor keeping?
2. It *IS* a case of inbreeding. Most people on the interwebs snake community just pass genes back and forth.. This always makes bad things worse. Combine that with unscrupulous hack breeders (the majority, you know it's true) chasing those insta clicks and quick clutch dollars. Then, the whole thing snowballs into poor ol Cinnamon being held up as "muh evurdah spahdur pithawn! Alluvem iz bad! REEEEEEE!" with all the NPC followers soaking it up and REEEEEEE-ing till it's "cawmun nawlij" among the well informed #lookatmetooalsostillmoreagain internet consumers who want to be seen as significant on their ego platform of choice.
Ego driven sloppiness. Well cared for snakes from clutches with distant parents don't wobble. Now if those snakes are poorly kept? Well, how is that different from any other species or morph being abused till it's damaged?
People rail on German Shepherd breeders for hip problems in pups because it's a sign of poor selection in parents. Why is that not the case with snakes? It's not the snake's fault that the breeders won't do what is known to work well to make good snakes.
I must say i don't particularly agree with you. Snakes are often kept in poor conditions due to lack of care or education that's just a sad fact. Spiders being easily accessible and as you mentioned prone to becoming worse with bad care end up having a poor quality of life even after getting rescued if their condition became worse. If we continue ignoring well known issues (in other animals as well) we risk becoming dismissive of worse issues in the future.
Having said that your opinions and reasoning do make more sense than a lot of others i have seen so keep up the good work ^^
And could you please make a blood python review? I'm very curious of what you have to say about them!
Thank you for your thoughts! We will cover them soon.
I’m sorry,maybe it’s just me,but I don’t get why would you breed a snake or a gecko or whatever animal just for a goddamn morph that can led to having neurological issues . Even tho there might be a small possibility of a snake having issues due to their morph, just don’t breed it. There are many other morphs that don’t include issues. I don’t get it . And also I’m kinda sick of people saying “you won’t even notice it” because there are some serious cases. I will still continue to follow you because you give really great informations and you are one of the best reptile tubes out there. But still
There are small chances for mutations or conditions with every animal.
Rambo Jambo true, but this is a morph you KNOW will have issues. Some can have it minor and some can be very serious but no matter what ALL spiders have a varying degree of neurological issues because they’re spiders
In family genetics of humans for example where we can have neurological, visual, and mental abnormalities that we can pass down is it unethical for these people to reproduce?
@@andrewl9169 Imo it isn't unethical. There will always be chances of a baby being born with a disability, however it's very different if your purposely breeding them.
For example if someone has a genetic disability that affects their quality of life in a negative way, but they decide to reproduce because they themselves are beautiful then it IS unethical. But if someone has a baby that has severe mental issues then it isn't unethical, it's just life.
@@andrewl9169 these people may love eachother and want a child. Snakes are forced to breed and don't care if they have kids or not.
Thank you, for this video! When I decided I wanted a Ball python, I did my research...what type/size of enclosure, temperature/humidity, lifespan, size, substrate, etc. When I had an enclosure ready, I went online and chose the one that I thought was the most beautiful, a Spider. I didn't know about the "Spider wobble", but found out about it soon after getting him. When I ordered him, I was told he was eating live mice. I offered him a frozen/thawed for his first meal with me and he didn't hesitate to take it. He has been such a good eater, even though he sometimes doesn't quite get it on his first try. I recently decided it was time to make the switch from mice to rats. He refused the first two times I offered a rat, but ate it on the third offering. ☺❤🕷🐍 I've had people make me feel like I should be ashamed for having a Spider bp, but I absolutely love him! Thanks again for this video!
I REALLY appreciate how open minded you are. The fact that you to study and look into the subject shows that's you care. I wish more people could be the same.
nah he is just stupid animal abuser who want make innocent animals suffer
@@eightbitfeline1415 im sorry but no ones gonna take u serious with that pic of my little ponies... lol
@@TBboyee tbh i would change this stupid pfp if can but i can't bc my ipad is fucked up now
Some people with autism are severely disabled and can't even speak. I hate this myth that everyone with autism has a mild condition. Autism can be absolutely debilitating.
Totally true.
I have autism
@@ClintsReptiles i have high functioning autisim
@@christianlifesofpets8549 nice. me too!
Also the myth that everyone with autism has some 'extra ability'. I can also say from experience, would those that do have this give it up to be normal? Some of them, hell yes they would.
I know I'm late to this debate but I have to throw in my two cents. Pretty much everything has already been said and I do appreciate your approach in that it is both scientific and comes from a place of kindness towards animals. But there are a few things that keep sticking out to me in this debate and they seem not to be covered a lot.
1. There is no such thing as a 'perfect' version of an animal, and yes, in pet animals color variations are not an issue as your house is hopefully predator-free. But we are not talking about a healthy animal, we are talking about an animal that is suffering from something akin to, say, epilepsy, Parkinson's, or MS. Sure it could be very mild and thus not affect the snake's life quality much but a number of owners have shown videos of snakes biting themselves by accident during feeding, corkscrewing, not being able to flip over when they are flipped on their back.... I don't think anyone would look at a snake like this and say 'if I were a ball python, THIS is the kind I'd want to be.' (And saying 'I wouldn't want to be any kind' is a cop-out - if you were given a chance between being a 'regular' one and a severely wobbly spider one, I'm pretty sure which you'd choose.)
2. The fact that the double copy of the gene flat out kills the animal before it is born is a.... hint that nature doesn't think this is a great idea? And sure, a good pet is not the same as a good wild animal. But I have a hard time seeing how something that misses its meal and chews on its own body instead is 'a better pet' than something that can just, like, eat a mouse without self harm.
3. Aside from the 'do you breed them' issue, there are issues of are people being informed about what a 'wobble' is, as well as how bad it can get. But people who breed them commercially will never volunteer this information because lots of people would be turned off from buying this snake. You keep saying 'if you are informed it can be a great pet for you' and I strongly agree with that. But what would you do if you sold a baby spider with a slight wobble, explained it as best you could, but then years later the new owners called you in distress because the wobble had gotten severe and the animal was hardly able to stay upright or feed itself and the owners were despondent?
4. When you breed spiders and you get a particularly bad one in a clutch, what would you do with it? What do commercial breeders who breed tons of them do with those who have more than just a funny little wobble? I'm not sure I want to know the answer, I seriously doubt they are all given great and secure homes for their natural lifespan.
5. You said in the other video you never had a bad case of spider wobble in the clutches you raised, but you did receive one as a prize and ended up trading it away later. So.... you entered the draw because you wanted to win the prize (a ball python), but once you had received an animal that was, essentially, severely disabled, you didn't think it had 'different wiring that is possibly a hidden superpower', you felt it wasn't right for you to keep and you traded it away. Something that seems a little difficult to square with risking bringing more of them into the world.
I know this is probably a 'TLDR' situation but essentially, I also respect that everything we do as humans is graded on a morality scale and we all sit at different points on that scale. I really appreciate you are leading an open and respectful debate and we should all talk about these things more. But if you wouldn't want to be one, and you wouldn't want to have one..... maybe you shouldn't risk making one either? My two cents.
Damn ... could you help me write essays for my school.
All of this, absolutely. Well said!
You hit a lot of the points that really got to me with this video. I enjoy his content but I'm not a fan of the cop-out, waxing philosophical answers that avoid the question altogether, and i'm glad this comment section called him out on it. The floppy ears on a dog = the flipping, self-biting snake part especially.
And almost all of those videos the animal is a rescue , meaning the husbandry was completely out of wack. I have seen a lot more spiders that have little to no wobble then I have of the super screwed up ones.
Regarding your second point - what's your thoughts on Basset hounds and Dachshunds? Both breeds have short-limb dwarfism resulting in their distinctive body shape. Most forms of short-limb dwarfism, including (AFAIK) the forms affecting those two breeds, are lethal in homozygotes.
I think that if all companies who breed and sell spider ball pythons are willing to be as careful as possible to minimize the wobble, that spider ball pythons would not have to be banned. Animals can have defects in the wild as well that are around the same level as a major spider wobble. The minor ones aren’t very serious. Although I still am not for it, that would at least be a solution.
From what I've seen, the times the wobble gets bad seems to be more from something going off in incubation, too much heat, or poor care. High temperatures _will_ cause neurologic damage in _any_ snake, and spider ball pythons may simply be more susceptible to that - meaning they just need to have a bit more mindful care.
Most of the ones I've seen have been rolling around with there heads in the air
There’s no way to do that in the breeding process though. The spider gene carries this inner ear problem that causes them to lose their equilibrium, some more frequently and/or more severely than others. How badly the animal is affected by this defect doesn’t seem to be something that breeders can control one way or the other.
You're kidding; if you actually believe that, you've never seen one with major wobble. Personally, as someone who has seen one miss when going after a pinkie and spend half an hour trying to eat itself because it managed to bounce off the wall of the enclosure and mistake its own stomach for a mouse, it's pretty obvious that animal would not survive in the wild.
@@iusethisnameformygoogleacc1013 and you can't have the spider gene without headwoble because of the epistasis
you should do a video on the earless monitor lizard
I'll see what I can do. I probably wouldn't want to bring one to the studio.
Very rare, very interesting lizard. I have recently seen some pics on an esoteric 'conspiracy' based YT channel where these appeared to have pale blue eyes which although very small proportionally looked amazing. However as it was such a site I am not sure whether the images were further doctored for 'reptilian' clickbait reasons or whether they were genuine untouched representative images of at least those specimens under those particular lighting conditions. I think YT channel was The Daily Rabbit hole ( ?) or The Outer Light (?) by some guy called 'Ed'.
My sister has a cat with cerebellar hypoplasia which is basically the cat version of wobble. She a beautiful cat who has an amazing life, isn't stressed or in pain and doesn't know she's any different from any other cat, but would I breed her for her to try to reproduce her unique and beautiful markings? Absolutely not.
Even though she loves life and has as good of a life she can have, she does not have the same quality of life as a regular cat. She can't jump, she can't play and hunt like all cats love to do, she can barely walk without falling over and she has knocked most of her teeth out because she can't control her head when eating. She may not know that there's anything wrong with her, but I know her quality of life is worse than her siblings.
Personally I would never ever breed a defective animal because they look nice even if we can't make a case for them suffering more or less than any other animal because odds are that defect is just gonna get worse with time.
btw, I don't mean to sound rude but comparing spiders wobble, a central nervous system disorder to autism a neurological and developmental disorder isn't a very strong case and as someone with autism I'm really sick of this comparison.
One thing that doesn't sit right with me is that I see mostly breeders defending the continued breeding of spider ball pythons. Breeders are directly profiting from pushing the idea that spider morph's neurological disorders are not that bad. You can make the case that there are some good breeders who will self police and try to breed spiders with the "least amount of wobble" but that's not good enough. Spider morphs sell for a lot of money, that's motivation enough to push the idea that the aesthetic of this morph is more important than it's quality of life, and it is a quality of life issue. There are too many videos of spiders who have trouble feeding, and that's not to mention the horror stories of spiders drowning in their water bowls. The comparison to dog breeding doesn't further your point either, as most people who are informed about the issues that specific breeds face (pugs, bulldogs, and dachshunds for example) are not in favor of the continued breeding of these animals. I don't care that a pug's squished face is cute, I care that they struggle to breathe and their eyeballs are at risk of popping out of their sockets. Aesthetics should never trump the health of an animal. I understand that you have your opinion, but I think that the fact that a majority of your audience disagrees with you says a lot.
😆 you took my words out of my mouth, but I do see his point too.
God bless 😀😃😅
I’m shocked that someone as typically knowledgeable as Clint would think that that was a good analogy. Anyone who knows anything about dogs knows that those breeds have a plethora of debilitating health issues.
Hey Clint, I have to say I'm also impressed that people were so willing to hear you out on this...
I understand that you have way more experience with reptiles than I do or probably will ever have, but I don't think the 'evidence' your talking about is really evidence it sounds more like your own observations. I've never really seen any studies on this and if there are any you can recommend I'd be glad to go through them.
Also im not so convinced that the wobble itself is always causing stress to the snake, but if a snake was to miss a strike and injure itself this would definitely cause stress and I have seen plenty of videos of spiders missing their food when striking when they have a more severe wobble. Adding on to this if the snake only takes live, the wobble is severe enough, and the snake isn't being monitored whilst a live rat is being presented the spider isn't going to have much of a chance to defend itself if the rat fights back. I have no idea if this is the way you feed your snakes and I'm not saying it is but their are breeders on RUclips that do and that suggests even more breeders outside of the platform do the very same thing, and as someone else you were talking to in the comments mentioned even if this isn't a snake problem but more of a people problem that doesn't mean the snake is safe.
Sorry for the terrible formatting I'm on mobile.
Normal BP also frequently miss they're food when striking. When feeding any BP the keeper is expected to position the rat so that there aren't any hard objects to either side or directly behind it. It's not just a concern for spiders, it's a general BP husbandry issue. If any snake isn't being monitored or checked on regularly while being fed a live prey item, that's considered bad husbandry. I've never heard anyone argue that point (except when feeding pinkies, which don't bite).
It kind of sounds like you're saying "if the husbandry is bad, that would be bad for a spider BP." While true, that seems to me like an issue with someone being misinformed to the detriment of their pet. Any BP in a scenario with the type of owner you describe would be at risk of injury. I agree that a spider would likely be at higher risk but being a spider wouldn't be the root cause of a feeding injury.
Clint is trying to present an argument that vindicates what he is going as correct. He isn't following the evidence to it's conclusion he is picking what he thinks supports his a priori position that spider balls are just great.
It's super disappointing.
@@GinEric84 I can see where your coming from there.
@@NaraMouse101 I definitely agree that a spider will most likely be fine with good husbandry but so will most snakes... I can link videos of people casually throwing rats into tubs with ball pythons, some of which are spiders... I actually didn't know it was common for a ball pythons to miss a strike, I've cared for snakes other than BP's and their have been bad strikes but never full misses so thanks for that info.
@@spuilloh2637 I certainly can't find any published studies at all never mind ones with merit... It's definitely disappointing and I feel like he's basing this of his own experiences and not considering the overall morality of the morph. He's saying that he will take scientific reasoning above anything else but what scientific reason is there for a spider BP to be more successful? I don't think we know any and without any studies to back that point up it's utterly meritless. There's certainly reasons why they wouldn't be as successful such as a severe wobble causing missed strikes and a higher chance of suffering when poor husbandry such as the reckless live feeding is provided. I think he's probably tried to convince himself that these animal are fine to breed because he wants to keep breeding them, but that's just a guess.
I'm sorry Clint, but in my opinion every single breeder of spiders is just choosing aesthetic over the health of an animal. It's kind of interesting also that you spoke against emotional appeal, then opened with one.
But he did make a good point I never thought about prior, which is that they don't show signs of stress when they are taken care of.
@@IBtehOmar that's still not a good argument as to why we should choose the asthetics over a clearly undesirable mental condition.
his entire video is just his delusional superiority complex shining through.
Wyatt Milliken in my opinion they’re choosing money over the health of an animal
Wyatt Milliken I very much agree with you. People don’t Mary other people with the thought of “oh, if I marry this person than I will have a child with a physical/mental disability. I usually agree with Clint too, but I will consider the health of my animal over all priorities.
This is perhaps the best defense of breeding the Spider Ball Python I have watched to date. It is a difficult gauge to consider when there are certainly some permissible dog breeds that may be infinitely more debilitated than Spider Ball Pythons inflicted with the wobble. You made an outstanding conclusion regarding domestication of these animals which may render those debilitations trivial. I think many may take the dignity approach which is incredibly subjective to begin with. So long as it has been well fed, has sufficient means of play/exercise, and has the capacity to live a full lifespan (provided the animal is not being raised for slaughter) I believe that qualifies for a dignified life as a domesticated animal.
Thank you for keeping an open mind.
I have to say I feel like the wolf v. Dog argument is invalid. We haven’t domesticated snakes. The breeding of particular dog breeds with issues that impact their quality and length of life would have been better. Pugs are prone to respiratory issues, Dalmatian get arthritis.... spider balls and jungle jags can get wobbles. My jag had a wobble.
I agree, a lot of people use the dog argument but I also disagree with breeding dog breeds that are aesthetic over quality of life and physical conditions
We haven't domesticated snakes, but it is a good comparison. Dogs were bred for looks and temperament, spider ball pythons are being bred for looks and temperament. The wobble is there, it always will be, but the same is for every pure bred dog. German shepherds are very well known for joint and hip issues, and some even at a young age will be unable to really walk or function while most older ones will most likely get hip dysplasia or arthritis, so should we ban GSD? The answer is no, we just need to be careful on how we breed them and keep in mind that it is a thing with them. You could have one from a great breeder and it still gets hip issues. You could have one and never have these issues. But a backyard or puppy mill breeder doesn't care and breeds just for the money. Which can cause a seriously unhealthy dog, as is the same for people who neglect their dogs. A Shepard puppy was left outside on concrete and nothing soft to lay on, it was rescued and needed help learning to walk again cause the concrete messed its joints up. So same for the dogs as with spider ball pythons, it takes careful breeding, understanding, care and the knowledge that it is there and it could happen but they can also live very long happy, functional lives.
I just stumbled over a research regarding this issue. A team around F. Schrenk found structural differences in the inner ear morphology of spider ball pythons that seems to be the reason for the wobble. Reference: Comparative assessment of computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging of the spider morph of Python regius and wild type Python regius to evaluate the morphological correlate of the wobble syndrome (Schrenk 2022)
For me the discussion is about success in captivity. In the context of captivity a BEL isn't hindered in its ability to be a healthy ball python because of that specific characteristic.
We breed morphs as exploring genetics, especially for colouration.
Spiders have a colouration many find desirable and so wish to perpetuate. This comes with their neurological issues as a package deal.
They are known to be 'good eaters' (that is if they aren't hindered by the wobble to the severity that they can't). But that isn't the reason for breeding them, since if the appetite really was the goal people wouldn't be placing emphasis on keeping the colouration despite the neurological issues, they would just go and look for other genes that help with appetite and not the spider genes.
I think the reason for rescue pythons perhaps having worse wobble, also has the potential be *due* to them having bad wobble. It could, as we don't know yet, not be caused by the previous situation but be linked to it. If that previous owner wasn't able to care for them as the wobble worsened perhaps that is a factor in their needing to be rescued. It's a case of correlation and causation
Success in captivity. I don't care for placing an emphasis on aesthetics for the sake of neurological problems.
Issues that snakes have that can be accommodated by a more forgiving environment. The trait of light sensitivity (that appears in albino snakes for example) can be accommodated without compromising on the husbandry of their environment.
And BEL don't need to worry about predators, making them able to have equal success in captivity.
When the functioning of the snake is impaired in a way that can't be accommodated for and still have a comparable standard of husbandry, then I would not wish to perpetuate that genetically.
If it's a mutation that just happens then yeah hat snake deserves the best care we can give it. But to choose to place emphasis and choose breed *for* characteristics like the spider genes, is not the same.
Breeding of animals is eugenics. It's selective breeding. For me it is the act of choosing to give a snake wobble.
For those who will and have tried to make the arguement of pro-spider by comparing selective breeding in animals to human eugenics, I do have something to say, from the perspective of an autistic person myself.
Human eugenics is evil, and *not* comparable to the breeding of animals in terms of eugenics. It is not the same ethically, and humans should not be selectively bred, nor should they be exterminated for their differences.
So when those who are *pro-spider* who bring up human eugenics (sometimes with the specific example of autistic people 👀) and say that breeding for spider genes is ok because they deserve life, are making a leap that doesn't really follow.
So pro- spider, we are talking about *animals.* Breeding animals... You in this scenario *already are* partaking in eugenics. That's what this is. It's not a very valid comparison to say "human eugenics bad, therefore my specific choices in snake eugenics aren't bad".
You can't bring up 'human eugenics wrong because all people deserve life' as a reason for *your choices* in the *eugenics* of snakes therefore being ok? You are *already making choices on the genetic profile of a living thing.* They get to be born and pass on certain genes due to *your* preferences. So... you can choose. You *are choosing* what kind of snake you are bringing into the world. If you were anti-eugenics in animals, you wouldn't be participating at all... *not* bringing up neurodivergent and disabled people as examples for something which for the logic and point of that specific argument is isn't valid.
People can disagree. But that is an example of an argument I wish people would understand doesn't make sense. I am curious and open to hearing other points of view, but this specific appeal isn't coherant for the point it tries to make.
Thankyou for listening. :)
Yeah, human eugenics doesn't factor into the discussion at all, because humans choose whether or not (and with whom) they want to reproduce, while animals are just doing what a breeder directs them to. The breeders are the ones choosing for the animals, which is why some people have an issue with it. Especially in cases where the animals are producing very unhealthy offspring or can't even give birth without surgery (an issue with some dogs). At that point the breeder is creating suffering, though the spider ball python defect is nowhere NEAR that extreme.
The neurological issues of spider ball pythons may be overblown, but it is fair to not want to breed/buy them until we have more data about it.
Believing that does not mean you have any problem with humans choosing reproductive partners for themselves, regardless of disability.
Preferring looks over welfare/neurological health of the animal one is breeding/keeping is highly unethical, and morally wrong. The animal must live with what the breeder has given it for the entirety of its life.
I'm also autistic, and resent the way Clint compared a debilitating neurological defect to people with autism. Given a choice, I'd give up any "benefits" of this disability for a neurotypical life. Most autistic people would, because it *sucks* being autistic, no matter which end of the spectrum you are on. That's my take, and I would like Clint to do some more research on autism before making any more claims about it.
I also have austism and I would not trade that away to be a neurotypical person, because I am content with the type of person that I am. Looks also contribute towards a better life, as animals with better aestethics also tend to be more loved and better cared for by their keepers, so breeding for aestethics is not necessarily immoral.
In what way is it ruining the animal’s welfare? His spider looks content. He explained the evidence that spiders actually do better in captivity than regular ball pythons.
It seems to me the issue is more of poor ownership, worsening a spider’s condition, rather than the spider being forced to “suffer.”
Also, he said himself comparing the spider to human conditions is a terrible idea, but he was trying to give them some credit by saying, “some ways you would compare would be...”
An animal constantly wobbling around and unable to control itself with a constant sense of vertigo sounds pretty wrong to me.
You ever heard of enigma leopard geckos? They're identical syndromes, an aesthetic skin color genetically linked inextricably to a neurological syndrome that affects their balance as a dominant trait, except one has legs and the other doesn't. And ES is well known as not a good thing to breed into them. Why should it be different for the spider morphs?
Would you condemn a human to a life of constant dizziness and unbalance? Why should it be any different for the animals? We have responsibilities to the animals in our care. Humans have choices in whether or not to spread their own dna around, no matter how messed up it may be. Animals that we have chosen to keep in captivity do not. It's entirely the owners choice whether or not to subject any possible offspring to a lifetime of misery and stress. It's not the snakes fault that it was born that way, but rather those who choose to allow it to continue.
Here's a fun fact: there's an IDENTICAL morph called pinstripe, it has the *exact* same aesthetic but also NONE of the wobble. It's also easier to care for an animal that doesn't have a disability, so why people are advocating for a morph with no benefits to the snake when an easy identical problem free morph exists is beyond me. Spiders have wobble. Pinstripes do not. Neurotypical animals are easier to care for and breed and feed than one with constant vertigo. Ipso facto: the choice is clear. The one without a chance to have wobble is clearly the superior choice.
There is no reason to advocate spider pythons. Unless, ofc, one is trying to sell them, and is trying to persuade people that they're not as bad as they really are.... But that could never happen... Could it?
//Edit for spelling errors and grammar
@@quagmaTV It might seem wrong to you, but you are not a ball python and you cannot empathize with what makes this animal content and "happy". What is most important and contributes to the animal's quality of life as a pet is that it does well in captivity. Spider ball pythons wobbles vary greatly, where some cases are mild. They also do well captivity overall and therefore they're solid pets that can live a good life, meaning there's not really anything wrong with breeding them as long as you know what you're doing when it comes to minimize the wobble.
I get where you're coming from, but I disagree along with many of the others. A wobble isn't healthy for a snake. It makes them dizzy and terrified, they miss when striking, they hit their heads, etc. I saw a juvenile albino python with a wobble and it had scabs on its head and was terrified, constantly in a dizzy strike pose.
But what about the spiders that strike themselves because they are unable to even strike their food?
Those are astronomically uncommon. Who knows how they got to be that way?
@@ClintsReptiles I personally don't support breeding spider ball pythons because of the wobble. Even though I understand your argument and where you're coming from, I don't like the idea of breeding a snake morph as humanly as possible even with the chance of getting a snake that may never be able to live a good life. Kind of like selectively breeding tourrets to get the least amount of symptoms, but there still being a chance of getting someone who can just barely eat brealfast in the morning. That's how I interpret it anyway, also kudos for responding to a comment on such an old video, love your content overall.
Spiders aren't the only morphs that do this, I can't tell you how many times I've seen normals munch on themselves and pastels ect, it happens
@@ClintsReptiles They got to be that way through a severe presentation of wobble, which is genetic. What is this argument?
@@philimentphilement374 I thought noodles weren't considered a morph?
Something I’ve noticed with my own spider balls is as the snakes age, the wobble shows itself more. Never noticed a wobble from mine until they reached a certain age. I still love them.
Mason Morphs I’ve noticed my spiders wobble at food time. I have a variety of ages, and spider x morphs each one has a different degree of wobble from essentially none to corkscrewing. My spiders eat better than my pied or Mojave or normal. I love my spider bps. My hidden gene Woma and cinnamon have a slight wobble also.
I want to preface this with a thank you for covering this so thoroughly. As someone who has wobbles/tremors it does make my life harder. It makes me sad when people breed animals that they know will have a high chance of neurological issues, especially since it's so hard to know how they're affecting something that can't talk. I act perfectly normal and don't seem stressed to others, but I'm always kind of in pain from my muscles overacting. It's not fun. I think we need more research into their wobble and stress responses/elevated baseline stress before we can decide the wobble isn't a big deal. I do love that you discuss observing their stress responses and restlessness compared to other ball pythons. It would be good to know if their stress hormones are different. It seems like the wobble is exacerbated by early-life trauma/high stress, from what I've read, but it does make me worried about their quality of life in general.
People really do need to tell the difference between what sort of opinions and arguments are worth discussing.
This here is actually one of those, and I wish you and others would take care to make that distinction. Thank you for your video, regardless. It was a very clear look into the complexity of breeding animals such as this.
I appreciate hearing your point of view but I feel like you are comparing apples to oranges when it comes to domestic traits and then traits that produce defects that mess with quality of life. Your dogs floppy ears are not going interfere with his ability to eat or play.
I want saying that they are the same thing. Snakes don't even have external ears 😉
What I'm saying is just because a mutation alters brain function, that does not mean that it is bad. That still needs to be determined.
Except apples and oranges are fruits that have been bred specifically for humans in some regard. And a friendlier wolf with floppier ears WILL do worse in the wild, harder to hunt when you don't hear as well and keep trying to play with your prey.
First off, props for presenting a respectful and well-though out argument. Personally, I've seen enough keepers come forward with examples of severe wobbles that I no longer feel comfortable describing the spider wobble as anything other than variable. While I think it's interesting to theorize that spiders with visibly severe wobbles primarily come from backgrounds of neglect or abuse, I haven't seen nearly enough proof of that myself to reach that conclusion. What do you think about keepers that report their spider's wobble getting increasingly severe with age? I'd be very interested to see a professional, unbiased study carried out to measure the severity of the wobble across different genetic lines and how those wobbles progress throughout time. While I think it's unlikely such a study will occur, a public facebook group for keepers to (respectfully) share their personal experiences with the spider ball python would be an interesting first step. Perhaps moderated/administrated by keepers with opinions on both sides of the spectrum.
Ultimately though, my argument is one of pragmatism. I don't think any of us can reasonably claim to have enough actual hard data regarding the spider morph to reach a scientifically justified conclusion. And what is the benefit that outweighs the risk? Personally, I don't think their physical appearance is a compelling enough reason. However, I respect that you can feel differently! Thanks again for approaching the topic with care and for encouraging your supporters and the community to keep the debate polite and constructive.
I have strange relationship with the Spider morph. I brought my Ball Python when my Milksnake passed and when I was at shop I saw they had a Spider Yellowbelly who took my breath away. So I brought her and took home and fell in love with her. Bryce became an irreplaceable part of my life. I started to notice her head wobble more and more and I put it down to new noodles anxiety and it happened more prevalent when feeding coupled with her absolute terrible accuracy when feeding but it did still happen day to day.
So I hit the old Internet and did some research and then learnt about the wobble and how it was an actual thing, I was not told about this at all and did ask the store about it and they said they don't breed spider but will get them in ( seems a bit counter intuitive). So after my research and learning more about the gene and wobble I changed my care and husbandary, example being rather then warming the whole mouse just the head to allow her pits to zone in. This didn't have complete success as she has missed and got me before causing some damage but never purposely.
Now Bryce is an absolute 'puppy' of a snake. She never does 's' up never gives any kind of warning and just slithers around chill as anything and is an absolute joy but there are feeding issues which can I relent also be BP attributes. I love her to death and couldn't imagine not having her but had I known about the wobble I probably wouldn't have even looked at Spiders and also had I been told once I picked her out probably would have put her back. I want to start breeding snakes in the future but I will not breed Bryce as I don't think we should pass a neurological issue in form in a purposeful way which is my opinion and I wouldn't push that on anyone.
Respectful discussions in disagreements and broading mindsets with experience based knowledge is important and does not require insulting or emotion outbursts. I love your channel as it feels so open and honest and everything is put forward so effortlessly professional. If I lived on the US and not the UK coming to your place and meeting you would be a bucket list endeavour.
I’m autistic and I don’t appreciate having my disability used as an analogy or justification for breeding spider ball pythons. We know that spider ball pythons all have a wobble to varying degrees, and breeding them increases the risk of getting snakes that have a lower quality of life. Yes breeding snakes always comes at the risk of random health defects popping up, but we should always try to keep that risk as low as possible.
It’s upsetting to me when people compare me as an autistic person to an animal, especially when it’s being done to justify doing something that I don’t endorse.
I still completely disagree, as I think we don’t yet understand the complexity these neurological effects have on the daily lives of snakes. But, I have great respect for you, your opinions, and responsible breeding practices. These discussions are very important so our opinions all evolve! And hopefully this will also help those who do breed ball python’s have better breeding practices.
Well said. I got mad respect for you and your channel. Very knowledgeable and respectful. Thank you!
Im sorry. I will desagree in this one. I have a boa constrictor with neurological issues similar to the spider gene and its just heart breaking, and his cuality of life is oviusly deminished. Its just plain cruel. I also happen to have a genetic desorder called Marfan Syndrome I am super tall and skinny (everyone tells me Im so lucky too look "like a model" ) , but I HURT all the time, and my lungs have collapsed 2 times Im almost blind in one eye and had 2 operations to be able to walk. Im sorry , thers no excuse for morphs with this kind of defects and your arguments dont meke up for it :(
Can I just say that domestication is different from the breeding that goes into reptiles dogs are bred to act a certain way and fit into certain situations reptiles are just about always bred for special color mutations making your argument of “A bad wolf” in my opinion not as valid of a claim
Yeah, snakes still share the behavior of their wild counterparts at birth. If you were to release a juvenile captive bred before it got acclimated to indoor life, into its natural habitat it would do all a wild snake does until it gets eaten for not being camouflaged.
Its not different than shihtzus pugs...its for looks. Should they not be allowed to.live even if an owner is willing to give them a comfy life and care for them properly?
+Yuki
We're not saying euthanize existing snakes. We're saying to stop breeding the spider balls, as they have a major issue. If we keep breeding for aesthetic rather than health, are we going to end up with the dog issue again?
Yuki Light when you find where in my first comment I said to kill spider ball pythons and dogs I will listen to what you have to say
@@michaelbonj4090you have missed the point a little here. All he wants you to take from this is that regardless of the trait, behavioral or visual, some traits are better suited in the wild while others are perfect for ONLY attracting a human to take the animal as a pet.
Once you grasp this concept, his other points build on this and develop his entire argument further.
Far too many people on this thread already had their minds made up and no matter what Clint said, he was never going to change their minds...
Ive seen nothing other than positive results with the Spiders I've owned. It's only when breading is done regardless of detrimental characteristics being a likely result that i take issue. An aside, My mother bought my father a rainbow boa when she was pregnant with me. I was 15 when it passed away. She was a wonderful pet that I used as an educational tool to teach my fellow students that most of what they "knew" about snakes was wrong.
Clint I think the comparison to domestic dogs falls flat. The controversy here is really around the severe end of the neurological issues. It's not about being "not natural" it's about breeding for a disorder that reduces the health, lifespan, and quality of life of the animal.
That said, later in the video when you talk about how spiders on average do better in captivity, are better eaters, etc compared to "regular" balls that was much more interesting and convincing. I appreciate your time in making this video.
As an aside, when you talk about people "having autism" you're using outdated verbiage. The APA has reclassified all previous Autism DXs (things like aspergers, PDD-NOS, etc) into one, over arching DX "Autism Spectrum Disorder" and so the correct way to say this is to say someone is "on spectrum." This is as of the DSM-V revision. It is also an incorrect stereotype to describe all people on spectrum as having some other "mental superpower" ah la Rain Man. While this is true in many cases it often isn't. I didn't at all think you were trying to be in any way insensitive here but wanted to offer this feedback as my son is on spectrum and I know there's a lot to keep up with ☺️
Im a new viewer and im glad to see that the comment section wasn't filled with rage comments, but ones wanting an explanation and curiosity on others point of view(i learned of the channel thanks to your collaboration with snake discovery)
We have the coolest fans on the internet.
@@ClintsReptiles Hey Clint:)
You don't intentionally breed for autism, like specifically knowing autism will be the result of the breeding. I think that would be unethical. That was a weird comparison.
I always appreciate your factual view on controversial topics. I am lucky enough to have a ball python with the spider gene (leopard bumblebee) and she exhibits no neurological symptoms and has the greatest disposition. Keep up the great content Clint!
Hey Clint. I agree with your assertions and observations for the most part, but there are key points that I cannot agree with. In short, I believe that their suffering is not something that can simply be quantified by lifespan and what anyone PERCEIVES as stress. Furthermore, I believe that no amount of detriment's importance, experienced in a creatures intended environment and caused by a controllable source, should be outweighed by a desire for something that is purely aesthetic. More research needs to be done to discover what degree of detriment these creatures experience throughout their long lifespans. Humanity has almost exclusively erred on the side of reckless adoption of new things without researching consequences or results, and it is something that I think we will continue to do for as long as we exist. It is human nature to be more curious than cautious, especially so when it isn't our hides on the tanning rack. Whether this is good or bad I think is clear. Historically speaking it has cost millions of lives. (Smoking, Drinking, Drugs, Weapons, War) I think until we have things figured out regulations should be created, in some capacity, to prevent the worst of these situations. I would love to have a longer conversation regarding this, but I don't believe the comments section of a RUclips video is the appropriate place. If you are by chance interested, let me know.
Thank you for making this video. It was very informative. You've brought up a lot of interested things that I didnt know about spiders. I'm still not a fan of the idea of breeding them, but now I don't feel quite so harshly towards those who do.
Just to say thanks - in general - for so many really great and helpful reptile vids, beautifully spoken, informative and with obvious love.
And in particular that in this video the way Clint speaks about autism is wonderful, and joyful, and as compassionate as the way he speaks about reptiles... which is saying a lot :)
Love this video! Thank you for sharing it, I’m sure it wasn’t 100% easy to make! Spiders are such a controversial topic right now. And while I am against the breeding of them, it’s always always nice to hear what informed people have to say! I have to say that this video is by far the best I’ve seen! I love that this is mostly sparking a really calm and rational conversation between people who disagree! Being on social media, I’ve seen many discussions spiral out because of disgust and anger where constructive communication becomes impossible! So I think videos and conversation starters like this are absolutely a step in the right direction for the reptile community (and globally as well)! Thank you again for this thoughtful and interesting video! I’ll definitely be watching it a few more times!💚🐍
Thank you so much for saying this. If there is one thing I am willing to stand up for, and even take some abuse for, it is polite discourse. If we can't have respectful conversations, what is left for us?
I personally think that this is one of those things that becomes neutral morally. A lot of people are making arguments about the spider being nice looking but damaged, but as you said it fairs better than most other captive snakes. As for them worsening their wobble in poor care, pretty much all snakes will suffer with poor husbandry. Some non spiders can become disabled or even die with poor care. So a good study to really see how spiders fair vs other snakes would have to be “are spiders more likely to become disabled with poor care vs other snakes and to what degree.” That would be difficult to study but without the answer to that question we can’t really know if it’s unethical to breed them. Furthermore should we stop breeding easy to kill reptiles like chameleons just because many of them die early due to poor care? I don’t think so. In the end I think people often lose the ability to be objective with animals because we project on them (when animals do not have the same emotions or cognitive processes as us) and honestly we just think they are cute. I would probably not get a spider, but that is just because I don’t really want one, not for a moral reason.
I completely respect that you have more knowledge, experience, and research, and I very much respect your opinion. However, from the other reptile owners I’ve heard from and the cases I see, many spiders don’t do well in captivity. The wobble can cause them to accidentally bite themselves, struggle to feed well, mobility, it just makes their life harder. I wouldn’t say that we should outlaw a snake that has a chance of a neurological condition, but every spider ball python has that gene, and in my opinion breeding them is breeding snakes that you know could have difficult lives before they even come out of the egg. From my perspective, this isn’t a worth while payoff for a specific scale pattern. To each their own though, thank you for sharing your experience with them!
Thank you for this video!!! The one point of discussion I have not seen AT ALL in this debate is the quality of life for these snakes. When it comes down to it that’s what counts. We, as humans, might not *like* the wobble, and if a person doesn’t want a spider/doesn’t breed them personally that’s perfectly fine. But, if the snake’s quality of life is on par with any other ball python your personal emotional reaction is irrelevant.
Clint, it does seem like you're taking the anecdote that spiders are better eaters and basing your recommendation for them around that. That is surprising since you dismissed the anecdote that a spiders wobble can get dramatically worse to the point that they have trouble eating. That anecdote and the fact that a spider with a bad wobble can crop up in any spider clutch (I believe you acknowledged that in the last video?) makes it difficult for me to support breeding spiders. I agree with your stance that evidence should lead opinion, and I hope we can have more facts to make easier conclusions in the future.
Love your work, Clint. Your a great person and an inspiration to animal lovers everywhere.
Clint, I normally enjoy your videos a lot. I don't even have any reptiles and I never will. But your knowledge, excitement and joy is contagious ☺I am especially fascinated by monitor lizards because they seem to have intelligence and individual personalities.
However, your argument that the neurological issues of the spider ball python can be compared with the issues that can be expected from your floppy-eared, friendly and playful dog, is perfectly ridiculous, to be honest! I would agree with you, that a lot of modern dog breeders have come up with very unhealthy dogs - like extremely flat-nosed pugs which can hardly get enough air. Since these dog may really suffer throughout their whole lives, breeding with certain lines should be forbidden or at least regulated towards much less extreme traits. However, there is nothing at all wrong with your friendly little floppy-eared mutt! Sure, he might not last very long in the wild - although you would be surprised how well some dogs which turned feral, are doing without human care if they have managed to form a pack. But your doggy evolved the way he did because he belongs to the first domesticated species ever, which evolved many thousand years ago from an ancient wolf population. They separated from wolves because some individuals learned by experience that they have a better chance to survive if they live together with humans - most likely because it was easier and less dangerous to eat food leftovers from human camps than actively hunting down prey. And those so-called camp-wolves or proto-dogs which were friendlier than others had a much better chance of survival because humans may have been more willing to accept their presence and even take actively care of them and their offspings. It's called "survival of the friendliest". There's also an element of "survival of the cutest"☺ And since your doggy is so friendly, cute and playful, he is actually perfectly adapted for living together with humans. It's ridiculous to call this a genetic defect. He may not be able to live and hunt with a pack of wolves anymore, but he is a genius when it's all about reading the body language and facial expressions of you and your family. Even a wolf which was raised by humans will never be able to understand humans as well and adapt as well to family life as your cute dog.
Interestingly the floppy ears of canides seem to be part of the domestication package, as the Russian experiments with breeding super friendly foxes have shown. But since neither floppy ears nor playfullness and friendliness create suffering as long as humans take good care of their floppy-eared and friendly best friends, it's perfectly fine and and a very useful adaptation. Btw, floppy ears are very useful for hunting dogs because floppy ears are better protected from sharp twigs and thorns. That's one reason why most hunting dogs have floppy ears. Watch- and guard dogs however need to have better hearing and they have erect ears which can be turned into many directions.
I really cannot contribute anything useful to the spider ball python controversy. If their neurological defects create suffering just like the extremely flat muzzles of some pugs, I'd say that they shouldn't be bred and sold. But if the snakes don't suffer physically and just need a little extra help from their human caretakers, it may be ok to breed and buy them. Unfortunately we still know very little about snakes and if they feel joy or if they can suffer. But snakes can definitely feel hunger and pain. If they didn't they wouldn't be able to survive in the wild. So, do spider ballsfeel uncomfortable because of their neurological defects? I have no idea and I guess that we cannot know that for sure. It's possible that we make the mistake of anthropomorphism if we feel sorry for them because of their neurological defects. But I wonder why some snake lovers even want spider ball pythons so much that they are willing to breed and buy snakes which are neurologically compromised. And frankly, some individual experiences with clearly suffering and severely compromised spider ball pythons give me pause! I saw a spider ball python which wasn't able to focus on grabbing it's food because of the wobble, and it finally sank it's teeth into it's own body! I think it's very callous to argue that this snake wasn't suffering!
Everyone has valid opinions! I personally disagree, my boy isn't as some bad as he used to be but he does suffer, he slightly.
He has trouble hitting his strikes properly and if he isn't supported he does twist upside down and get stuck.
I still adore your content! And I can't wait to see more videos❤❤❤🐍
Manta Tsubasa give your boy a nice life and if you want to adopt one that’s fine just never buy because that encourages more breeding
He gets stuck upside down? Man, that sounds pretty severe. Do you know much about the level of care it received when it was young?
Now THAT sounds like a severe case
@@ClintsReptiles He sorts himself out after a few seconds he just needs a bit of help. The shop I worked at ordered him in and I felt sorry for him so I bought him. He was my first snake so I never saw how bad it was until I got another ball python. I don't know anything about the breeder sadly, I got him when I was 17. Thank you for replying though Clint!
He's still my precious son and I love him.
@@lukastroutman4600 Now that I'm older and more experienced with snakes I would never get another, unless it was a rescue. I love my boy dearly and he just needs more help when he eats.
You don't like anecdotal evidence but you put your dog and friends as example/metaphor in your video, I'm a bit confused.
Also, I would like to point out that so many breed of dogs, if not all, have heatlh problems yet people keep on breeding them and if you were to base their breeding on purely how happy or unstressed they look, no one would see a problem with them but I understand you can't completely compare dogs with snakes.
What I'm trying to say is that all of this feels a bit sketchy. Saying emotions shouldn't come into manner seems a little bit manipulative (as well as the thumbnail) considering one should always feel empathy towards sentient beings. It sounds like "facts don't care about your feelings" and, well...
I am just doing my research watching sides of the argument, and I have to say that... after months of watching Clint's Reptiles and loving, admiring the scientific and biological approach to things and the informative videos. I found myself heavily disappointed with the side taken when it comes to breeding spider ball pythons. I have one common boa pet. I don't breed snakes. I breed tropical fish. And I must say... if your batch is a 100 fish, you get few odd fry in man made morphs... they get their fins twisted, guess how they swim... too long to move about comfortably or swiftly, spines shortened creating so called balloon effect... etc... etc. Yes, if i'm determined to keep alive an animal that hardly goes around getting food in their mouth, I can put it in a separate container and bring food to its nose raising it to be a new freak trend in a hobby. But this animal left in a standard set up where you would raise it as its 'more normal' siblings... would never made to any adulthood or further breeding if it's not pushed food in it's face when it's spinning in circles or missing where to strike on regular basis. It's like creating a breed of dogs, cats, hamsters or parrots, that are blind and they smash into things in it's 'sweet way' but food needs to be delivered to their nose, and it's gonna be a 'new cool thing'. Was a massive fan of Clint's Reptiles.... processing what was put in there to justify his breeding of animals that struggle... if you are a snake that doesn't know where to strike... you would be an amazing feeder if something was actually put in your mouth every week. Thank you.
I totally see where we are missing one another. Most spider ball pythons don't have any difficulties at all. Like with your fish, there are a tiny minority that do. Is the minority higher for spider ball pythons than non-spider ball pythons? I don't know. If those issues were common, I would totally agree that we shouldn't breed them.
Clint, I discovered your channel fairly recently and I've been watching a lot of your videos and trying to "Catch up."
I'm impressed with so many things about you and your channel. First, you as a person. Your vast knowledge doesn't give you a sense of entitlement or self-righteousness. You show kindness, patience, humility and accountability. With that, if your enthusiasm and positive attitude could be transferred into a usable energy source, I believe you could power a city (by no means a calculated thing).
Furthermore, your knowledge, personality and crew have acquired/created this inspiring community that has a wonderfully accepting and welcoming atmosphere. This doesn't happen easily or with luck. You and your channel have created this community and it's amazing. So kudos to you and your team.
Now to be more video-specfic: what you've posted must've been nerve-wracking for you considering the controversial nature. You must've struggled with not wanting to offend or scare away your fan base. The fact that you chose to go ahead with it, on its own, is courageous. The fact that you took the resulting criticism and some less polite reactions with such grace is evidence that you're really a fair and understanding person.
As for the comparisons you made that had upset some people; I believe the way in which you made the comparisons was harmless. You were clear (from my perspective) that your comparisons weren't direct and that conditions you were comparing a. weren't the same thing, and b. were neutral points, or not of a bad or good status. In my opinion, nothing degrading or dismissive was said.
Anyway, thank you for being so informative, open and fair minded, humble, and enthusiastic. I have more respect for you because of your (and your team's) execution and response to this video. I'll be continuing to watch and hopefully signing up on Patreon soon. :)
Thank you for leaving such a thoughtful and considerate comment. I feel like a lot of people have, for one reason or another, misrepresented what I was trying to say with this video. It is so satisfying to hear that you understood what I was saying and also what I wasn't saying with this video. Thank you for taking the time to say what you did. It means a lot.
As someone who works in a scientific field with a focus on observable behavior (ABA) I do think emotions are an important consideration. To not consider emotions would be inhumane and potentially cruel. Not that he said they should never be considered but I hate how scientists sometimes discredit as argument due to it having an emotional component.
I'm also curious if Clints autistic friends have aspergers, which while on the spectrum is very different than a lower functioning form of ASD. Some people even say aspergers should be it's own diagnosis. There are plenty of individuals with ASD who will never receive the "superpowers" Clint talks about as they will be early learners their entire lives.
Let's be honest, Autism is a catch all bin for anyone who doesn't fit in the normal box or one of the few special case boxes that have been built. Until doctors actually break it up based on root cause, it will always be a bin of many different human variants/conditions, some disabling, and some gift giving and everything in between.
ABA is abusive, so even though I agree with your "emotions" bit, it's kind of fucked up. Please don't pretend you have an ethical leg to stand on.
The question is whose emotions we are talking about and whether they are justified or can and should be changed. The negative emotions of someone abused and the negative emotions of someone who just 'feels' that, say, LGBT people are unnatural and shouldn't exist aren't worth equal consideration. If the emotion goes against the evidence about what is actually beneficial or harmful, the emotion has to yield. A harmful tendency that I have observed is the widespread acceptance of the idea that all emotions/feelings are entitled to being accommodated just by virtue of existing and being felt by someone and regardless of whether they are justified or not - in spite of the fact that this principle obviously leads to absurdities and to things that most or all people wouldn't accept.
This is and always will be the case of "The Garden of Eden." We have all these trees (morphs) that are perfectly fine but we just GOTTA have the fruit of the one tree (spider) that we're not allowed. And to be honest, if I only had my spider bp to go on, I'd call people delusional about the wobble. But I have 2 spiders, and they could not be any further differing than they are. My spinner is rock solid and has not shown a wobble that I've seen and my albino spider is all over the place. They have been side by side in my rack since I got them so they literally have the exact setup and it's been interesting watching them and seeing just how different this morph can manifest itself.
I really like everyone’s open-mindedness on the subject, whether you’re for or against breeding spiders. It’s a big deep breath of fresh air! Keep it up!
However, I disagree and I think that we should limit breeding spider ball pythons. Not everyone who knows about the wobble knows how to take care of the wobble. Fallen into the wrong hands can really hurt the animal. Of course that’s with every pet, but even more so with ones that are a bit different.
I got a spider BP for my second one and I had no idea about the wobble, he's now passed away because he refused to eat and drink and wasted away. I didn't know how to help him. I'm against spiders BUT I feel if they are going to sell spiders they should tell the buyers about the wobble first at least
The difference with the spider wobble and friendly dogs though is that the wobble sometimes causes suffering, and friendliness does not.
I don't know, I was pretty friendly with a few exes that eventually made me suffer a little 😂
@@AnotherCatLady- fair point.
Faulty argument interpretation - you missed the point that was made. Dog friendliness often comes with _floppy ears._ The wobble often comes with being a less picky eater.
Floppy ears result in significantly increased risk of ear infections, which are quite painful to the dog - and if left untreated, can go septic, and even if treated, can result in deafness. Thus, friendliness carries with it a chance for increased ear infections, which, due to the nature of infections, comes with an increased chance of infection-related death.
The spider gene isn't just a pretty pattern with a wobble - it also causes behavioural characteristics that help the ball python thrive in captivity (eating better, less likely to starvation-strike itself to death, and so forth).
Both things sometimes cause suffering (frequent ear infections from the 'friendly' gene making the ears floppy _is suffering)._ Both things also can be beneficial to the animal, with an owner who exercises proper care and supervision to avoid exacerbating a predisposition to specific conditions.
@disillusionistic spider moph royals are worse eaters than wild type royals. The only reason why we see them as better eaters is because the picky ones often starve to death
TL:DR, thank you Clint for calming me down and making some excellent points, points that I think most of the commenters before me missed entirely!!
I'm a bit late here, and new to the channel but have some thoughts that I feel like I need to share. I just got my first snake, Christmas gift for my fiance. It is a spider bp and I knew nothing of the controversy until AFTER purchasing. I chose this snake because it was in my $ range and I liked the way it looks.
I started researching the morph when I got home and was immediately alarmed after seeing so many opinions against the breeding of spiders as well as the worst case scenario videos.... Then I saw this video that made more sense than any of the others.
What I realized while reading that comments is that most people here already have their opinion developed and aren't going to change it. I came in unbiased. Also they seem to be confusing a disorder with suffering... Just because all spiders have a "disorder" does not mean that all spiders suffer. I thought Clint did a good job making this point but I guess when you already have an opinion formed, you are blinded to some things and lose the capacity for critical thinking.
And for the dog comparison, Clint was pretty spot on but people again didn't understand this point. In the same way that domesticated dogs who make great pets likely wouldn't do well in the wild because of selective breeding, certain ball python morphs make great pets while at the same time aren't equipped to thrive in the wild. That's the whole point being made by this comparison and I'm not sure how anyone can even begin to argue against it. Its facts.
Once you accept this point it's clear that evolutionarily speaking, the spider morph is a pretty successful one indeed, in the sense that mutations that lead to increased populations and the perpetuation of the species are successful mutations.
In this context the look of an animal is extremely important. So people saying that breeders are soooo immoral for breeding because of looks don't understand how in the context of a domestic environment, it is more beneficial to the species as a whole to have better looks.
If the disorder was so debilitating as some have claimed, the breeders would not breed these due to the increased cost and care required, it wouldn't make economic sense. Additionally the snakes wouldn't breed so successfully if the disorder was so debilitating. I'm no snake expert but everything I have seen, from people on both sides of this argument, say that stressed, suffering snakes don't eat/breed/lay good eggs.
What we know for sure is that most spiders have the same life experience as other domestic ball pythons, live as long, eat as much, and reproduce in the same frequency. A smaller number of spiders have severe motor skill issues, as do other morphs/species(including animals other than snakes).
Unless more data emerges that shows that the actual degree of suffering experienced by spiders far outweighs the evolutionary benefit, I'm with Clint.
Thank you for taking the time to process the points that I'm actually making. I do find that many people are misunderstanding them in their responses, and I hope it isn't because they were unclear in the video.
Honestly I have not made up my mind about spider ball pythons. I have too many questions. People say they feel unbalanced and their version of nauseous constantly. Which sounds like what would happen to a human if their inner ear gets damaged. So is the behavior associated with this gene the wobble truly a good enough measurement for how bad the neurological issue is in a given snake. Like could there be a snake that does not show a bad wobble but has a very bad sense sense of up or down or is constantly nauseous just does not show it as much as others might. We can only see the effects of the neurological in behavior so what if the neurological issue that goes along with the gene is worse we just don't see it. It just does not follow logically that just because a spiders wobbly is less then the neurological issue is less. Most people assume that is how it is. But what logical or sceintific reason for that is there? It could all just a be correlation. I think some serious research needs to be done comparing what is the difference between a spider ball pythons brain and a normal one. If is neurological we should see some difference in it. Then we would have much more info to make better decisions.
Well, we do see some major differences. Some "wobble" so bad they can barely move in a space a regular boa could, because they flop upside down and can't find their way around objects. "goherping" has a spider ball snake that is an example of this. Pretty clear it's a Neurological issue when it can't differentiate between moving its body up or down.
The way our inner ear functions is very different from a snakes though- a snake that's always feeling physical discomfort I'd expect to behave like a stressed snake. That's probably Clint's best point - not assuming snakes experience these things like we do and instead comparing how these snakes seem to feel to other healthy comfortable snakes. If the snake seems like a comfortable snake, that is more important to its actual state than asking if we would be comfortable
+ZZz
Don't you think it'd be better to research rather than assume? I'd like some hard facts on this, but there seems to be nobody who can present any.
+Zzz
The major thing I'm feeling from this whole issue though, is, why are we doing this to snakes after we've seen how much we've screwed up dogs? It seems like the mistake is being repeated.
GoHerping has a video on spider ball pythons. I recommend giving it a look.
First off, you've got a great approach to talking about this, and it seems to be that a lot of people agree with that part. It's a similar situation to pugs, bulldogs, and other dogs with similar issues (I say as I have a ckc spaniel, and they're prone to heart issues later down the line, but that's a debate to have another day).
That being said, I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you on this. I'm coming to this as person who's chronically ill, as a person with an invisible illness. I've had to adjust my life to it all. Just because you can't see the stress or suffering, doesn't mean that it's not there.
I've seen multiple examples where the neurological issues associated with spiders make life extremely hard for them (failing to strike food properly, biting one's self, etc). Sure, they can live with assistance, but the quality of their life should be the most important. Some can end up fine or with a slight wobble, but you're taking a chance on them being worse, if breeding.
That being said, I know I'm going to get arguments against my hypocrisy with my dog. I'm open to questions and having discourse about it. One hundred percent. She's going to be trained as a therapy/service dog for me soon (we hope). That's the main reason I have her. But with spiders, all I really see to their existence is aesthetics.
I do appreciate most of the comments section being civil about this topic as well. Always better than having an absolute dumpster fire of comments.
This is such a good video and I am so happy you made it despite the controversy. I do agree that well bred and well kept spiders seem to thrive. One MAJOR problem is that a lot of people seem to be very uninformed when they get one and aren't prepared for what is essentially a special needs animal and this seem to cause more problems than the health issues alone. Spiders are too common and too freely sold.
While I do agree that well bred and well kept spiders seem to do very well and probably are OK to breed I worry that if we accept the spiders it might be the start of a slippery slope. Some people have drawn comparisons to dogs and I think we all agree that if a puppy that had such a short nose that it couldn't breathe or was as deformed as some established breeds like pugs or bulldogs are popped out of a big, healthy dog or even a wolf we would be horrified and either cull the animal or definitely never breed it because it was suffering. But because we've gotten to this point slowly, slowly we've gradually accepted and even intentionally bred for traits that are severely harming the animals and many of these breeds are very popular.
My worry isn't so much about the spider itself as if we think the wobble is fine, then maybe this unintended trait is fine and then the next trait is fine and we end up breeding unhealthy animals for the looks.
Where do you draw the line? I don't know the answer to that.
So if the homozygous is lethal, then because of incomplete dominance wouldn’t the heterozygous spider gene still be considered bad?
Also, I would not want a snake to feel like having what appears to me vertigo half the time. I love your channel Clint, just disagree on this topic.
That's fair. Spiders certainly give no indication of being distressed. They frankly do great in captivity.
Clint, could you address my first question? I would like to get some clarity on it.
I never said I have vertigo, but if I did, I would prefer not having vertigo than being say 15 percent more handsome.
@@landonnorman It will affect your ability to reproduce. I bet everyone will tolerate vertigo for 15 percent more handsome.
Yulus Leonard It depends on the severity of the vertigo. I know someone with vertigo bad enough she vomits and often has to lie down on the floor for half an hour. She has lost jobs over it and it has required medical care. She is like a very bad case of wobble. My dad also has vertigo, but only occasionally, and closing his eyes for a bit fixes it. One would choose that 15% more handsome deal, the other wouldn’t. The question is, how common is one compared to the other? What is the mechanism determining that risk? Can we actually determine those answers?
Thanks for putting this out there Clint, I love your videos and highly respect your opinion, even if it differs from my own. Keep being rad!
I am here a long time after this video. I am a dog trainer and I can’t even begin to list the amount of dogs that are full of breed specific issues. I recently got a fire spider at a show not knowing this problem and mine has yet to show more than a minor wobble. She has had tremendous stress from the RI has and all the vet trips, antibiotics and not being able to shake it. The wobble has not worsened as far as I can tell. This video has helped me so much. Not because I am looking to feel better, I went to get a tarantula and came home with a spider. I turned into a 2 yr old holding her not because of her morph, just because I because a child with animals LOL. I wouldn’t buy her again, only due to the venue and her likely coming into my care sick. The spider gene in my limited care is so much less a problem then that infection and the incredible difficulty with treatment. Thank you Clint. Your channel has been so helpful for me.
I personaly think that its wrong to breed spider ball pythons because of the problems they can have, and I think that people should not breed them, however I also think that it wronge to belittle someones opinion, so even though I disagree with you I'm not say that your wrong
Thanks for reading this, have a good day!