Incubation temperature/ length vs. Color/ head

[Misskiwi67]

That's extremely fascinating!

Does the brick vs fire engine difference seem to hold true even after a gecko passes into adulthood?

Yes, for instance, two siblings produced by me:

Inferno, hatched Winter 2008:


Sunspot, hatched June 2008:

[Ilona]

I own a hatchling (from Debbie) on this board that took 141 days to hatch. (at lower temperatures)

He/she was born on February the 2nd 2011 and the gecko is now 6 months old.

structure:
Although I can vouch for only one case, I love the head structure of the gecko.

You can see some pictures here, taken by Debbie, when the critter was only a few days old.

http://www.pangeareptile.com/forums/...ad.php?t=46207

It confirms the general theory that longer incubation (might) lead to better structure results of the crested gecko.

Of course to be absolutely certain we would need more testing and progress development pictures.

color:

I can't say a lot about color yet since the crestie is still young.

(fired down at 4 months)



(fired down at 5 months)

[Ollie]

Wow. I love Inferno! So his base color is considered to be brick red then? And sunspot is fire engine red? She is very pretty also.

I guess I just trying to think of a good way to produce bright red geckos with good head structure but I was getting it backwards. So maybe starting out with low temperatures and raising them in the last few weeks? But I don't know anymore. I like the results of color achieved with Inferno and that was during cooler temps. hmm.

Thank you all for your responses!

[StellarAwesome]

Yes, for instance, two siblings produced by me:

Inferno, hatched Winter 2008:


Sunspot, hatched June 2008:

I'm very interested in the fact Inferno appears to have more white, while Sunspot has more yellow. Have you noticed anything like that in other siblings?

[Spyral]

In the book, Leopard and Fat-Tailed Geckos By R.D. Bartlett & Patricia Bartlett, the authors state that incubation temperatures affect the color of hatchlings. Cooler temps = darker babies. This is also repeated on the Tremper's website with details on how to adjust for sex and color.

Theory time!

Tyrosinase (which controls melanin and other pigments) can be affected by temperature, as in the different "points" coloration in cats: the extremities take on a dark appearance because they are cooler. There has to be a gene in place, however, so that the lower temps allows the mutated Tyrosinase enzyme to become active. That's why not all cats have color points. These color points are also present in horses (and likely lots of mammals).

If this carries over to reptiles, which the data from Tremper, et al seems to suggest, and to crested geckos in particular, there may be some nuggets of wisdom to extract on manipulating incubation lengths. With the exception of sex determination, which doesn't seem to be correlated in cresties.

If it could be determined at what point head structure becomes optimal under low temps, then raise temps to an acceptable level, it is theoretically possible that the intensity of reds, (as well as oranges and yellows) could be increased while maintaining a good head structure.

I'm really hesitant to test this myself, especially at the high range of temps.

[StellarAwesome]

EVERYTHING YOU SAID!

Spyral, I really appreciate this post. Whenever this topic arises, it always makes me wonder how much is genetic and how much is genetic and how much could be tilted to or fro in our favor.

Assuming monitor colors are moderatly true, I have seem some bright fire-engine red cresteds with wide head structure, however I haven't really seen any with exceptionally long or thick crests.