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Translucent bearded dragons are dragons that completely lack, or lack to display a certain level of white pigmentation. A dragon that displays translucent appearances is a homozygous carrier of the trait. There are different degrees of a translucent. We like to refer to them as “low expression translucent” or “high expression translucent.” This gene will give the bearded dragons’ scales/skin a translucent or transparent effect. This is how the purple bellies or arms, pink arms, etc are explained. This is due to the fact that you can see right through the animal, exposing its internal organs, and tissue matter. This gene also effects the coloration of the eyes. Since there is a lack of white pigment, bearded dragons may show expressions of the translucent gene in varying levels. A high expression translucent bearded dragon will have black eyes. This is because the white coloration of the Iris is removed due to the genetic manipulation of the translucent gene(s). Because of this, the eyes appear black, or dark in coloration. A low end translucent may not show any difference in coloration of the eye. Another trait of this gene is its progressive or retrogressive development. Some dragons will develop this gene as they age, some dragons may also lose characteristics of this gene as well. Development of the translucent gene is commonly known to occur among breeders we work with, all the way up to 9”-10” animals. Personally, we have not had an animal significantly develop or lose characteristics of the gene past the 8-9” mark. We consider that an animal may no longer develop the gene after it is approximately 9” long (head to tail tip) although it is more common to lose traits into adulthood. CLICK HERE TO SEE OUR TRANSLUCENT EXPRESSION CHART Translucent bearded dragons first showed up around 2002-03. They were worked with closely by a breeder named Josh from Phantom Dragons. Another breeder that is known for working with these animals the longest is Dachiu from Bearded Dragons and other Creatures. The gene to these animals works recessively, and for that reason is increasingly difficult to diversify and breed the animals into stronger bloodlines because you can not visually see the animals that are heterozygous, but only homozygous carriers (and sometimes not even that in low expression translucent dragons). The animals have been out crossed generations, however, without proper research before animals are bought, it is very difficult to determine the relation of the animals you may be trying to breed (especially in translucent to translucent crossings). When translucent bearded dragons are bred together that are too closely related, just as with any other animals, the inbreeding, or line breeding, may produce, and in our opinion will produce animals that have higher mortality rates and deformities from birth. Our experience with the animals shows many differences from the “average” bearded dragon. An average bearded dragon has no gene manipulation, no high coloration, nothing other than what your average animal. The translucent morph shows a higher mortality rate in the babies produced than that of an average dragon. From our experience it also seems that the animals do extremely better with a higher humidity level(this is also achieved by adding a water bowl to the enclosure of the animal). It almost appears as if the gene (or genes, we can only see what is visual) manipulated does have an affect on the animal as far as dehydration is concerned. It seems that the higher humidity level helps counteract that. We have also taken notice that a lot of our translucent bearded dragons would keep their eyes shut during the day considerably more often than the rest of the morphs. We have since lowered the UVB output of the light with our translucent dragon only. So far we have not experienced anything but good results from doing this. We are not sure if the lack of the white pigment, where an animal has black eyes, allows too much light to enter the eye inadvertently causing pain or discomfort to the animal. In a normal eye, it appears as if the Iris would provide some kind of protection against this, or at the very least reduces the amount of light that enters the eye because of the white background in the coloration in the iris of the eye. When this white background coloration is removed, it again provides a translucent or transparent affect that allows light to more effectively pass through to the retina. We believe that the translucent gene affects just more than visual aspects of the animal. Until we can completely figure out what is being affected, we cannot care 100% for the animals, and will experience loss through trial and error. If we learn from the losses or experiences and share them, we can hopefully find the absolute perfect husbandry practices for this specific morph to ensure their thriving nature such as most other morphs experience. The translucent morph has been around for over half a decade. It seems that the strengthening of the gene has some way to go until it can reach that of an animal that is a carrier/displayer of the hypo gene for instance, although they have come a very long way since the gene has been discovered. We will continue to work with this morph in attempts to provide stronger, healthier, more diverse bloodlines of the translucent bearded dragons. We have found and it is recommended that crossing a het translucent female, to a translucent (homozygous carrier) male will produce the healthiest offspring with the most babies displaying the translucent appearance. It appears as if most (there is always exceptions and will hopefully be more soon!) het translucent bearded dragons females generally produce higher numbers in the clutches and show less problems during the gravid period than that of homozygous carrying translucent female. It appears for the best genetic results crossing a het translucent to a het translucent produces the strongest animals, although, you will produce fewer numbers of translucent babies. We have found the most success in breeding a translucent male (homozygous carrier) to a het translucent female. Finding out the genetic background and not crossing bloodlines in what would be considered to be inbreeding or line breeding (must be separated by at least 5 generations of animal) is the best way to produce the healthiest animals. Please feel free to contact us with any additional information or questions at contact@dragonfortress.com Thanks! DragonFortress.com CLICK TO GO BACK TO GENETICS MAIN PAGE Last updated 7/27/2010 |