Albino firebelly

[Eixa]

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but is there such thing as an ALBINO firebelly newt? It just sounds like a really cool thing to have.

 

[frogman]

Any amphibian or animal can be albino. So yes. Even humans can be albino.

 

[Eixa]

Sorry, I should have rephrased that. There must be albinos somewhere out there, but can you just buy one, or even have a slight chance of breeding one?

 

[Azhael]

Depends on what species you are talking about. If you are talking about Hypselotriton orientalis, there are no known albinos, but it´s possible they could appear spontaneously in any breeding (possible but very improbable).
Why exactly would it be cool to have a newt with a congenital disorder? Albinism is only very rarely neutral. In most cases the loss of pigmentation has consequences, plus the mutation itself may be associated with other mutations that could cause a whole range of problems (often, embryonic lethality). I don´t mean to accuse you personally of anything, but i find it baffling that people would consider a deleterious mutation to be something cool or desirable. You wouldn´t want your kid to suffer from a genetic disorder....why is it desirable for your pet?

 

[Eixa]

Thanks for the information, but I think you took my question the wrong way. I don't want a messed up, seven-legged, blind firebelly newt just because it's an albino, I was just wondering if they were well, common. I figured there's plenty of albino axolotls and geckos and many other animals, so why not newts?

 

[AngieD]

There are a lot of 'morphs' out there with animals such as geckos, snakes and axolotls, due to intensive breeding of animals showing these traits.
Breeding newts appears to be less common in general than the breeding of axolotls and reptiles, perhaps due to how readily available wild-caught newts are, so it stands to reason that albino newts are pretty much unheard of