Don, it is so interesting to read about yours and Rad's experiences in Thailand.

I love giving interesting (at least to me) examples in genetics. There is an extremely small (3-4 acres) island off the coast of New Zealand. The Catham Island Black Robin has been isolated there for well over 100 years. When the population was found, it consisted of 4 males and 1 female, all highly inbreed. However, the deleterious (bad) genes had been removed from the population and they were able to increase the population.

This is an example of pure luck. In the vast majority of cases, this species would have gone extinct. Even now, this species has very little genetic ability to adapt to change.

Most populations have as much variability within their populations as they do between populations. You just have to watch and remove any individuals that look like they have problems.

Norm Kopecky