Making me think about why I want a tetra...

1. Is it because I want a beautiful snake to look at and admire?
2. Is it because I want to feel like I'm helping to keep a species alive in captivity?

My thinking was originally option 2. But then I realised that if it was a dog ugly snake (negating option 1) then I probably wouldn't give a toss about option 2. My feeling is that tetras are a species worth preserving for as long as we can. But I'm increasingly feeling that the EU-bred tetra isn't going to satisfy option 2 unless I have complete confidence with where I source the snake from.

We've talked about inbreeding and health problems. I'm aware that I, for one, have made an assumption that if there's inbreeding in the tetra population there must be an impact on the health of the population - simply because that's the biological consequence of inbreeding.
I'm not aware that anyone contributing to this thread actually keeps/breeds tetras, so it would be useful to hear about first hand experience of low breeding yields, high mortality in young, mutations away from the tetra phenotype, etc. Is it really a problem, or one assumed because the EU stock all came from handful of snakes?

In the US controlled breeding with chipped specimens, and all offspring being chipped, and only sold to keepers who are licensed, may help.