what comes first??

[ClemonsKimberly]

Ok, so this is very much so my fault but it was completely done out of innocence, I swear! I have 4 BP's, 2 males and 2 females. When I aquired them they were housed together so that is how I left them. (I actually have 7 BP's, but this happened before I got the others. The new 3 just came in yesterday. And everyone is in their own tub now. ;~)!!!) Anyways, I want to know what if they locked up?? O.K. - I will get eggs, and a lot of drama I am sure, but what I mean is will they actually lock up, then ovulate, then shed, then comes the eggs?? In that order or not? Also if my female hasnt stopped eating, is that a sign that I am in the clear? I am concerned because they were sorta a rescue thing, I got them all for 80 bucks....the female is 3 and only weighs in at 576 grams!! I am trying to gradually get her weight up. I can see where her skin is sorta "loose" I guess is the word. The guy said she has been bred, so my guess is that he probably stuffed her with rats to get her real fat, bred her, then just put her aside. IDK, but in the 3 months I have had her, she has been a real joy. She is looking so much better now as far as her skin goes, we have shed the scars! But Nevermind all the weird details, I just want to know what to expect and exactly what to look for. Before I actually ordered what I wanted, I did a ton of research, and got all the no-no's corrected. Everyone has their own tub. Well they are all in their own tub except the largest male, when I went to get him, he struck at me. I realized he was in full shed, so I left him alone in the tank, when he is finished his shed I will put him in his tub as well. But he scares the crap outta me when he strikes. He is almost the entire 5 ft! By far the largest I have seen. To wrap this up - Now I am a little scared that because of what their original owner told when I got them, that I might be potentially facing a problem. I would not know where to begin with eggs!! Please help! Thanks!

[docturgonzo]

Please can you just clear up the following things

Are they oringinally all housed together 4 snakes in one viv?

What are there weights.

I have hearded people mention they are less likely to breed if housed together but i have no insight into this as all mine are seperate.

That female mentioned seems too small to breed by a long shot and i would be worried if he has bred her before and thats the weight she is at now. Something doesnt sit right with me on that.

Look on www.ball-python.ca/gallery/breeding in the gallery there is a brilliant piece on what signs to look for during pregnancy .

[docturgonzo]

On a side note

I dont know if its already been done but maybe one of the larger scale breeders on here could maybe create a sticky in the breeding section with common seen signs and things to look out for during the breeding process through to Egg laying... just like Markus Jayne have but maybe a little bit clearer

Just a thought but could be really useful if someone was wiling to donate the time

[Evilme5229]

Clemon,
I know that it might be a little shock if it turns out that she pregnant. I'm just started out breeding. I have 4 ball pythons. The reality is that you might be able to get the incubator for like $50.00 and than you just need specific bedding.
Be calm and take deep breaths, everything will work itself out. :-)

[ClemonsKimberly]

Docturgonzo, here is the specifics you were asking about:
They were all housed in the same tank, its measurements are 4ft ong, 20 inches wide and 20 inches deep. Now please remember, I didnt do this, its how I got them, and I didnt know better to change them untill recently.
Here are their weights and ages from what i was told
Mojo, normal male, 4 yrs old, but i cant weigh him, he wont hardly let me pick him up!
Rosey, normal female,3 yrs old, only 576 grams
Stretch, normal male, 2 yrs old, 638 grams
Sasha, normal female, 1 and a half years old, 387 grams.
The weights on the three I know for sure are current as I just weighed them on Sunday. Since then, I have attempted to switch to frozen mice with Sasha and Rosey and both took just fine to them, As soon as Mojo is done shedding I will try him and Stretch started his shed just before time to feed as well so as soon as he is done with his shed I will try to see if he will take frozen.

I guess my concern is that Rosey may have locked up and I dont know it. Plus I really do need to know the order these things happen in if for no other reason than just to have the knowledge. Can you help tell me the actual order? Also, since I had 2 males in with her at the same time, is possible that she could be pregnant with both males eggs? I am really new, so forgive my dumbness, but someone told me that a female can get pregnant with 2 males eggs at the same time...what a predicament that could end up being huh? Tomorrow morning I will take them out and take some current pics and post them here, will you guys please take a look and get back with me? (LOL- please dont forget, I am not sure what to look for and not knowing is killing me!)

[docturgonzo]

Hi Clemons.

Thanks for getting back to us with the weights.

Looks like they are finally in good hands with you.

With those weights in In my opinion there is a massive chance that they wouldnt have bred as the female is way too small to go through the rigours of producing Eggs ect as it takes up alot of the snakes energy and at such a small size could possibly end up killing her. With this in mind i would say she would have not let a male reproduce with her.

There are no hard and fast rules as to what to look out for as most of the signs people tend to assotiate with a female becoming gravid can occur in normal females and males.

If he says she bred last year she must have been small to begin with and never really gotten back into a feeding schedule. Bless her

Heres my take on breeding

During the breeding process the female begins whats known as building. This is where she produces follicles which will eventually develop into eggs later.
When she is building she will seek the cooler end of the viv, sometimes wrapping round the water bowl to keep cool. She will usually still eat during this time.
The follicles grow larger until they reach a size of 45mm. when they reach this size the female will ovulate. This is were the eggs become fertilised or not. at this point she will have gained a large and noticable swelling in the mid to back third of her body which will look like shes eaten a very large meal. This will usually last for a couple of days and is sometimes missed. After she ovulates she will stop feeding totally.After this she will remain very large and ,may even begin laying inverted or on her side as she tries to get comfortable with her eggs. I would now be looking for any shedding activity as she will eventually have her 'pre lay shed'... 28 days after this date she will lay.

I would record all sheds from now as a point of reference as she will also have a Pre Ovulation Shed roughly 30 days prior to ovulating

I have probably missed some stuff and people will say they look for different things such as 'Glowing' which is observed in females as a drastic blushing and lightening of the colour in her.

Sorry if this is a bit garbled but im sat at work trying not to get caught by my boss

[angllady2]

I would watch the bigger female very carefully. Even though she is very small, someone here recently posted about a little 800 gram female laying eggs.

Now that they are separated, she could just reabsorb any follicles she has, I've heard a lot of people here talking about that.

I'm very glad you can take such good care of them now, and this place is the best for helping you learn what you need to know.

Gale

[ClemonsKimberly]

I just wanna say thanks to everyone who is saying that they are glad I am taking good cae of them now. It really does make me feel better since I feel so crappy about leaving them in the tanks just because I was told it was o.k. I really should have researched a lot sooner. I wasnt even going to buy a snake and then I saw these. They were super cheap and I kinda felt sad for them, but didnt know why. If I had planned on actually buying them before I went, I would have done this research prior to getting them, it was just a spur of the moment kinda thing, ya know. I just really thought that since this guy was a breeder, he must know what he was talking about. Man I was WRONG! He didnt give me any papers or even a card, all I can remeber is that he was from Atlanta. I wish I could remember the name, I would tottaly call him out! Then I would educate him. Wouldnt that be great, a newbie educating a so called expert? LOL One could dream right?

[docturgonzo]

Good luck with them and i hope they thrive in your care which im sure they will.
Unfortunately there will always be some people out there who misslead us wether its due to greed or just plain ignorance but thats just life i guess.

As balls have grown in popularity of course some bad eggs have jumped on the bandwagon but they always get found out.

Good luck with your new addtions