people confuse me

[Bain]

So why is it that people get a ball python, or any snake for that matter, when it is a baby an can fit in a small 10-15 gallon terrarium but try and sell it when it gets to big for the terrarium so they don't have to buy a larger tank?
Just a general question of confusion.

[BHReptiles]

I guess people don't care about their pets. Honestly, if you can't afford the pet (including upgrading cages), then you shouldn't have the pet at all.

[JLC]

Well, show me a single hobby, activity, interest, etc...in which "people" never engage in stupid behavior. People are people...which means there's ALWAYS going to be SOMEone who does something stupid, and they're the ones who get our attention, because they stick out like a sore thumb. They buy cars they can't remotely afford. They fill every nook and cranny in their house with empty "collector" tins. They own dogs they can't control. They stay out on the beach until their skin is burnt to a crisp. They ride skateboards across insane cement terrains until they fall and break their face. They keep 1000 cats in a tiny house that's about to fall over. And...they buy "cute" baby ____ (fill in blank with animal of your choice) because they're cute...then get bored with them and want to get rid of them. There's nothing to "figure out". It just...is.

[TheSnakeGuy]

Folks are dumb. All we can do it educate and try to break through the ignorance. I warn people about such things on a daily basis as a pet care specialist at PetSmart. In the last couple weeks I've had to tell SOOOOOOO many people to put the red eared slider turtle they found in the creek BACK IN THE CREEK! They just look at me stupid. Then I ask them if they're willing to take care of this animal for the next thirty years. I tell them that they're going to need up to a 75 gallon tank when that animal grows up. They say they're gonna let it go before it gets that big. That's when I remind them that they will be setting a domesticated animal back into the wild and basically condemning it to death. I make it my job to teach people about caring for an animal at it's adult size.

[Pythonfriend]

They are worth more when they are up to breeding size. Also sometimes people get very good deals on clutches and hatchlings.


So some guys might just have a rack for female breeders, a few enclosures for males, and a hatchling/subadult rack. And then they buy and trade for hatchlings, and sell well-started hatchlings and subadults and adults and proven breeders.

People do it with tropical fish, some discus fish breeds are 20 dollars or 50 dollars as well-started babies and 120 or 300 dollars as full-grown adults retail, with price going up with body length in several steps. So one economic model is to get large numbers of babies, to grow them up while continuously selling a few, to get a stable group of 10 with selected high-end optics, and then sell that group for a hefty sum to a breeder or derive breeding pairs from that group. (a bit different, they are kept in groups but bred in pairs and you need a group and watch its behavior to determine sex and select good breeding pairs). Others specialize on the difficult breeding process, to produce maybe 100 offspring at a time, to be sold as babies in quantity as soon as they are off plankton and getting coloration.

Very different animals, but one thing is about the same when comparing BPs to discus fish: it takes years to get them to breeding size and their price rises during that time until they are mature.

Maybe its just economics for some? people can have one foot in the business if they dont breed but on the side always raise a few hatchlings up to perfect breeding age and weight. And other people can focus on the breeding by buying ready to breed BPs and selling hatchlings.

another reptile example would be: i heared about a breeder of albino aligators that offers a deal where you get a baby, raise it up, and once it reaches a certain size you can trade it in for another baby to raise up.

of course there is the odd person that majorly screws up and simply buys a snake that will outgrow his or her own ablities. But i think we see this more with even bigger snakes, or alligators, green iguanas, monitors, aquatic turtles. With BPs, it seems to be less of a problem, they stay quite small, i mean, you wont need to switch to rabbits or chickens and it wont grow into something you can no longer handle alone.

[MarkS]

So why is it that people get a ball python, or any snake for that matter, when it is a baby an can fit in a small 10-15 gallon terrarium but try and sell it when it gets to big for the terrarium so they don't have to buy a larger tank?
Just a general question of confusion.

MOST people DON'T