I have a question mainly directed at the long-term breeders and keepers who have been in the business or world of Ball Pythons for the past 5, 10, 20 years... or longer. I'll try to explain my question the best that I can. I've only been in the snake/reptile/bp world less than a year, so forgive my ignorance if I'm overlooking something obvious.

My question is in regard to some rare morphs I've seen and their costs. Two I can think of off the top of my head are the Axanthic Piebald - Vpi Line, and the Urban Camo's that Osbourne Reptile offers on their site. I've both of these morphs for sale in the thousands of dollars. I'm not discrediting their worth at all. My question is, what if nobody buys these animals at that price, what happens next?

If you breed an animal you feel is worth let's say $1000, and price it for sale at that amount. Maybe you keep it for a few years and nobody buys it. Do you give up with that project? Do you use it to make more? Do you breed it with something else to see what happens? Do you lower your asking price? if you have 100 people say "I'd give you $500" for it, do you try to breed more and then sell them at $500/each?

I know that the more there are, generally, the price goes down. Just in the past year, I've seen the crazy growth in banana/coral glow morphs. The price of a banana has dropped a tad since I started looking at BP's around a year ago, but not a whole lot. I've read where some morphs maybe sold in the thousands 5 years ago and are $500 now. Is this just how the snake market works? Something fancy comes along and is a high-dollar item... but over time more and more of them are available so when supply is greater than demand, prices drop?

One of the reasons I ask is this, I think the two above mentioned morphs are absolutely amazing. I'd hate to see those morphs be bred out of existence because people couldn't afford them or just didn't breed them. Has that ever happened to a morph? I guess there is just a lot in the business that I don't understand. Thanks for reading, and if you have anything to add, I greatly appreciate it.