Disappointment in super dwarf breeders..

It seems to me that soon there will be no more pure super dwarf retics at all. Most breeders are more concerned with getting colors and morphs than they are with preserving the true SD's. I have not seen a true 100% SD available in quite some time. Sure there are quite a few on kingsnake but they are not SD's. If they are het for anything, or if they are any visual color morph, this was bred into them by breeding them to mainlands and dwarfs. They will still get as big as a dwarf. Maybe 15 ft or more depending on the breeding. There are no known color morphs of pure SD's as of yet so let's go ahead and ruin them..

Don't these people know that the only true SD blood left in the states is from whatever came in a few years ago? Collecting from those islands has stopped. There is no more importation of these snakes.

Why are people breeding out the tiny 5-7 ft SD?

I was considering selling my male because he is not tame, but I'm thinking that may be a bad move now. People need to breed to keep the species alive, not to make pretty colors. I feel it's wrong to advertise these as SD retics when they are clearly not pure. Someone will buy one after having done research on SD's and when the snake grows to more than 10 ft, they may no longer want it or be able to keep it.

Just a rant

and unfortunately it's not just retics... i'm mainly into aussie pythons. since they don't import them anymore, you know how hard it is to find pure, verifiable specimens??

Do SD fetch more money than morphs?

They did (more than basic morphs) a few years ago. Now they are only a few hundred but so few people still don't know about them. I'm sure more people would love to own a retic but the size is too much. I believe that because they come from a select group of islands, they should be bred together more often to preserve the species.

well its going to hit a point when the cost of dealing with the animal isn't worth the return. and then with all the bills being passed aorund, I don't think breeders are the ones to blame

I've thought of that but I also believe that they may eventually recognize the SD's as a separate subspecies. If they do, it might help us to keep our retics since they are smaller than the average female black rat snake.

We may even be able to help that along. Some well worded letters to certain people couldn't hurt.

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Originally Posted by Colin Vestrand

and unfortunately it's not just retics... i'm mainly into aussie pythons. since they don't import them anymore, you know how hard it is to find pure, verifiable specimens??

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Impossible.

We have no respect for locality or true type.

It's all about the eye candy.

It is unfortunate a friend has been trying to breed Jampea's (sp?) for a while but ended up being sold a small dwarf as a SD. So have SD/D babies now. His plan was to run for smaller animals but the offspring (hold backs) hit 9 foot. He was very upset, although they are really beautiful albinos, they are also still bigger than expected.

Great timing for this thread haha I was just looking into SD retics last night actually. I love the look of retics and it seems like a lot of them are very friendly and tame, but there's no way I would ever be able to handle a 10-15+ ft snake being 5'2 and 120lbs. And I agree... if I thought I was buying a SD and then he grew to be 10 ft, I unfortunately would probably try to find him another home.

So is there anyone who actually sells pure SDs anymore? Or at least high percentage? I was looking on kingsnake last night and also noticed the large amount of hets and morphs, and while I love purple albino retics... I thought it seemed pretty suspicious that they were also saying they were SDs.

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

It is unfortunate a friend has been trying to breed Jampea's (sp?) for a while but ended up being sold a small dwarf as a SD. So have SD/D babies now. His plan was to run for smaller animals but the offspring (hold backs) hit 9 foot. He was very upset, although they are really beautiful albinos, they are also still bigger than expected.

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That's what I'm saying. There are no SD morphs so they shouldn't be advertising them as SD. Too many people just don't know and will it. Many breeders do put the percentage but others don't.

The jampeas are dwarfs. The truly small SDs are the Kaoloata, Kayaudi, and Honey island locales. These are the locales you need to look for.