Dilemma male or female to start

I agree with everything said above.
Females first!
Though I wait 2 winters and not 3 to start breeding them.
Getting a male first is a little pointless because you have an extra mouth to feed, house, and clean after.
You would still have to wait for that female to grow up (lets say 2 years). So within that 2 years, you have a male and female(s) to take care. Yes it's not difficult, but you can save time and money not housing that male for at least a year.
I say buy a male when your female is at least 500-800 grams. Plus by then, male prices would probably drop.
Also, someone mentioned breeding a 2 gene female to a single gene male. Unless the single gene male is a high dollar or uncommon morph, you want to breed that female to a snake equal to or better than her. (2+ gene males)

Anyway, with that said, I also recommend investing in multi gened animals. They are better in the long run and will save you time, space, and money. For example, instead of having a pastel and spider, you can get a bumble bee. That's half the work, time, and money. It adds up in the long run.
And multigened animals means less chances of normals in a clutch.

Thanks everyone for the input. I'm starting small, my goal right now is to have a 1.3 colony to start hence why i bough the 4 tub rack for now. You can buy dividers from RBI for their rack/tubs so I'm thinking i will divide up the tubs for now to raise my starters in there till they grow big enough than I will remove the divide. The baby rack can come later when I'm able to finally breed.

Recalculating every I definitely underestimate the enclosure side of things. the rack itself comes with heating and tubs already but since i live in Canada I will most likely be hit with tax and duty when i bring the rack across the border. I skimp on thermostat and just got a cheap $30 one from amazon for now, with my budget I don't think I will have more than one snake for a couple on months I figure a good thermostat can wait till i have at least 2-3 animals in the collection.

So I'm estimating around 400-450$ on the caging and equipment that leaves me with 350-400$ for the snake. I'm thinking of looking for a bumblebee female to start, seems to be the cheapest multigen right now.

I would Raise that girl up for a few months at which time I should be able to throw down another 500$ or so for another multigen girl and than go from there

How does my plan sound? Am I missing something glaringly obvious before I order the equipments and get my hands dirty

Quote:

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Originally Posted by threezero

Thanks everyone for the input. I'm starting small, my goal right now is to have a 1.3 colony to start hence why i bough the 4 tub rack for now. You can buy dividers from RBI for their rack/tubs so I'm thinking i will divide up the tubs for now to raise my starters in there till they grow big enough than I will remove the divide. The baby rack can come later when I'm able to finally breed.

Recalculating every I definitely underestimate the enclosure side of things. the rack itself comes with heating and tubs already but since i live in Canada I will most likely be hit with tax and duty when i bring the rack across the border. I skimp on thermostat and just got a cheap $30 one from amazon for now, with my budget I don't think I will have more than one snake for a couple on months I figure a good thermostat can wait till i have at least 2-3 animals in the collection.

So I'm estimating around 400-450$ on the caging and equipment that leaves me with 350-400$ for the snake. I'm thinking of looking for a bumblebee female to start, seems to be the cheapest multigen right now.

I would Raise that girl up for a few months at which time I should be able to throw down another 500$ or so for another multigen girl and than go from there

How does my plan sound? Am I missing something glaringly obvious before I order the equipments and get my hands dirty

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Sounds ok. I would recommend just getting your whole rack and tubs set up first, finish that and then see how much money you have left over before you start planning ahead. I know I do that and it makes time seem like forever. The best thing keep ball-pythons has taught me so far is planning and efficiency. There is always work to be done in the mean time rather than obsessing about balls, do the work and results will come much sooner.

If you want to start with a male bee and normal breeder females that is fine in my eyes, you have to start somewhere. At the same time tho you will end up with babies fast and will need somewhere to house them so that means buying or building a hatchling rack and buying a new t stat for that rack.

I think you just need to sit back, drink a beverage of your choice and add up the expenses going the route you originally posted. It will cost twice as much as your initial guess due to needing another rack and stat. Best of luck, don't rush into it or you will probably not like the outcome...

I agree with the females first. Like its been said its super easy to get a male heavy group because of the price of males most of the time.

I'm not sure how much bees go for in Canada, but in the US I haven't seen good quality bee females under $500-500.

I also agree with getting the rack setup first and go from there. The last thing you want is to get the snake and have a malfunction or can't get the temps straight and the animal suffer or die because of it.


Just my $.02

Quote:

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Originally Posted by threezero

Thanks everyone for the input. I'm starting small, my goal right now is to have a 1.3 colony to start hence why i bough the 4 tub rack for now. You can buy dividers from RBI for their rack/tubs so I'm thinking i will divide up the tubs for now to raise my starters in there till they grow big enough than I will remove the divide. The baby rack can come later when I'm able to finally breed.

Recalculating every I definitely underestimate the enclosure side of things. the rack itself comes with heating and tubs already but since i live in Canada I will most likely be hit with tax and duty when i bring the rack across the border. I skimp on thermostat and just got a cheap $30 one from amazon for now, with my budget I don't think I will have more than one snake for a couple on months I figure a good thermostat can wait till i have at least 2-3 animals in the collection.

So I'm estimating around 400-450$ on the caging and equipment that leaves me with 350-400$ for the snake. I'm thinking of looking for a bumblebee female to start, seems to be the cheapest multigen right now.

I would Raise that girl up for a few months at which time I should be able to throw down another 500$ or so for another multigen girl and than go from there

How does my plan sound? Am I missing something glaringly obvious before I order the equipments and get my hands dirty

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You should build your own racks for now. Much cheaper and would allow you to purchase a good thermostat.

when starting on a low budget to purchase the snakes. you need to get something that's going to help you build a collection of female morphs. my opinion would be something like. buy females. maybe a few pastels and a few normals. raise them up some and then buy a male bee as you were thinking of a bee anyway or killerbee depending on the price in a year or two. the normals you can get fairly cheap even with some size to them. when you breed your male to them, you can produce:

with the male bee to female pastel,
killerbees
bees
superpastels
pastels
spiders
normals

with the male bee to a normal female
bees
spider
pastels
normals

with a killerbee male to a pastel female,
sames as the bee without any normals or spiders

male killerbee to a normal female,
bees
pastels
no normal or spiders

bee = bumble bee

you can make many morphs with these combos, holdback ones you want and trade for morphs you don't have
it's a start, you need to build a base of morph females with size so when you want a combo male that's more than you would like to spend on a single snake, you at least have females to support it.
good luck with your decision, this was just an example and I hope it helps some. don

Thanks again everyone.

So I just ordered my rack. With the money left I could either buy one bumblebee female or I could buy say 2-3 pastel/normal females.

Since I'm aiming for quality not quantity right now(aiming at a 1.3 breeding colony here) should I just buy the bumblebee female or should I diversify?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by threezero

Thanks again everyone.

So I just ordered my rack. With the money left I could either buy one bumblebee female or I could buy say 2-3 pastel/normal females.

Since I'm aiming for quality not quantity right now(aiming at a 1.3 breeding colony here) should I just buy the bumblebee female or should I diversify?

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I would honestly say get what you like looking at the best cause it's gonna be your pet for the next two years. I recommend the bumblebee female if that's what you like, then which ever morph male you get for her a year down the line(preferably a 2 gene) will give you crazy odds at cool morphs with less chance of normals. If it were me I would rather produce morphs of 1-4 genes on my first go rather than say any male to 2 pastel females.

I would also advocate getting females first.

I would say you should try for a 2 gene animal. The female bumblebee sounds great.




I noticed you joined in 2006 but have not mentioned any animals that you currently own. If I glazed over something, apologies. Are you just 'diving in' or do you have experience with ball pythons? Maybe you should get one as a pet for a while before deciding you're going to breed them. It's a lot of work from what I hear around here and it is not guaranteed to 'pay off.'