Question about morphs and genders.

If I were you I wouldn't buy a male right now at all. Instead I'd use that money to get a better female. Maybe something with two genes. It is going to take that female two or three years to get to breeding weight. As long as you don't power feed. Which I don't recommend at all. A male is ready to breed in a year or so, so you would be feeding him for that extra year or two while you wait for a female to be ready. That's just a waste of funds in my opinion.

So my advice? Get a super pastel female or a bumblebee female instead of spending anything on a male. Then next year or the year after get a two gene male as well. You'll produce much better combos and have a much smaller chance of throwing normals.

My two cents.

this article is good:

http://ballpythonbreeder.com/2012/02...thon-breeders/

i suggest getting two females now, and a two-gene male one year later. that is assuming you buy hatchlings, and raise them up.

you can breed one male to several females. so while in an individual pairing it makes absolutely no difference which parent snake contributes what, since you breed one male to lets say 3 females, the male should be the one with the genes.

also, males reach sexual maturity much faster than females do. there is round about 1 year difference.

so when you actually breed, you will realize that a spider female or a pastel female really make long-term sense for breeding, its nice single-gene females, never bad to have those. but both a male spider or a male pastel will become useless rather rapidly.

a plan could be: get a pastel female and a spider female, and one year later maybe a pastave male (pastel + mojave), or a lemonblast male (pinstripe + pastel), or something like that. that way you can get your bumblebee, and also lots of other stuff, including stuff with 3 genes. having good males is important, and here it helps that they are also cheaper and mature much faster.

or get a bumble bee male. you can breed that one to a normal female, the results would be identical to the results you get from breeding spider to pastel. except that you can replace the normal female with maybe a black pastel female or fire female or whatever, and make the results even better.

simplified down to a little rule of thumb: the job of the females is to make the eggs, the job of the males is to make sure these eggs have the best possible content.

Why do you need the pair now?
Females take longer to mature so if you want two animals now,
why not get two females say spider and pinstripe,
then next year get a super pastel male.
You will make some nice combos and no normals.
just my .02

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Originally Posted by leeshawho

I didn't even THINK to consider it this way, which is silly since I've seen so much advice in my research to look and plan ahead. Thank you! :bow:

Given this piece of advice, looks like I'm going with a male pastel/female spider.

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Are you buying hatchlings or full grown breeders?

I answered under the assumption you were buying full grown breeders and looking to breed this year. If you're buying hatchlings and growing them out that's a different story.

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Originally Posted by Jt balls

http://www.newenglandreptile.com/genetics_codom.html

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Thanks so much for the links, very helpful!

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If I were you I wouldn't buy a male right now at all. Instead I'd use that money to get a better female. Maybe something with two genes. It is going to take that female two or three years to get to breeding weight. As long as you don't power feed. Which I don't recommend at all. A male is ready to breed in a year or so, so you would be feeding him for that extra year or two while you wait for a female to be ready. That's just a waste of funds in my opinion.

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This makes a lot of sense, and I feel a little silly that I didn't think of this. My mindset was "more bang for my buck", but it seems in the long run I would be on the path to wasting money in that case. Excellent advice, thank you!

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i suggest getting two females now, and a two-gene male one year later. that is assuming you buy hatchlings, and raise them up.

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Definitely excellent advice, and I'm fairly certain this is the path I'm going to take now. Thank you!

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Why do you need the pair now?

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I definitely don't, now that you've all brought it to my attention! I knew I wanted to get two snakes for sure, and my thought was a male/female pair would be the best bet. I'm so glad I asked for advice because it's obvious now that's not the case! Thank you!

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Are you buying hatchlings or full grown breeders?

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I am getting hatchlings. I'll be going the route of two-one gene females now given the advice I've received. Clearly now the overall obvious choice :)

(Edited the genes on the females)

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Originally Posted by leeshawho

I am getting hatchlings. I'll be going the route of two-one gene females now given the advice I've received. Clearly now the overall obvious choice :)

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Yea. If you're getting hatchlings that is definitely the way to go. In 2 years you'll be able to get a rocking male to go with the girls you get.