Stupid question

Ok so I've never intentionally bred any of my animals. I run a Reptile Rescue and adopt out to appropriate homes once they've met my standards. well I had two females in a cage together when surprise on girl was actually a really big boy and two 16hr lock ups when I wasn't expecting it....dang needing sleep lol! Well so I started looking more into the breeding stuff since I'll probably have some gorgeous little ones. Everything I read said 6wks to 6 months after fertilization she'll lay but she'll shed just before she does..... The last lock up was feb 4 and well she's already going to shed and still has an awesome appetite......can anyone help me here? I so wasn't ready for this and well i need an estimated when and wether or not I should incubate or just let her do her thing....bp are the only ones i've never dealt with

Everyone is going to tell you to use an incubator to be in the safe side, for the eggs and the mom, she will not eat as long as she is coiled with her eggs, thats about 50+ days.

I have not breed any BPs yet, so Im not sure what small incubator will suffice, but when you do find one, it should be running at a steady 88 degrees.

Also thank you for doing such a good deed! Im sure it is time consuming :gj:

There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers! What came before? the snake or the egg? :D

I think you have some time to wait her to make sure shes even gravid. I don't remember the time frames, but you should look at the signs. Hugging the water bowl, staying the cool side of her enclosure etc.

Just because they are locking doesn't guarantee that you will be having a clutch. Your male sounds like hes up to pair weight wise, but how about your female. Females breeding also has to do with weight, if shes on a the small size 1000 grams or less, she might not go as far as breeding.

If you have no intention of actually breeding them, I would separate them to decrease your chances of ending up with a clutch. Theres lots to preparing that you have to do before your suppose to be breeding. I would start looking into incubators, cost, and all the necessities just in case she does go. But I would just do some reasearch until you know shes packing. lol

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Originally Posted by Danounet

Everyone is going to tell you to use an incubator to be in the safe side, for the eggs and the mom, she will not eat as long as she is coiled with her eggs, thats about 50+ days.
:D

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Alot of ppl use hova-bators. You can check out big apple pet supply. They have one. Theres a couple different models, depending on price.

http://www.bigappleherp.com/Hovabato...4Pa38Ta38Sax10

If you are "rescuing" these snakes...why would you house two random snakes together? Have they been properly qt'd? What if one snake is sick or is carrying mites? It just doesn't make much sense to be a "rescue"...yet be so careless with the animals. I'm not trying to sound harsh or anything...i'm sure the animals are in a better place than they were. You might just want to do a little more research and be more careful. Good luck!

demjor19- first I'd like to address your statement....yes I am rescuing these animals both were probed female the two I had probed male were in another cage. Every animal I get does get a full check up I wasn't born yesterday I just don't breed bp, the only snakes I've ever bred were hots hun. Danounet, Evilme5229- Thank you and well she is staying on the cool side of the tank and has kept coiled since the two lock ups, aside from eating, also swelling steadily about 2/3 her body length thus far. She's also about 3 1/2 to 4 foot long and definitely meets the weight requirements as did the girl that turned out to be a huge boy almost the same size.

If shes eating, I would be feeding her smaller meals, because if she starts to accommodating eggs its going to be harder for her to feed when she has eggs in there. Breeding age means shes probably on Medium rats, so smalls should be good enough until thoughs eggs are outta her.

I would look at incubators, checking her on regular basis, and just keep feeding her the smaller meals if she will take them. Once you know 100% that shes going to go, I would start the investiments of getting prepared. I would say do it now, but since your not planning on doing this on a regular basis, i would avoid the cost until you have too.

Thank you again as soon as she sheds I'll post a pic or two of her. She is a stunning snake with almost flame like patterns on her sides and beautifully spotted belly I've never seen anything like her before.

These are a couple sites that may be helpful to understand timing. I hope you can learn something from them. Best of luck.

http://www.ballpython.ca/gallery/breeding.html

http://www.8ballpythons.com/journal/...ngcalendar.htm

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Originally Posted by JEWSKIN

demjor19- first I'd like to address your statement....yes I am rescuing these animals both were probed female the two I had probed male were in another cage. Every animal I get does get a full check up I wasn't born yesterday I just don't breed bp, the only snakes I've ever bred were hots hun. Danounet, Evilme5229- Thank you and well she is staying on the cool side of the tank and has kept coiled since the two lock ups, aside from eating, also swelling steadily about 2/3 her body length thus far. She's also about 3 1/2 to 4 foot long and definitely meets the weight requirements as did the girl that turned out to be a huge boy almost the same size.

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I understand and appreciate what you are doing. So many animals out there end up in crappy homes, so it's nice to see other people out there helping them (I just rescued a 5+ foot girl last weekend). I wasn't trying to come down on you in any way...I was just stressing some concerns (of which you answered). One other thing to note is that BP's are mostly a solitare animal in the wild and housing them together is not always a great idea (although some on here have done it successfully). I guess that's a call on the keepers part.

Unfortunately I have no hands on advice to offer on the breeding questions, but I do wish you the best of luck!

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Originally Posted by demjor19

I understand and appreciate what you are doing. So many animals out there end up in crappy homes, so it's nice to see other people out there helping them (I just rescued a 5+ foot girl last weekend). I wasn't trying to come down on you in any way...I was just stressing some concerns (of which you answered). One other thing to note is that BP's are mostly a solitare animal in the wild and housing them together is not always a great idea (although some on here have done it successfully). I guess that's a call on the keepers part.

Unfortunately I have no hands on advice to offer on the breeding questions, but I do wish you the best of luck!

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No worries

Thank you everybody for all the help she is doing great we'll see what she looks like after her shed!!!!! Today started off great in fact woke to texts from a wildlife rehab center wanting to discuss helping them with the reptiles that get dropped off to them....adopted out all 3 bearded dragons to a wonderful new home and ended up with a carpet python really couldn't be happier......oh and one of my breeder rats took in an orphan baby from across town her first litter so proud

what do you think....this is the big girl still in shed but hasn't eaten for a week and swollen...
http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g1...ck101/aa-1.jpg

and now this one ate about a week ago hasn't shed but has swollen mind you probed male now having doubts given the last experience

http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g1...101/aaaa-2.jpg

Please let me know what you think

Is that scarring or weird markings on the second ball?

unfortunately the last owner thought live feeding was a great idea....thats from a mouse...a good example of why not to feed live I use this snake for educational purposes....not sure of sex anymore was probed male but idk

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Originally Posted by JEWSKIN

unfortunately the last owner thought live feeding was a great idea....thats from a mouse...a good example of why not to feed live I use this snake for educational purposes....not sure of sex anymore was probed male but idk

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There is nothing wrong with live feed, as long as it's done the right way. Unfortunately a lot of people out there do unattended live feedings. :(

Eh... feeding live or feeding pre-killed is a personal choice but feeding live always poses a risk for your snake even if you're supervising. My albino ball got a scrape above her eye from a rat that I was 100% sure was out cold if not altogether dead. I ordinarily kill all the mice and rats I'll be feeding off prior to offering them to my snakes because I think it's easier for me and for them this way rather than waiting around for rodents to thaw out, but I was in a rush that day and the rat I offered her wasn't completely dead. She didn't immediately strike it and when she did, it snapped awake and started clawing when she missed her mark. I pulled the rat's claws away from her face while she was coiling it, but the damage had already been done. I'm lucky her eye wasn't injured in that mishap. It was an ugly scar until she shed. Now it's not so noticeable and I'm hoping it fades more over time with more sheds.


As for the ball pictured.. Have you or someone else popped it? I prefer popping to probing unless I don't get any penes through popping and then I'll probe just to double-check.

see i don't like popping I've seen many snakes injured that way...when the lock up happened it was originally in the other cage with another male and got antsy with the action going on next door was moving around a bit lifted it's tail opened up you might say and nothing popped out so yeah not sure anymore

Well, it's best to quarantine them separately in individual cages unless they came from the same place--vet check or no, some dangerous and contagious diseases may take as long as 10 months to incubate. Strict attention to hygiene to prevent any transfer between enclosures can minimize risks. If you're running a rescue, you know you may get in animals from a variety of questionable backgrounds--you don't want to rescue a snake only to have it die of IBD or paramyxovirus brought in by another snake (and that's just the tip of the iceberg--vet checks don't cover things that are not yet symptomatic).

While you might get away with housing 2 females together if completely necessary, housing 2 males together is likely to lead to some knock-down drag-outs.

YouTube - Ball Python Combat

You wouldn't think they had it in them, but there you go.

As folks have stated, if it's not your intention to breed, house them separately, and the female may not lay a clutch. They don't always, even if they lock up multiple times.

A Hovabator is a decent choice for an incubator, though I would recommend purchasing a better thermostat and not using the wafer thermostat it comes with. Incubate at 88 or 89, and use a 50/50 mix of vermiculite and water by weight, for the media. (Other methods exist, but this one is easy and proven).

The female may try to take your hand off when you go to remove her from the eggs, so put a hand-towel over her head, and gently unwind her. Wash her in a weak chlorhex or very dilute detergent solution, and wash and disinfect her cage and all cage furniture after you remove the eggs. This will remove the scent of the clutch, and she should begin feeding again after a few days' rest.

Thank you for your inputactually the two known males were adopted out to amazing homes and I am getting regular email updates and well visits when they are in the area as for the two in the pics the top is a proven female...the other probed male but idk my last probed female turned out to be a big boy...not to mention the two in these pics came from the same location the girl had them for 3 years from when she worked at a petsmart or petco and she saved them....though not sure when the scar was caused on the bottom one they are both on f/t med rats

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Originally Posted by JEWSKIN

unfortunately the last owner thought live feeding was a great idea....thats from a mouse...a good example of why not to feed live I use this snake for educational purposes....not sure of sex anymore was probed male but idk

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Wow, for a mouse to do that much damage, it's clear it was left in there unsupervised for some time. :(

I feed live exclusively to all 50 of mine, have for the past five years, over 10K live feedings, with less than 5 incidental scratches, not a single wound or scar.

yes the scar is intense I feel bad for him/her not sure of sex ugh it can be a pain but oh well lol but it's doing amazing on f/t

I also only pop ball pythons to sex them. I have a set of sexing probes, but I've never bothered to use it on the balls. It's too easy to pop them. I've never actually heard of an injury being caused from popping. I can't imagine someone using that much pressure--the only way I can imagine that happening is if someone just did NOT know how to do it, and thought that increasing the pressure was the solution. It doesn't require that much pressure, just the correct technique.

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Originally Posted by JEWSKIN

see i don't like popping I've seen many snakes injured that way...when the lock up happened it was originally in the other cage with another male and got antsy with the action going on next door was moving around a bit lifted it's tail opened up you might say and nothing popped out so yeah not sure anymore

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I've never seen a ball being injured via popping. That's not to say that it's not possible, but I've never seen it or heard about it from someone I know. Probing, on the other hand, I have seen what can happen to a snake when someone probes poorly. Popping is fairly simple once you learn the right technique and it's not so invasive. I leave probing as a last resort method when I just can't tell through popping.

If you're saying that a male ball lifted his tail and opened his cloaca while a neighboring male and a female were courting/copulating and you didn't see that male's hemipenes, I think it's more likely that he was just scenting the enclosure. If there's no female present for him to lock with, I can think of no reason why he would fully expose his penes. They're delicate organs and not something just dragged along the ground. They take time to coax the female to be receptive before the penes become part of the equation. It sounds like the male you described was simply re-establishing his territory when he caught scent of the other male (who had likely already scented the area around the female) and was in combat mode.

he/she was in a different tank....it would be the one with the scar in the second pic that is suddenly huge and no less has been curling around the water bowl

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Originally Posted by Danounet

There is nothing wrong with live feed, as long as it's done the right way. Unfortunately a lot of people out there do unattended live feedings. :(

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Good example of why leaving a live mouse/rat in an enclosure is a big no no. Feeding live is not the problem, the owner is.