How many snakes do you have?

Many people have a lot of snakes, and I was wondering how many you have. If you have one as a pet, that's like me.

If you have many snakes, are they all pets, for breeding, or selling? Do you breed feeder animals, too?

How much time do you spend cleaning tanks/racks/tubs?

Hope it's not too intrusive or impolite to ask so many questions. I'm learning a lot here... I did not know about the different colors and patterns of ball pythons, morphs, etc, until I got here. Seeing the lists of number of each type on some signatures was an eye opener, since I (naively) thought of snakes like cats, where a person might have one, two, maybe three at a time.

Thanks for sharing!

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Originally Posted by Teacher's Pet

Many people have a lot of snakes, and I was wondering how many you have. If you have one as a pet, that's like me.

If you have many snakes, are they all pets, for breeding, or selling? Do you breed feeder animals, too?

How much time do you spend cleaning tanks/racks/tubs?

Hope it's not too intrusive or impolite to ask so many questions. I'm learning a lot here... I did not know about the different colors and patterns of ball pythons, morphs, etc, until I got here. Seeing the lists of number of each type on some signatures was an eye opener, since I (naively) thought of snakes like cats, where a person might have one, two, maybe three at a time.

Thanks for sharing!

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i currently have two ball pythons(male and female)but i'm looking to get more..i've learned they're like tattoos..its hard to just have one.
i spot clean often but it doesn't really take alot of time and break the enclosures down every few weeks or so to clean everything

Snakes are addictive, it's hard to have just one. :P

My snakes are pets I plan to breed someday. I love them all, but I do have my favorites. All of my snakes have names too, I have it in my head that once I stop naming them they stop being pets.

I don't breed my own feeders because mine will eat f/t and I hate rodents.

As J.Coils stated it doesn't take much time to clean. I find it's pretty easy because I keep mine in tubs so it's just the tub and the water bowel that really need cleaning. If I was maintaining a lot of cages with decorations I would probably have less snakes.

I only have one male normal for now but I plan on adding a spider later this year.

We have 62 snakes and 2 armadillo lizards and a Sav monitor. We breed ball pythons and are getting into breeding carpets this year and boas probably next year when ours will be ready. It's takes a lot of time and devotion to take care of this many and to do it properly. We also breed our feeders. That's time consuming as well. We probably have 350-400 rats,asfs and mice.

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Originally Posted by ScottNBecky

We have 62 snakes and 2 armadillo lizards and a Sav monitor. We breed ball pythons and are getting into breeding carpets this year and boas probably next year when ours will be ready. It's takes a lot of time and devotion to take care of this many and to do it properly. We also breed our feeders. That's time consuming as well. We probably have 350-400 rats,asfs and mice.

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Sixty-two snakes! How does a breeder manage inventory? What if a snake doesn't get purchased, does it become a pet? I'm curious!

Right now I am at 14 bp's and 1 Boa.... My goal by the end of the year is 25 bp's and at least one more boa... :D

Right now I'm at four snakes - 2 ball pythons, a boa and a corn. They're all pets for now, until my yellow belly girl gets old enough to breed and I'll start using her as a breeder as well as some others that I'll aquire in the next two years. It isn't going to be huge scale because I'm still in school and will more than likely be in an appartment, but maybe have two or three pairings a season.

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Originally Posted by Teacher's Pet

Sixty-two snakes! How does a breeder manage inventory? What if a snake doesn't get purchased, does it become a pet? I'm curious!

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Well its really not hard for your morphs to sell. Our normals go for cheap or go to a local pet store here thats has a nice reptile section. The 62 is including our hatchling balls, baby BRBs and our baby viper boas. It's a bit of a challenge but when you love it like we do it's not a job or a chore it's a passion.

It is hard to tell. I've got 22 adult BP's in the racks. Two yearling BP's in another rack. Twelve babies in racks, ten eggs in the incubator that should be out any day. Also, in the incubator I've got ten eggs that are not yet ready. Some of those adults are going to be laying in the next month or so. It constantly changes!

I've quit breeding feeders and am glad I did. The rats took up more time and effort than the snakes and the smell could get pretty bad. Even with breeding rats, I was still ordering rats just about every other week. It is simpler to just have them delivered. It may cost more, but it is worth it to me.

The snakes take about one and a half hours per week to clean (my wife and kids all pitch in and help). I spend a little time every day checking on them pulling babies out of the incubator, pulling eggs out of racks, feeding, etc. It does take time and effort, snakes are not as maintenance free as some would have you think.

In the evenings, I normally pull a snake or two at a time out of the rack for me and my wife to handle while the kids are in bed. We like our babies to be accustomed to being handled. I don't really count that as time worked with the snakes. It is our reward for the work we put in!

I have 50+ balls and currently have 600 or so ASFs in my garage to feed them. The most time consuming aspect of this for me is probably tied between keeping the rats clean and constant cleaning/sanitizing of the snake tubs/hides/water bowls.

The daily upkeep on the snakes doesn't take too long at all and usually flies by due to the awesomeness of being in a room with a few dozen snakes :D

i have two males a bumble bee and a orange ghost for now, soon ill have four more a female spider het pied,a lil piebald and a mojave pair.As soon as im done builing this furniture/reptile rack i'll have them & will post pics of the snakes & the project itself!!!But i still have a axolotl aka salmander,two super snow geckos,a blue tongue skink and a 125g central american cichlid community tank..http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JA6hjo6OJZI Heres a video i took a while back!!Enjoy...i do!!:)

I only have 9 for now and 7 eggs in the incubator i plan i getting many more the tattoo comment is so true you can not just have 1 tattoo or 1 ball you just keep adding more and more.

We're up into the mid 2's at the moment with babies hatching...all bloods, Borneo short-tails & Sumatran short-tails. :)

We are advanced hobbyists who primarily breed in pursuit of specific traits that we want in our own collection of animals, basically striving to produce what we consider the "perfect" blood or short-tailed python. We love to keep these snakes, plain and simple, and we love hatching babies every year. We don't breed every available python we have every season, and limit our efforts to just the very best of what we want to produce in pursuit of "perfect."

Lucky for us, there are various manifestations of "perfect" (and almost perfect ;)) so it's a great reason to keep quite a few critters that we really, really love. Fortunately we also have high demand year-round for animals from the group of snakes we're working with, so that allows us to have a hobby that pretty much pays for itself.

We have 2 dedicated rooms for our pythons that are climate controlled, and have a couple of friends that come down once a week to give us a hand with husbandry. Our primary "snake night" takes 2-3 hours, because we all relish the good company, snake talk and banter with friends, along with the animals (and a tasty supper!).
We have a very efficient maintenance protocol that can be completed by 2 people in a couple of hours, or 4 of us at a leisurely "talk and tend" pace, so we're never in a bind or strapped for time if for some reason we have to postpone or reschedule.
My husband & I also spend another hour or two a day with our collection just fiddling around, setting up babies, updating records & photos, making future plans & enjoying our pythons.

We breed our own rats and mice as A) we prefer to know exactly what's going into our snakes, B) we have what we need, when we need it, and C) we enjoy it. :)

HTH!

K~

im at 8 right now hopefully getting two more sooner or later.

I have 11 BP's, 4 milksnakes, & 6 kingsnakes. Also, have a pair of Crested Gecko's, 1 Gargoyle Gecko, 1 Leechie Gecko & a Hermann's Tortoise.

14 balls, 1 red tail boa, 1 banana cali king, 1 pygmy chameleon, and just added a green tree frog today.
Rats????????? 4 tanks with 1.2 and about 45 hoppers.
Mice 1.4
1 american staffordshire, 1 chihuahua, and 1 affenpinscher

My fridays are dedicated to all the animals and the ps3:D

I currently have 14 ball pythons, a red tail boa, adult savannah savannah monitor, 1.1.1 crested geckos and 1.2 leopard geckos. and still thinking of what snake i want next :)

BTW I have a Lesser male coming in two to three weeks and I am looking for an orange ghost female. Then that will be my limit till I get a couple clutches on the ground:gj:

I currently have 2 Normal Bps, 2 dogs, a female Jack Russell and a male Pug mix, and just added 4 pet mice today :)

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Originally Posted by lasweetswan

4 pet mice today :)

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The "pet" mice are hard to keep around:rolleyes: I let them play with my snakes and then I cannot find them anymore:O:rofl:

My wife and I have 46 balls right now and expecting clutches soon. We were out of the hobby for a while due to a long distance move we had to make but thats over so the collection should be growing considerably soon. We are also starting to breed our own rodents again as we now have to many to buy for every week and we only feed live b/c we get a much better feeding response. We have a lot but we still try to handle them all as much as possible to keep them friendly.

If you include snakes im watching for a friend and the two babies waiting to go to new homes I have 27. 22 of which are mine. I also have two females who are going to.drop eggs soon. Because I'm moving I don't plan on purchasing any new snakes but I plan on keeping some from both of those clutches. By the end of this season I will probably have around 30 snakes. Next year I plan on adding another 1-2 snakes.

At this moment I have 60 breeder snakes, I keep BP, Honduran Milksnakes, Bull Snakes, Carpet Pythons, and a blood python.

The majority are of course BP representing 90% of what I have.

The pythons are in the main snake room that remains between 78 (winter) and 85 (summer)

The colubrids are in the office which is much cooler.

I breed as a hobby and this is only part of what I have during baby season it is obviously more.

The collection is always evolving adding new morphs letting go of animals that no longer fit in my projects etc

I cannot tell you how many hours I spend in the snake room because I seriously have no idea, probably more than I really should simply because the snake room is my favorite room in the house and I enjoy being in it.

My goal is probably have a collection of about a 100 animals at the very most, something that I can enjoy and does not require help.

I also breed my own feeder I probably have 70+ breeder rats (not counting the feeders) I probably spend 3 hours a week to tend to them.

Rat have their own room with exhaust fan in the basement.

That's all ;)

I'm somewhere in the 50 range if you include hatchlings.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Teacher's Pet

Many people have a lot of snakes, and I was wondering how many you have. If you have one as a pet, that's like me.

If you have many snakes, are they all pets, for breeding, or selling? Do you breed feeder animals, too?
Pets that I breed to create my own morphs instead of buying them unless i really need a certain one to create what Im trying to create.I will sell off babies ive produced or ones ive bought for other projects to fund new projects. I currently have 21 snakes. I use to breed my own rats for them but after having two surgery from my car accident I switched back to frozen thawed.

How much time do you spend cleaning tanks/racks/tubs?
I clean out tubs just about everyday. Between them pooping and urinating and spilling water. Im a neat freak and like my snake room to smell like an average room.

Hope it's not too intrusive or impolite to ask so many questions. I'm learning a lot here... I did not know about the different colors and patterns of ball pythons, morphs, etc, until I got here. Seeing the lists of number of each type on some signatures was an eye opener, since I (naively) thought of snakes like cats, where a person might have one, two, maybe three at a time.

Thanks for sharing!

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Wow, I couldn't imagine having the number of snakes that some users have, even though I'd like to. Current lifestyle doesn't allow me to build a collection... yet!

I have one BP. It's only one, but he's everything I could hope for in a pet. He's also my first, and what a good pick for my first ball experience. Luckily, he eats like I starve him every time, so I haven't had to deal with feeding issues (knock on wood). It's great reading about others' collections though.

I have 6. Four balls, Coral Albino Boa, Kenyan Sand Boa. No plans to breed. After I bought my Normal and joined this site I saw all the different morphs. I had to have a Mojave, Spider and my husband wanted a Pastel Ghost. If I could afford to buy one more I would love to have a BEL. Let me get some bills paid off and see what happens :please:

This looks like a great way to kick off my first posting here on the forum! :) I currently have one normal ball, one spotted python and 11 corn snakes. They are all pets with no intent (at least not anytime soon) of breeding. I said I'd stop at 7, then 10, now I'm saying 20 is my absolute max. They are definitely addictive!

Just 2 for now, 1 normal fm bp and a pastel male bp.
I also have a fm Russian Ratsnake getting shipped next week. My wish list for my 4th is either going to be a Savu python or a Bulgarian Ratsnake.

Wow, that is just so interesting! I can see how it happens, though. Just having this one little ball python is fun but not too interactive. He can't be handled during the shedding process or for a couple of days after he eats, so that alone is limiting my time with him. Besides, I'm sure he is just tolerating me playing with him. I like to think he is bonding with me, but I don't think they do that. Do they?

Love this site, btw. :D

At this point, I have 4 Corns, 5 Ball Python, 1 Jungle Carpet Python (and another JCP, an Irian Jaya I'm picking up at the expo in August), 1 Brazilian Rainbow Boa, 1 Western Hognose and a Malaysian Blood Python. So 13 IN my house at this time.
Mine are all pets although at some point when they mature I might* breed a few of them. But mainly, I've just got a collection of morphs I like, snakes I like, and *tame* specimens . ..
as I really like being able to show off snakes and use them at educational things for kids and such (like the Blood Python I got I looked long and hard to find one that is very docile).
I do not breed feeders (with the exception of mealworms for my leos)..
I like rodents to much to be able to do that PLUS I only feed f/t.
Cleaning up after snakes is easy.
That said, the corns have a bit more work to them than any of my big snakes but I still love em.

I have 11 right now plan on getting more. It doesn't help to have empty rack space. I plan on breeding someday

I have 7 snakes so far...

2 BP (normal and pastel)
3 Boas (red tail, coral albino, cross b/w columbian and hog)
2 Corn Snakes

Idk if I will get into the breeding aspect or not. I enjoy having a variety of colors in my collection.

To make it easier I feed f/t and it usually take about an 1 for all cages worse case scenario...once a week. I try and stay on top of it so they can stay fresh and clean all the time.

I plan on getting more one day. They are just beautiful :)

11 Ball pythons
1 boa

The ball pythons I want to breed,and have been trying but so far none of them have put out for me. A few of them are dinkers though, but I've made up my mind even if they never proved out I'd keep them anyways for simply how cool they look.

The one boa was a bit of a rescue from my cousins'coworker who said he didn't want it anymore,theres no telling what would have happened to him cause when I picked him up he wasnt in the best of conditions. I had planned on getting a boa and had orignally wanted a snow boa but I couldn't just leave this guy where he was.Though I have no idea what kind of boa he is, I know he isn't a redtail,and hes doing heaps better and put on a lot of weight since I first got him :P

I have one male normal that I just got like 10 days ago. It is my first (probably only) snake. He ate after one week and is starting to shed so I think he is off to a good start. (I hope!) I'm a newbie so I'm hoping to learn more on this site. =)

I have a lot. More than 10, more than 50, more than 100...

Dang.. I should probably go count now.

This is a good poll.

We only have 26 at the moment. We've been downsizing our odds and ends.

We currently have:

2.4 normal balls (couple dinkers)
1.0 pastel ball
1.0 spider ball
0.1 irian jaya carpet
0.1 coastal carpet
1.0 jungle carpet
1.1 Candoia carinata-carinata
1.1 amazon tree boas
1.0 normal het amel corn
1.0 amel corn
0.2 snow corns
1.1 okeetee corns
0.1 reverse okeetee
1.0 striped corn
0.0.1 peublan milk (pure evil!)
1.0 dumeril boa
0.1 hypo red tail

0.0.6 corn snake eggs in the incubator. Due very soon! Woot!

Also have 0.0.1 blue tongued skink, 2.1 hairless rats, 2.1 black hooded rats, 1.0 rose hair tarantula.

We breed our own feeder rats and we usually have close to 100 feeder rats at any given time.

I started out with one, albino corn snake, with no intentions of getting anymore than that. I fell in love with my corn snake and so I had to have the other begginer's choice snake...the ball python. Picked up a normal female ball python and then learned about all the color and patern mutations in the bp world. Soon after I found I great deal on a hatchling male fire ball python and couldn't pass it up. When I learned that by breeding my fire ball to another fire ball I could produce whitesnakes with black eyes, I had to have a female fire. And it just kinda took off from there. Now I have six ball pythons, and six various colubrids....and I can say this is the first hobby that i've ever had, that a couple years later I am still mezmeriezed and don't see myself becoming bored with it anytime soon!

13 total but planing on at least 10 more by this november

I'm currently at 28 snakes.

80 breeders
20 juvies that will be breeders
72 hatchlings in some state of life

so 172.. Right now.

Only 13 right now :(

Right now we only have 2, but our newest one is coming in a couple weeks and we may get another at the reptile show next month. They are all pets that I plan on using for breeding when they are big enough. I will sell most of those, but probably keep a couple. Ball pythons are very addictive with all the morphs out there. And their docile personalities make it that much harder not to get more. It doesn't take much time to clean them (we do it during feeding since we feed in a different container). I don't breed feeder animals and never will because I am terrified of mice. Frozen food isn't that expensive anyways, I just may need a bigger freezer if I keep adding more snakes!

We have about 20 burmese pythons of varying sizes and morphs.... Are they breeders? Yes.... But they are also pets.... Everyone has a name and their own personality, we get them out and spend time with them all. It takes about two hours on Sundays for Cleaning and about an hour on Feeding, now we do have to spot clean during the week if one doesn't know he/she is suposed to poo Saturday night.... Now I do have about 40 babies right now and it is still hard after all the years to see them leave on shipping day or at a show, but breeding my pets and selling the babies allows me to keep all the burms I want... It isn't cheap feeding 20 big ole babies every week or two...
I love all my burms, yes even the two that are a tad bit evil... sometimes I like them a little more, because they keep me on my toes... Like today, my nastiest burm I have ever had, that has been chilled for a year and I thought had gotten over her evil ways... She was setting me up, and tried to eat my face today... She did not get me, but came close.. Totally my fault, but it did wake me up quick... She is now about waist high in the rack instead of face level like she was today...
Anyway that is my story..

I have 9 snakes.

I have 2 glass aquarium one side turned, 3 custom enclosures one more on the way and 4 in a rack (plastic ap)

The enclosures are naturalistic with lots of stuff in them it takes 50 min to clean them (remember 30 min for sanitizers to do their job, so 20 min of work 30 of waiting) The rack takes me 45 a tub again 30 min of waiting I make sure to clean all snake contact surfaces. The bottom part of each shelf is the real time killer. (My tubs are open topped and slide into shelves so the snake can reach and contact the bottom of the shelf above the one it is on.)

I clean the enclosures at lest once every 2 months or when my nose tells me it smells anything other than clean earthy. (I use coco coir aka eco earth it smells like fresh turned earth)

The rack gets dirtier so I clean everything inside and out and the tubs inside and out once a month and each tub every time an animal makes a mess in it. Which is about every two weeks or so. I spend about 2x to 2/3 more time cleaning the rack than the enclosures they can be spot cleaned but the rack cannot easily so the whole tub needs doing every bowel movement. I am in the process of redesigning a rack with pull out shelves (rigid body with removable shelves) to make cleaning easier (back heat I think).

Mine are all just pets. No breeding past a promise to my friend whom was a breeder I have taken on a dinker project that is now in year 6

6 snakes. All of them are pets.

4 ... 1 more next week... 2 more on hold. All babies :) want to add one more as well.
Planning on breeding in a couple/few years. Can't wait. Love genetics.
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4 ball pythons, 3 of them pleasant.