ReptileRadio Question

Ight so I missed reptile radio last week and had a question for adam... and pretty much everyone involved in BP's... This is an opinion based question and I'd like to see everyones opinion...

Does the size of the cage a snake lives in have ANY effect on the clutch size?

My theory is that a larger enclosure would allow a snake more room to move around and get more exercise. This exercise will in turn make the snake healthier and hypothetically produce more eggs. I know that there are plenty of breeders who keep their snakes in smaller enclosures and still have plenty of success with breeding and getting large clutches. Again this is just my theory and I will be testing it out this year and in the years to come with some more concrete answers down the road.

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Originally Posted by JoshJP7

Ight so I missed reptile radio last week and had a question for adam... and pretty much everyone involved in BP's... This is an opinion based question and I'd like to see everyones opinion...

Does the size of the cage a snake lives in have ANY effect on the clutch size?

My theory is that a larger enclosure would allow a snake more room to move around and get more exercise. This exercise will in turn make the snake healthier and hypothetically produce more eggs. I know that there are plenty of breeders who keep their snakes in smaller enclosures and still have plenty of success with breeding and getting large clutches. Again this is just my theory and I will be testing it out this year and in the years to come with some more concrete answers down the road.

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Clutch size is dependent on snake weight and health although obese snakes do not breed well. but. I think that over feeding is the cause of obesity and not lack of excersize. So I don't think your theory would be correct.

Ball pythons thrive under the security of small dark areas, larger cages don't provide that as well so stress (i think) would act negatively on breeding/clutch size.

Ok so you say that the snakes health is important... more exercise = better health. As far as stress... I offer 2 hides inside each enclosure so stress is not a factor by any means

A good friend of mine hatched out a clutch of 15 eggs this year from a 4000g female that has lived her entire adult life in a 27qt tub (rubbermaid #2221) So I would have to say no...

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Originally Posted by JoshJP7

Ok so you say that the snakes health is important... more exercise = better health.

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This is true in warm blooded animals because our muscles can atrophy where as cold blooded animals muscles do not atrophy. Also reptiles burn far less calories than warm blooded animals so exercise with I sure offers a slight benefit to the animal would not be enough to dictate health or increase clutch size.

Maybe I need to be a little more specific with my ?... I understand that it is still possible to get a large clutch from a big snake ... say we have 10 females in small tubs... 10 females in large tubs... they breed... will the average clutch size be larger with the females in small tubs? larger tubs? or it doesnt matter?

I think your still trying to think mammalian, or warm blooded. Snakes bodies use food differently than warm blooded animals. I don't know the specifics, but it takes a simple observation to show that the weight of the snakes, fat percentage, is far more important than the exercise it gets.

Snakes are sedentary, cruise around to hunt, have excellent senses to hunt with, all to maximize their meals and metabolism to get food quickly and put it to use for digestion and growth.

Connie you mention fat percentages and weight... doesnt fat content decrease when exercise increases? Maybe I dont know enough about snake digestion/nutrition its just hard for me to think that exercise wouldnt benefit the snake... Freakie makes a good point with it bringing benefit... its just unsure of how much benefit... I guess thats what I would like to find out.

It's hard to explain what I want to get across. Exercising the muscles of a snakes body is not going to in a sense "make them healthier" as they do not exert the same amount of energy as a warm blooded animal.

(This is all regarding Balls)

If you want to decrease the fat of the snake, feeding them less will encourage their bodies to more effectively use the meal towards digestion, lean body weight and growth, and have less left over to store for later use.

We aren't saying that exercise won't stimulate a snake, but you must understand that with a MUCH slower metabolism, who's to say that the act of constricting, and eating the meal is not sufficient for maintaining good body mass. Snakes use so much of their meal just for muscle growth, I don't think their sedentary lives promotes a fat snake in any way. (But over feeding will)

I think if you were to try and get your snake to exercise more by letting him run loose in a very large cage, I think you would find him more often than not sleeping and waiting for you to bring him food.

At night they may roam around, but I still don't think your going to see them utilizing the space like you want them to. Who's to say that the weekly constricting and eating isn't enough for them to stay fit?

If so much of their meal goes towards growth in captivity, by forcing them to exercise and hunt their food themselves, your taking away from them using that energy towards growth. I think that all leads back to why WC snakes will eat (when they do eat) whatever you put near them. They are programmed to eat as much as possible to put on weight and mass because so much of it is used for hunting etc, and they never know when the next meal will come along.

If you increase the exercise, you must increase the food. I would think the results would still be the same, and the free roam snake would actually mature slower than the ones in the small enclosure. (And also remain smaller)

Josh,

I don't think you're ever going to find out the answers your looking for. The population sample size of the experiment would have to be pretty large in order to get results that are statistically significant. You or I with our limited snakes wouldn't really be able to experiment and have our results really mean anything. We would need to experiment with hundreds of snakes in order to have results we could legitimately compare.

With that said many of the breeders who have this number of snakes are housing in rack type set ups with "less" space available. So I think it would be hard to actually get a concrete answer to this question.

Sorta like the whats better...rats or mice debate.

pretty interesting post connie! All of my snakes are in larger tubs than the average ball owner keeps theirs in. I just moved all my 07's(except my pewter whose still small just over 100g) over to 116qt tubs and their behavior is the same as before... they sleep all day and roam at night. For those snakes in 4x2x1.5 ... they act the same way... sleep all day out and about at night. What I do think people are over looking is them using the space... all of my snakes are out at night roaming their cage whether they were fed the night before or 4 days before. Its not like 1 or 2 are out roaming and the majority are in their hides... unless theyre in shed theyre always out. Just like them utilizing the space... I provide them something to climb on and again they all use it. What I will consider down the road is like you said feeding them larger prey... they have more room to move so theyre moving more often so a larger meal may be key. I disagree that they grow slower and smaller as my 07's are fed 1nce a week and are all growing at about 100g a month. If anything I see more exercise + larger prey = bigger snake but I could be wrong...

Rich - I see what your saying... Ill only have like 6-7 breeding females in 09 (ill have 2-3 this november) so it will be hard to get a concrete answer that would be respected by the whole ball community. What I do hope happens is I get some of the results I'm aiming for. If I get a couple females to pop out some rather large clutches I may be on to something... then again they could just be big healthy females poppin out eggs like any other breeder.

I really wish there was more info available on these animals. Due to the genetic variability among snake to snake and the snake's actual ability to communicate; its really hard. At least with a dog or a cat you know when something is detrimental or beneficial to the animal because you can sense their overall mood. Doing this with a snake is really hard and leaves it all to the owners intuition; which is why I guess the "do what works for you phrase came about".

I give you credit for taking the time to actually try this out. Good luck with it.

116qt tubs are huge!!! :O Good luck finding your answer, very interesting. Personally i prefer to keep my snakes tucked tight in 32 and 15 qt tubs.

judd it would be impossible to put two hides a water dish and something to climb on in a 32qt tub. Im going off my memory but the dimensions of a 116qt are 30x17x13.5 which isnt large by any means for a 4ft snake. Either way the two hides act as the nice tight space for them to feel secure in.

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Originally Posted by JoshJP7

I disagree that they grow slower and smaller as my 07's are fed 1nce a week and are all growing at about 100g a month. If anything I see more exercise + larger prey = bigger snake but I could be wrong...

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Josh, when I mean a large enclosure, I mean something akin to 160 gallons and larger. Your tub size hardly qualifies as large, when we are comparing to their natural habitat. I do not know how large of a range they roam, but doubt it's a 3 x 1 footprint of space.

Something large to where you wont readily even know where they are at any given time.

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Originally Posted by JoshJP7

judd it would be impossible to put two hides a water dish and something to climb on in a 32qt tub. Im going off my memory but the dimensions of a 116qt are 30x17x13.5

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thats like a 31 qt, wait....thats taller though.

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Originally Posted by JoshJP7

judd it would be impossible to put two hides a water dish and something to climb on in a 32qt tub. Im going off my memory but the dimensions of a 116qt are 30x17x13.5 which isnt large by any means for a 4ft snake. Either way the two hides act as the nice tight space for them to feel secure in.

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I use mostly CB70 tubs which are almost the same floor dimensoins only the height is the big difference. So it's really a normal size adult tub that is taller. As a matter of fact my freedom breeder rack has the CB-70-8 tubs which are 8" tall instead of 6" and thats what I keep my breeding females in.
Any way your tubs aren't really that much bigger because floor space is what makes the greatest difference.

I myself take my snakes out of 32qt tubs when they are 700-800 grams unless one happens to be a real nervous nanny.

Back in the late 90's I kept a group of about 30 ball pythons in large cages ... 4 ft x 2 ft x 18 inch Neodesha plastic reptile enclosures ... multiple hides, climbing branches, the works ... I now use a combination of CB70's and 32qt Sterilites. According to my records there is absolutely no difference in the number of eggs that the girls were laying in the larger cages than what they give me today.

Hope this helps.

-adam