Those of you breeding, what is your living situation?

My fiance and I are really excited about the possibility of breeding our ball pythons in the future. (Our snakes are still a couple years out from breeding age/weight). This is just a fun, learning hobby for us, but should we ever want to do more than say...1-2 clutches/year, I would be concerned about our living situation.

Presently, we rent a home and I am pretty certain that they will not allow past a certain number of snakes. We would like to move in the next year after we get married, and I am concerned about what our living options are/will be with more than 4 snakes (our current number).

For those of you breeding BP's regularly can you please tell us what your living circumstances are, what issues you've run into, etc. ? I can't imagine that any condo's with HOA's would like snake breeding going on. Same with apartment complexes. Are we going to be forced into buying in order to take this hobby any further than the 4 snakes we have now?

FWIW: I'm not in the breeding biz (yet), but bought and are raising the hets to do so in a few more years.

I currently own. My mortgage is just 2 yo. Unfortunately, I got laid off in Sept, so I dont know if I'll be in this house for longer than the first of the year. That's how long b4 my UIB runs out, and the fact I paid 3 months extra months in advance to buffer keeping a roof over our heads.

For us, it won't be just the breeding plans either. Now that I'm working the HNS rescue, and our personal collection, we have 32 (as of last night) snakes.....two of which are yellow anacondas.

Despite the market and jobs, if you could swing it, I feel owning would be best for stability and safety for your collection if you want to breed, but buying has its downsides, too.....

Best of luck, no matter WHAT U decide!!!

I hope to do some breeding next year. I own a home. My one concern and it may be a little goofy would be breeding or owning too many animals in a apartment or duel occupied residence of multiple units.

My concern would be along the following lines.

Ball Python's are an investment of time, emotion, love and money. I would not trust living in a multiple dwelling unit where the actions of others could cause an event like a fire or what have you. I know that may be being overconcerned.....and events like that can happen anywhere...but raising large groups of animals where you have to deal with other people and the behavior would make me nervous.

None of this may make sense but having the apartment burn down because someone 3 doors down left their curling iron on or thru their joint in a wastebasket and burned the place down would drive me nuts lol.

I rent a home, with 3 room mates one being my girl. But its kinda hard to do so im really trying to expand my collection and start up breeding i am doing it this year. But we are working on getting our own place so i can have a room dedicated to snakes like i want and not just my bedroom. :rolleye2:

I own a home. But the snakes have a room that's built on to the garage. I use to have them in the house but you get more than a few and it just get's unreal..

...I've been in your shoes before!

I was renting a home with 3 roomies while I was an undergrad. None of my roommates wanted anything to do with my reptiles. So I basically turned my room into a snake room with my racks and cages. I had very little floor space....I slept on the floor on a small single mattress. :P Luckily, my landlord was an 80 year old man who did not do stairs....I lived downstairs so he never looked in my room. :rolleyes:

...I then moved into a 2 bedroom apartment with my fiance during grad school. I sold off half of my collection prior to the move. It turned out to be a good idea to reduce my collection because I don't think I would have been able to hide all my racks from the landlords. I lived in this apartment for a year and never ran into any issues with the landlords.

...I currently am renting a home with my wife. My landlord thinks I have A pet snake. :P My wife has a Cal King she keeps in our office upstairs...I keep my current collection downstairs. I use a couple of privacy screens to...well give the snakes some privacy. My landlord has practically leaned against one of my racks and never said a word. :D

I feel organization and cleanliness is important in this (really all) situation. I keep my racks/tubs/snake area spotless...well as spotless as I can keep up with. I keep everything organized, all my wires are twisty-tied...so if the day ever does come where my landlord does find them...my snakes look well cared for, secure, and safe.

Good Luck with everything! :salute:

This is my first year breeding, but crested geckos not BPs. I have a 2BR apartment to myself, one room is pretty much dedicated to the pets.

1 br/1 bath apt. Rent. Currently we have 18 snakes (8 of which are females that have locked up this season, so hopefully there will be many more soon). My landlord could care less what I am doing in my apt as long as it is not dangerous, illegal, or makes noise...lol. However, we are currently looking to buy a condo or small home so we can have a dedicated snake room.

Should be more options!

Im currently staying back with the parents after a few years out on my own with my boyfriend. Hes doing school and im paying down bills, and we will be looking for a house when things are a bit more stable.

When we were out on our own, we rented 1BR Apartments.

I'm Alicia's fiance (OP). Thank you everyone for the insights! I wasn't aware that so many people were in apartments. That's kind of a nice surprise. :)

I think renting a home would be more difficult - the last house I rented the landlord was always stopping by to check on things (with notice, of course)...and it's kinda hard a bunch of tanks of snakes :P We don't have any kind of breeder racks/system yet. Just using multiple 10 gallon tanks.

This is my first year breeding, but I do have a good sized collection. We own our home, and the snakes have the basement. I'll soon be putting in large AP cages upstairs for my boas and bloods, in the same room that houses my crested cages.

I own my home and land, and the snakes have their own room, but the lizards have both an outside cage and cages in my living room. Owning your home is the best, since people can't toss you out because you own a snake, and they can't toss you out because you have mroe snake furniture than people furniture.

We own our home where the entire reptiles facility is another building on the property. Used to have to use two rooms in an older house but it works out alot better in a seperate building so if we have any escapees none of the other animals we own can get at them.

We rent a huge 2 level apartment in a 100 year old home that's been broken into four units total. Our landlord is a very laid back guy and is fully aware of the snakes and rodents we keep. Our agreement with him is that we will ensure as best we can that no escapes occur and our hobby does not bother our neighbours. Over the 2 years we've rented here the landlord has had far, far more trouble with our neighbours and their dogs or parties or illegal activities. I think our quiet family, even though we keep a lot of snakes, is easy for them. :)

I stil llive at home and we live in a trailer so veryl imited room we wnat o move ( since we don't own the land), but with us both (mom and myself) on disability it hard to get approved for anything. I currently house 8 bps,1 boa ,5 corns ,and a ageing blackrat snake that over 15 years old ( ido reptile removals/rescue as a hobby.. I have laready build mental plans for if we can get a place. and they include 3 possible designs and all. WE just need to find someoen willing to give us a chance. ( I mean come on with us on disablity ther no job to lose ) plus we not looking to own large lots and a mutli-story fancy house. but I limit my breeding to 1 clutch a year right now until I can make sure I will have a way to move large numbers of snakes..

I live at home with my parents, and have 50+ snakes crammed into my approx 12'x12' bedroom. Haha...

I don't breed yet, but plan to this next winter. I and my BF/partner live in a 2Bdrm/2Bath rented apartment. I admit that the space has been a strong issue, but after building a display system for the corns and two racks for the BPs it's gotten a lot better. :) I have 12 snakes BTW, plus a BTS and a veiled cham.

The management know about the snakes and rodents (we had to pay a $300 deposit extra because the manager hates snakes) and don't mind what we do as long as the apartment isn't damaged and neighbors don't complain (neighbors think it's cool).

I would think the main issue when renting, house or apartment, is to make SURE that the management/landlord knows exactly what you have and what you plan and are still OK with it. :) And get it in writing! Our reptiles are written in on the lease.

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Originally Posted by frankykeno

We rent a huge 2 level apartment in a 100 year old home that's been broken into four units total. Our landlord is a very laid back guy and is fully aware of the snakes and rodents we keep. Our agreement with him is that we will ensure as best we can that no escapes occur and our hobby does not bother our neighbours. Over the 2 years we've rented here the landlord has had far, far more trouble with our neighbours and their dogs or parties or illegal activities. I think our quiet family, even though we keep a lot of snakes, is easy for them. :)

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Before I bought this place, R and I lived in a little 1950's type 2br/1ba house. We had snakes and rats in her room, snakes in my bedroom and the livingroom. At that time we only had five snakes, but bought 8 more while we lived there the 18 months. The landlord knew we had the cats, rats and snakes. He didn't care what we did, sort of like Joanna's LL. As long as we didn't destroy anything.

When Kaa escaped, right before we moved, he was really cool about it. I explained where I thought he might be, and F let me tear a (bigger) hole in the wall to make sure the snake wasn't btwn studs. When it was found that Kaa died in the back of the stove, there wasn't any animosity or anger. We talked, I cleaned, and due to fire risk, we decided to replace it, and the last of my deposit bought a new one. He was really cool about it all....

That's not to say that many would be, but renting from him was the best rental situation I've ever had......even though he lived 100' away in his own house.

I rent an apartment, and it is hard to get them to let you have more then a certin number. I wouldnt recommend it if you rent (b/c I know how hard it is). I rescue cats for my apartments so she doesnt bother me

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Originally Posted by Kysenia

I would not trust living in a multiple dwelling unit where the actions of others could cause an event like a fire or what have you. I know that may be being overconcerned.....and events like that can happen anywhere...but raising large groups of animals where you have to deal with other people and the behavior would make me nervous.

None of this may make sense but having the apartment burn down because someone 3 doors down left their curling iron on or thru their joint in a wastebasket and burned the place down would drive me nuts lol.

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if your thinking is going that way then my collection no matter how big or how much it cost wouldnt make the list of things id worry about in a fire. i keep my family in my apartment and id rather lose my collection twice a day then anything happen to them once.

you have to have more faith in others. if you worry that much you should find a bank vault hop in and stay cuz the world is full of dangerous things.

I rent one side of a duplex. When I moved in I had one snake, now I have around 30. My landlord doesn't mind as they make no mess, don't smell and generally leave things alone. He loves my Macklots. I got lucky, I don't think I could find another place to rent if I tried. Should be hopefully buying within a year.

Ashtin and I don't breed, yet, but our landlord is cool with all the animals. He loves the dogs (3 of them) and couldn't care less that we use one of the rooms to house 2 BPs, 1 RTB, and 23 rats. He has walked in, walked around, and looked at what he needed to and doesn't care. I don't think I could ever ask for a better landlord.

I'm renting a studio right now, with my gf and I's four babies. (okay only one is a baby). They're in a rack chilling next to the couch. Finding an apartment here in Chicago that allowed snakes was a PAIN!! I wrote twelve places, telling about them and asking if they would be allowed, I only received two responses! Both were from the same place, one saying yes, and one saying no. Was able to get in. "as long as it doesn't get into the vents".

It's kind of funny though. There's a mouse hiding in my place somewhere. I cant wait to have that conversation with the land lord. I feed FT.... I'm just waiting for them to try to blame it on me, saying that I let it lose while feeding. We'll see how that goes.

Just if you are thinking of renting, make sure you have some sort of control over the temperature. The heat here is radiator, and theres only one valve that controls the 5 levels. They have to keep the first floor over 68 degrees, leaving my floor at 85* + at some times. So I had to keep really close tabs on cooling the apartment ect. Just watch out for things like that.

Do yourself a HUGE favor and don't ever tell anyone that you have snakes. I own my home and still keep it a secret. What I did was to fill the living room with snakes, and the dinning room with rodents. The dogs and cats share the kitchen, and the bedroom is all mine.

We own our house, and we have one room that is snakes/ homeschool books (we homeschool our kids), and another room that is music gear/ snake quarantine room.
We didn't have any snakes before we bought- just a dog and a cat, but it's way nicer to be able to do whatever you want without worrying about what the landlord might say.

We rent but our landlord doesn't care about the snakes or dog. He just says "pay the rent and don't tell me what is in there."

We are moving to a new house May 1st and that land lord owns a mojave, 2 pastels, a cinnamon and an albino ball python. So we got lucky. When we have to move for vet school though I hope we can find a decent land lord.

Well let's see here.

Before I moved in with my best friend, I was taking care of my mom after she had two surgeries and I rescued Boots (RTB). She did not want Boots in the house so my best friend let me go ahead and move him in there. A few months later, I moved in. A few months later, I met my boyfriend/now fiance and he moved in. A month later we got another snake (first ball python). My best friend/roommate isn't too pleased about the new snake (even though I told her before I moved in at all that I'd be getting more snakes). Now we're moving to Florida this weekend/beginning of next week. It's been hell trying to find a place to rent that accepts snakes and isn't outrageously expensive. Jason, my fiance, owns his own DJ'ing company so needless to say he's been at home a lot calling places and talking with people. We have a few places narrowed down and we're making the however long trip it is down there this weekend to finalize something (according to google it's like 11.5 hrs and to him it'll take 8 hrs). We're planning on renting for a little while to make sure that everything works out as this will be my first time moving away from my hometown. Next year we'll most likely invest in buying a house, but for now it's either going to be apartment/townhouse/house for rent.

We only have the two snakes right now. The ball python is my first (of my large want list) to breed but she's a late 08 so we've got some time. We plan on getting a rack and collecting slowly til we buy a house and that will give us time for Ms Patsy to get old enough since I want her to be my first bred girl (yeah I know I'm cheesy, but gives me plenty of time to learn and collect more)!!

Sorry for the book lol!!

I used to rent an apartment. I had all of my snakes in our 8x6 storage closet but had to buy all of my feeders. That sucked and was expensive.

Since I bought my house I have converted one of the basement bedrooms into my snake & rodent room. I escape-proofed it and it works really well. My next project is putting in a laundry sink for all of my washing/watering/bathing duties.

I dont advertise the snakes but I do like to show friends; the look on their face when they see how many feeders and snakes are in that one room is priceless!

I'm 22 and bought a house in May. Before I was having to move the snakes around way too much (about once a year or 2) and was tired of doing that so did my best to get a house and did it. Since then my collection and the health of my animals has since drastically increased!

Live with my mom who owns the roof of the house that is over my head.

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Originally Posted by AjBalls

Live with my mom who owns the roof of the house that is over my head.

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that not a bad thing I know mom don't drive so I got a little lead way but it also helps she gotten nit the snakes a little and does offer to help when I need to do some complete cage cleans ( scrubs). plus she keeps the rats in her room. SHe hateds the ideal I feed them off, I think she turn any and all animals into pets if allowed.

We used to live in a two bedroom townhouse, with the second bedroom being dedicated to the snakes and rodents. Technically they were not allowed, even though we had gotten the verbal ok from the lady in the office. Found out we needed written consent or they could tell us to move the snakes. We didn't want to risk them making us get rid of them so we kept our mouth shut. Never had a problem though.

Now we live with my mother in law, renting out two of her bedrooms in her three bedroom townhouse. She is not charging us rent, so we are hoping to pay off our debt and then save up for a down payment for a house.

I own and the boids have their own room to clean up. :)

16 year old kid. I have a room for my bps. But my mother is not a big fan of snakes. Lolz

We own our home. I will attempt breeding this coming winter. I used to keep my snakes in my office, now I have converted our den into a game room for my son and his friends. I also moved my cages into the game room. Needless to say, all the neighborhood kids love it. However, I'm looking to build a rack system next year. I'll have to convince the wife on keepng it in the gameroom. I figure if i build something that looks really nice, she will be ok with it. I also plan on keeping one of our future morphs to be displayed in our livingroom in a nice cage.

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Originally Posted by Brian_Sutton

We own our home. I will attempt breeding this coming winter. I used to keep my snakes in my office, now I have converted our den into a game room for my son and his friends. I also moved my cages into the game room. Needless to say, all the neighborhood kids love it. However, I'm looking to build a rack system next year. I'll have to convince the wife on keepng it in the gameroom. I figure if i build something that looks really nice, she will be ok with it. I also plan on keeping one of our future morphs to be displayed in our livingroom in a nice cage.

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You'll never see it unless you keep some strange hours. I have one BP (bumblebee) that is often out and about but he is the exception to the rule. I keep corns in my display tanks, unlike BP's they are always out for viewing

I started buying my house when I was 20. 2 bed 1 bath. I have 5 BPs in my bedroom now. I'm waiting to remodel the other room, them it will be my snake/computer room. At the moment I'm also building me a custom desktop.
My dad told me once that I couldn't have any snakes in my house then, I told him this is my house I'll do what I want. Then he told me that he was proud of me for telling him that. Kind of weird I think.

My husband owns the house we live in.

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Originally Posted by Kysenia

I hope to do some breeding next year. I own a home. My one concern and it may be a little goofy would be breeding or owning too many animals in a apartment or duel occupied residence of multiple units.

My concern would be along the following lines.

Ball Python's are an investment of time, emotion, love and money. I would not trust living in a multiple dwelling unit where the actions of others could cause an event like a fire or what have you. I know that may be being overconcerned.....and events like that can happen anywhere...but raising large groups of animals where you have to deal with other people and the behavior would make me nervous.

None of this may make sense but having the apartment burn down because someone 3 doors down left their curling iron on or thru their joint in a wastebasket and burned the place down would drive me nuts lol.

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That's exactly what I was thinking. When you are in an apartment you aren't the only person that can burn the place down. That's a scary thought in itself. People are stupid! Our apartment almost got burned down because our upstairs neighbor threw his cigarettes over the railing and onto our balcony and one of those times it just happened to fall in the trash can that I thought was safely out of his reach, poof there went our balcony that was made of wood. It got hot enough to melt our curtains before I was able to put it out.

And also the fact of never knowing your next living situation, or other apartment dwellers finding out you have snakes and getting them banned from the apartment building-a really easy thing to have done.

We own a house, just bought it in September.

We rent a 2 br/2ba apartment that has an evil pet policy and hence they dont know about my snakes. There's a huge walk-in closet that they are being moved to, and I am so ready to buy a house but my wife isnt sure that UT is where were staying for a little bit of time, and I dont blame her.

I own my home (well paying for it anyway) and I keep my snakes in a seperate air conditioned storage unit in my back yard.

I have been there with renting and having tons of animals, always standing inthe doorway when the landlord comes by so he doesnt see in, or keeping the rent check taped to the front door, lol. In my opinion is just not fair to yourself or your animals. The best thing to do is just wait till you can do what you want with your space. Not having to worry about other people and setting up a permanant space dedicated to the animals is so much easier.

Then again I am married and my wife hates snakes, thats why they are in the yard......maybe I was better of being single and renting....

I live with my parents and they have been really cool with my snakes and rosents. I keep them both in my room (thank god asfs aren't smelly). I have 11 snakes in a rack I built so it looks quite presentable. I really want to get another at the Daytona show but may have to
sell one to keep things happy on the home
front.

It's great to have supportive parents. My mom actually likes some of my morphs, my dad isn't too in to them to say the least (btw I'm 24 moved
back home after quiting law school and staying with them til I get back on my feet, so this thread has been really helpful).

i live in an apartment and have snakes everywhere lol im in the process of buying a home soon so its not a big deal for me i do what i want :D

Right now Im living at home so it works well because my parents are willing to tolerate my obsession. In a month I will be leaving for school and my reptiles were a major concern for me. I am not willing to give them up, I cant leave them here, & I just didnt want to risk taking them to the dorms and then getting a roommate that hates them or something. My only option was to find an apartment near the school that allows pets. I ended up only having one choice though because the other places that do allow pets said no to reptiles.
(BTW, with the reptile hobbyist community being as large as it is, you would think some of these apartment owners would realize there is money to be made by simply allowing reptiles. Most of them can do nowhere near as much damage as a dog or cat. )

wish i was breeding. but my BPs are just fam pets =D

I plan to breed in the future. I Rent a 1BR/1Bath apt. We are moving to a two bedroom two bath in Aug of the upcoming year (I wasn't sure if I was going to do another year of undergrad or go to grad school) and one room will be the office/snake room. The managers here don't allow cats or dogs but if its in a tank/tub its ok with them. I figure if neighbors (who don't know about them) complain or they think I have too many there might be issues, but right now they like us and we have it in writing that its allowed.

I own 16 snakes, and therefore I'm homeless.

I rent half of a house (1BR, 1BA), though my half is 1000 sq ft, so I have plenty of room. Woo! I don't want to make snake-phobic people uncomfortable, so all my snakes live in my bedroom (once they're out of quarantine) and the lizards have taken over the living room.

I got lucky, like some people here. My landlady likes reptiles, so she has no problem with my snakes and lizards (her kids get a kick out of them every time they come over). Well, I can't have a ton of them, but that's okay; I don't plan on having a giant collection until I get a house of my own.

Complicated. There is no checkbox for 'partial ownership of a home'. <lol>
We're hoping to switch that to just 'owning a home' next year, though.

I own my home and have a finished basement with a large room for my ball pythons, and a seperate larger room for my boas (that one is also my den). I just started my venture into breeding and considering the ammount of cages and equipment I have I would not attempt doing it on the scale I am in a rented house, but that is just me. If you are stable in where you are renting then I guess it would be ok, but I have no one breathing down my neck as to what I am doing, or that can tell me no.

My house it completely set up for breeding snakes with a very large industrial sink in between the snake rooms for cleaning bowls, cages, and thawing rats. The main floor of the house has not a single snake in it, it looks like a regular ol house and that is the way my wife likes it. If I neeeded to move what I have to an apartment I do not think that it would fit unless it was a very large apartment. I am only up to about 35 snakes right now, but I have the room for about 300+ more, but I am just starting out and do not plan on over extending myself right now.

I am also retired medically from the Army, so I have the time to take care of all of these snakes, and still have a steady income to keep my family fed, and my house payed for. I probably would not have tried this had it not been for retiring, but that is just me. Many people have no problem doing this and holding a regular job.