Getting Ball Pythons straight from Africa.

[Reps4life]

In about 3-4 weeks when they hatch/shed I will be receiving an unopened bag of 10 ball pythons from Africa through Outback Reptiles. Hopefully some of the babies will prove out to be genetic. I can't wait!! Just thought I would share

[deto360]

i saw that post on KS but it would be my luck to get a bunch of normals i mean i love bps but i love morphs

[toddbecker]

Don't expect to get anything spectacular. The gathers and farmers in Africa have learned in the last decade or two what is unusual and they jump onto a computer at the local internet cafe and check it out. They know what the costs are and they know what they can expect to get from the "cool" stuff. There is a possibility of getting reduced patterns, bandeds, and such and possibly even a yellowbelly or something like that that is more "normal" looking but then you have to spend years and years to prove them out and then determine if they are a new line or just another specimen of what already exists. Really the only good thing about fresh imports is it freshens the bloodlines of your collection. Good luck with the new ones when they come in. Todd

[j_h_smith]

You may want to have a different location for these snakes until they clear your QT. Some can be pretty nasty. I wish you good luck, but I think the time has passed for getting anything special on these deals.

Jim Smith

[Clint Bundy]

Sorry but with the sickness that can be imported I opted out of getting in on the bag of balls deal. Good luck and I hope you get some cool looking stuff.

[billye1982]

They claim there are no parasites or mites in Africa, has anyone ever confirmed this?

[snakeman13]

They claim there are no parasites or mites in Africa, has anyone ever confirmed this?

ya......no west nile either!!!

[j_h_smith]

They claim there are no parasites or mites in Africa, has anyone ever confirmed this?

I can't speak about recent activities, but 15 years ago, there were.

Jim Smith

[billye1982]

ya......no west nile either!!!

LOL, no malaria or typhoid fever either huh

[dr del]

Hi,

From my patchy memory I don't think they have snake mites in Africa - I seem to remember them being Asian in origin.

I think they do have ticks and other assorted internal parasites though.

But as long as a good quarantine regime is in place I don't see unopened bags being any different than the usual CF animals in stores. They come form the same source after all - the shop just unpacked them.

You are however extremely likely to get a bag of normals - the people packing these bags are not stupid and this is their job. They know what looks unusual.

In fact they tend to sell the unusual one seperately as "specials" - buying a bag of specials would be of more interest to me simply to see what they looked like.

Just remember it takes at least one breeding to find out if anything is genetic and several over a couple of generations to be able to say for sure what you may have.

Nobody is going to open a bag and get rich overnight.


dr del