So me and my wife have decided recently that we are going to attempt to receive a business loan to kick off our breeding program. I learned there is a thing called "self-funding" your business which applies to partially funding it. Considering I have racks, snakes, food, litter, water dishes (most of my expenses are these objects) I plan to count that as self-funding our program. However I am putting in our initial costs the price of 2 new racks, a large rack for the breeders and a large hatchling rack. I am also increasing the amount of snakes from the few we have bought to a solid 24 count. 6 males 18 females. Now I did my research and decided to go with ARS racks and I generalized the prices of new snakes via Morph Market average prices (although I will most likely try to get them cheaper over time from expos\other breeders). I also calculated the cost of 1 year's worth of food for my breeders (I assumed I would have males eating 1 medium rat per week and females eating 1 large rat per week). I guestimated a cost of litter for 1 year and included the price of a 500 pack of deli cups for each rack. I also plan to breed my own rats. I bought a few rats from the pet store as feeders and began breeding them. I currently have 2 males 6 females breeding for my personal collection. Of course that isn't enough to feed all 20 of my snakes but I don't have room to expand them at the moment. My question here is, I plan to have 24 breeding animals + whatever holdbacks I keep + feeding the babies until they sell. How in the world do I calculate how many breeding females I will need to support them?? Also, Should I switch from regular rats to soft furred rats? None of my ball pythons have issues eating the regular rats even though my reticulated python won't touch them. I was thinking 60 females would be enough to provide my snakes their own food source. If I have extra that's ok too I have no problem freezing extras or selling them.

TLDR; Should I try ASF rats or are they going to be a pain from normal rats, IS there any other expenses I am not putting in here? I have Snake racks, Snakes, Rat racks, Rats, Food for both, Water for both, Litter for both. I am going to allow the extra electricity\water etc to be Overhead. I do not have a place with enough room to breed on a larger scale so I am considering adding a building to the business plan. Not quite sure if that will be worth it.

Thoughts Thoughts Thoughts.


On the topic of a Snake Room. I am trying to lay out my plan for how I would like to design the room. I know on one wall i'll have all the snake racks and opposite wall of the snakes I will have the rat racks. In the middle of the room I would like an "island" or large table to work on\put snakes on. I plan to have a plumber install an extendable hose so i can mist snakes\fill water bowls up without a lot of hassle. I also want a small storage area for extra tubs\cups\food\litter etc. Obviously I would need lots of receptacles separated between plenty of circuits so that I never have a power issue. What should I do as far as ventilation? I wouldn't want the room smelling like rat piss all the time, and I wouldn't want to completely suck the humidity out of the room for my snakes. Not sure how that would work. I am also not sure on an incubator. Probably just purchase a standing one and have it in the corner of the room. Is there anything I am missing or any suggestions anyone has on this?