Helpful tips needed

[Pg0615]

Hey everyone I'm looking for some general tips and advice on breeding. I've loved pythons in general since I was a teen. I've recently went and purchased my first no I over 15 years, and reconnected with my passion. However, I want to venture into breeding them this time around. I've done research online, but would love input from experienced breeders... None of my bps are anywhere near appropriate size so I know I have plenty of time. Thanks in advance to everyone for input.

1.0 Banana pied
1.0 Axanthic
1.0 Pastel
0.1 HET Axanthic
0.1 Albino-High Contrast
0.1 Superstripe

[PartySnake13]

Hey everyone I'm looking for some general tips and advice on breeding. I've loved pythons in general since I was a teen. I've recently went and purchased my first no I over 15 years, and reconnected with my passion. However, I want to venture into breeding them this time around. I've done research online, but would love input from experienced breeders... None of my bps are anywhere near appropriate size so I know I have plenty of time. Thanks in advance to everyone for input.

1.0 Banana pied
1.0 Axanthic
1.0 Pastel
0.1 HET Axanthic
0.1 Albino-High Contrast
0.1 Superstripe

At least you have some aging females, if you buy any more, make sure to buy females, as they take much longer to mature.

In the meantime, I'd check around for fully mature normal/single gene females to help get in some practice.
If you don't mind breeding spider, there are typically always people looking to sell off mature, healthy, proven spider females for cheap.


Banana, pastel, and axanthic all go excellent with spider.

[Craiga 01453]

At least you have some aging females, if you buy any more, make sure to buy females, as they take much longer to mature.

In the meantime, I'd check around for fully mature normal/single gene females to help get in some practice.
If you don't mind breeding spider, there are typically always people looking to sell off mature, healthy, proven spider females for cheap.


Banana, pastel, and axanthic all go excellent with spider.

This is not good advice at all.

Do not breed normals "for practice". That makes no sense whatsoever.

In this day and age breeding normals makes no sense at all unless you plan on keeping all the offspring. As a first time breeder with no reputation you'll have a hard time moving ANY animals, let alone normal or single gene animals. Breeding normals or single gene animals will get you next to nothing in return and feeding and housing would cost more than the animals would sell for.

Bottom line: with the world not knowing what's going on, with no signs of the economy magically rebounding, unless you plan to keep the offspring now is probably a pretty bad time to be starting any amateur breeding projects.

[vivi]

I know you don't plan on breeding just yet, and I´m not trying to discourage you but the BP market is RIDICULOUSLY over-saturated. You won't find many sales unless you breed something new and higher end or price it super cheap. (BPs can go for as low as a dollar sans shipping.) Not a great way to do business if you ask me. Also, I agree with Craig, have you seen the economy nowadays? Again, I am not trying to discourage you but it might be hard to sell anything.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

There is a lot going into breeding first you need to ask yourself the right questions.

Are you ready to breed, do you have enough hands own experience?

Are you knowledgeable about genetics?

What is your goal?

Do you have a plan back by a solid investment?

Can you afford to lose money?

Do you know your market?

Do you have a reliable source of live feeder?

What will you do if your animals don't sell?

Etc

I am not trying to discourage you just making sure you understand it is more than just putting two snake together, while some people do not have a goal of making money no one however wants to lose money and that can happen very fast if you do not make the right descision or are not knowledgeable enough about the market itself?

Basically even if your goal is to have a hobby paying for itself you will have to treat this like it is a small business and no one can layout the goals for you, YOU will need to do the work.

Now when it comes down to the technical part after you gave a good thought to what I just mentionned and still decide to move forward this is what I recommend people to follow during their first season.
https://ballpython.ca/breeding/

[PartySnake13]

This is not good advice at all.

Do not breed normals "for practice". That makes no sense whatsoever.

In this day and age breeding normals makes no sense at all unless you plan on keeping all the offspring. As a first time breeder with no reputation you'll have a hard time moving ANY animals, let alone normal or single gene animals. Breeding normals or single gene animals will get you next to nothing in return and feeding and housing would cost more than the animals would sell for.

Bottom line: with the world not knowing what's going on, with no signs of the economy magically rebounding, unless you plan to keep the offspring now is probably a pretty bad time to be starting any amateur breeding projects.

Not true at all, normals and inexpensive morphs in the $50-$150 range sell incredibly well, and when breeding males with dominate genes like banana, only have the offspring will be normal.
If he starts sooner rather than later, then he'll have experience under his belt, therefore when its time to breed something more expensive he'll be successful, as he has already gone through the trial and error phase.

[Craiga 01453]

Not true at all, normals and inexpensive morphs in the $50-$150 range sell incredibly well, and when breeding males with dominate genes like banana, only have the offspring will be normal.
If he starts sooner rather than later, then he'll have experience under his belt, therefore when its time to breed something more expensive he'll be successful, as he has already gone through the trial and error phase.

Look, I'm not gonna argue with you. You don't even own a BP. I've been in this hobby the better part of 20 years.

You don't play trial and error with living creatures. You do proper research and do it right the first time.

Normals and single gene animals will cost more money to house, feed and since OP has zero experience or reputation, they'll probably be in his care for at least a year if they sell at all.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

Not true at all, normals and inexpensive morphs in the $50-$150 range sell incredibly well, and when breeding males with dominate genes like banana, only have the offspring will be normal.
If he starts sooner rather than later, then he'll have experience under his belt, therefore when its time to breed something more expensive he'll be successful, as he has already gone through the trial and error phase.

So what is your experience breeding and selling Ball Pythons? I can tell you your advice could not be any further from the truth and show a lack of understanding for the ball python market but I have only been doing this for 14 years so maybe my knowledge of the market and what a good investment is not accurate.

Sure Banana sell however they are easy to make as well and have been around a long time which means the supply is very high.

When

supply > demand = low prices, delayed sales or no retail sales at all depending on whom you are which means increase overhead which means decreased profit.

Normal unless you sell them out of the egg at wholesale price to a petore you will loose money by the time they sell, how much money depends how long you will have to hang on to them, even with a good reputation you still might not sell them depending on what your targeted market is. You have to calculate your time, food, electricity housing etc so taking 3 months or more to sell a snake under $100 means you break even or lose money.

The reality is if someone wants to breed they need to make smart investment otherwise I guarantee that your "trial and error phase" which includes the work, loss of money etc will quickly take a toll and lead to a collection sale within 5 years (I see it all the time) and that is true even for someone that just wants to break even and have a collection paying for itself. People diving in not thinking this through do not succeed get overwhelmed and quit.

[Craiga 01453]

So what is your experience breeding and selling Ball Pythons? I can tell you your advice could not be any further from the truth and show a lack of understanding for the ball python market but I have only been doing this for 14 years so maybe my knowledge of the market and what a good investment is not accurate.

Sure Banana sell however they are easy to make as well and have been around a long time which means the supply is very high.

When

supply > demand = low prices, delayed sales or no retail sales at all depending on whom you are which means increase overhead which means decreased profit.

Normal unless you sell them out of the egg at wholesale price to a petore you will loose money by the time they sell, how much money depends how long you will have to hang on to them, even with a good reputation you still might not sell them depending on what your targeted market is. You have to calculate your time, food, electricity housing etc so taking 3 months or more to sell a snake under $100 means you break even or lose money.

The reality is if someone wants to breed they need to make smart investment otherwise I guarantee that your "trial and error phase" which includes the work, loss of money etc will quickly take a toll and lead to a collection sale within 5 years (I see it all the time) and that is true even for someone that just wants to break even and have a collection paying for itself. People diving in not thinking this through do not succeed get overwhelmed and quit.

Spoken by one of the best in the business.

OP, make sure while you're learning you're learning from reputable sources. Deborah of Stewart's Reptiles is one of them. She's fantastic. There are more than a handful of very knowledgeable BP breeders on this forum who will be happy to help you out. Just be sure to learn from the right ones.

I don't breed, so I won't offer any actual breeding advice. However, I've been around this hobby a long time and try to stay pretty in tune with what's going on in the hobby.

[vivi]

Not true at all, normals and inexpensive morphs in the $50-$150 range sell incredibly well, and when breeding males with dominate genes like banana, only have the offspring will be normal.
If he starts sooner rather than later, then he'll have experience under his belt, therefore when its time to breed something more expensive he'll be successful, as he has already gone through the trial and error phase.

You´ve never kept snakes or bred them for that matter, where´s all this knowledge and experience on the BP market coming from? I´m no breeder and am incredibly inexperienced but how do you know they sell incredibly well? People will more likely buy from a tried and true reputable breeder over a breeder just starting out so it could be very hard to get business, especially since there´s around 16,000 BPs for sale on Morphmarket alone. Again, OP, no one is trying to discourage you. I can´t give you any suggestions because I don´t know anything about breeding or morphology and will leave that to the more experienced breeders.

Agreed, Deborah is a great and experienced breeder. Be careful who you take advice from.