Determining age?

[engywook]

Hi from Helsinki! (Yes, Finland.)

I finally managed to get my hands on a pair (1.1) of BPs about 20 days ago; the previous owner was moving, so I got a pretty good deal for the whole setup. They're both beautiful, healthy and eating well; the female is going into her shed cycle. I read up online quite a bit before getting them, so I haven't really had any problems yet, which is great.

My question is about age. I was told that they're 14 years old; their last owner said she had had them for 7 years. Is there any way to get a realistic estimate of how accurate that figure is? (I don't think she's lying, but I'm not sure if they were actually already 7 when she got them. She obviously cared for them, but didn't seem particularly technically competent -- the heating mats were quite old and there were no thermometers or hygrometers (of course, now there are).) I haven't weighed them yet, but the male is a bit longer than 1.3m (um...just over 4 ft).

Thanks!

[JLC]

So far as I know, once they are fully matured, there is no way to determine age. But maybe some of our more long-term-experienced folks know something I'm not aware of.

[daniel1983]

Unless the actual hatch date was documented then there is no way of knowing. For ball pythons that are 'still growing' an educated guess can be made based off of experience, but with full grown adults there is no exact way of telling.

[engywook]

Thanks. I expected as much, but I thought I'd ask anyway....I'll post pictures as soon as I have them.