I got my first bp a few years ago (3 maybe?), she's a normal I got as a pet. As is often the case, I got bit by the bug and have wanted to try my hand at breeding for a couple years now. I've managed to hold off as I haven't been in a spot to really make the commitment (racks, space, time, feeders, incubators, on and on) but think I'm finally at a point in my life where I can make the jump and feel confident that I can really give what it takes to be a responsible breeder.

That said, I've been kicking around ideas for my first breeding project and could use some advice to make sure I don't make a costly mistake. I've been extremely lucky in the last few years and found myself in a spot now where I have a decent amount of money that I can invest in a project, around $10k or so for snakes if necessary. Its kind of an interesting spot because numbers-wise as I want to ease myself into breeding with a small number of snakes (6 snakes or so) but financially that means I could invest in some really quality snakes. I would like to have eggs next season so I'll be looking for 2011 or early females, I'd be fine if a few produce next year and a few hold off for the season after next.

My question relates to the morphs I should plan on buying. I'm thinking right now about investing a large portion of money into a couple powerhouse snakes, 1 male and 1 female, plus a double or triple morph male and a few more females. I have my eye on the powerhouse snakes now and don't want to give too much away, but the male is a 5 gene hypo and the female is 4 gene (5 if you count a Super as 2). Added to them would probably be a hypo black pewter male and a few hypo females (hypo + codom if the money works out).

My thought is I would breed the two powerhouse animals hoping to get some seriously powerful het hypo babies. The two males would then be split across the other females depending on the specific female morphs and the snakes interest in breeding. Worst case scenario would be the male powerhouse isn't ready to breed next year or isn't interested in locking with most of the females. This would hopefully be mitigated by having a second male, the hypo black pewter male would still make nice combos with hypo females (especially if they are hypo spiders, hypo pastels, etc.)

Does this seem like a reasonable plan to you all or do you have recommendations for more interesting/financially better plans? I know there is always concern with breeding visual recessive to non-recessive snakes, anyone see a red flag with my plan? Any other issues jump out at anyone that I haven't thought of? Last thing I want is to spend this kind of money on a project and find out 6 months or a year later that I made a pretty major mistake in snake selection or timing.


Thanks in advance!