How's the BP Market Now?

[BuckeyeBalls]

Sure everyone and their mom can breed a mojo to 9 normal girls and get a bunch of mojaves, but the future of the market and the hobby is in selective breeding. There will ALWAYS be people willing to hunt for the perfect example of a morph and pay top dollar for it because its exactly what they want.

Like the ones that people try to sell for $20,000

I wish i could afford that lol

[Jay_Bunny]

I am looking at it from both sides. As a buyer, things are "better" because morphs are getting cheaper. When I first got into ball pythons (a little over 2 years ago), an albino male was $1000 for a nice one. Now, you can get a nice albino male for around $400. That's $600 less in less than 3 years! That is awesome since I want to get more morphs soon.

As a seller (hopefully this will be my first season that I am actually going to be selling hatchlings), this is bad because I will be lucky if I sell any snakes I produce this season, especially since I am not a breeder that is well known (I'm not known at all really). And I won't be able to sell the hatchlings for very much. When I purchased my male spider, he was $300. If I produce any male spiders this season, I can really only sell them for $200 or so. Prices keep going down.

[jkobylka]

I have never been more confident in the market as a whole than I am right now.

[Dave763]

We all know, morph prices are a race to the bottom. With so many new breeders every year,we can expect prices to remain in a downward spiral.
Just as in any pyramid scheme the guys at the top make the money. Like NERD, RDR, TSK VPI ....ect. Why buy from a small breeder when there are so many reputable big breeders to choose from? Only one reason comes to mind...lower prices, duh.

However there is money to be made,(sell the idea of making money breeding ball pythons) just don't expect to get rich.

[pavlovk1025]

I feel there is a flaw in that logic.

corn snakes can produce what, 25+ eggs in a clutch? AND double clutch? BPs have like 16 eggs at the absolute max with 4-8 being more normal, and there is no double clutching. Most of the morphs in corns are also simple recessive, with BPs you get a mix of simple recessive, codom and dom traits.

Sure everyone and their mom can breed a mojo to 9 normal girls and get a bunch of mojaves, but the future of the market and the hobby is in selective breeding. There will ALWAYS be people willing to hunt for the perfect example of a morph and pay top dollar for it because its exactly what they want.

I agree with Eddie completely. Sure they can't double clutch, and sure the average is 6 eggs. But consider this. NERD is going to have what, 500 clutches? BHB is going to have about the same or more? How about TSK? What about RDR? How many are going to be imported? How many more are going to be produced by small breeders? Is 10,000 clutches a conservative estimate for the total number of clutches that are going to be produced by all the breeders out there right now? At an average of 6 eggs that's what, 60,000 snakes? How many of those are going to be single gene co-doms, how many are going to be hets, poss hets, etc. They have to go somewhere, like the hands of the person who just googled snake and found ball python morphs. Now they want to breed to get a sewper k00lz bumblebeez ball python. More bees on the market, more pastels and spiders on the market...it doesnt stop.

This time last year, a super pastel was like $800. Im pretty sure you can find one for about $400 now.

[pavlovk1025]

We all know, morph prices are a race to the bottom. With so many new breeders every year,we can expect prices to remain in a downward spiral.
Just as in any pyramid scheme the guys at the top make the money. Like NERD, RDR, TSK VPI ....ect. Why buy from a small breeder when there are so many reputable big breeders to choose from? Only one reason comes to mind...lower prices, duh.

However there is money to be made,(sell the idea of making money breeding ball pythons) just don't expect to get rich.

True.

Just gotta do it for the love of the animals above all else.

[Dave763]

True.

Just gotta do it for the love of the animals above all else.

Exactly. If I make enough to buy rat food, I'm good with that.

[pavlovk1025]

Exactly. If I make enough to buy rat food, I'm good with that.

If I make something that makes my jaw drop, Im good with that.

[marct]

Exactly. If I make enough to buy rat food, I'm good with that.

X2

[Tim Mead]

We all know, morph prices are a race to the bottom. With so many new breeders every year,we can expect prices to remain in a downward spiral.
Just as in any pyramid scheme the guys at the top make the money. Like NERD, RDR, TSK VPI ....ect. Why buy from a small breeder when there are so many reputable big breeders to choose from? Only one reason comes to mind...lower prices, duh.

However there is money to be made,(sell the idea of making money breeding ball pythons) just don't expect to get rich.

Plus, pending laws,15 plus million americans out of work and forclosures reaching astounding proportions doesn't help matters either..