Quote Originally Posted by sicilian1928 View Post
well first of all i never considered them to be companions, that wasnt my intention nor was it stated. 2nd its called IBD, inclusion body disease, which is why you buy the snake from a reputable dealer and quarantine them..obviously. 3rd red tails and balls have the exact same husbandry needs, so there is no conflict or this wouldnt be a possibility. I think that if he has done this for 10 years straight, and they havent had health issues, and they are not picky eaters it is not a huge deal. Yes there is a possibility of the snakes idk being cannibalistic or aggressive towards each other, but that sort of stuff is easily discovered by simply putting them near each other for a length of time to see how they respond. I see this sort of tunnel vision all the time on this site, people say if you get this type of bark the snake will die, or this temp is too hot or cold.. Its a lot simpler than people make it out to be. If they have space, i think it should be fine. And they will have ample space to where they dont ever even need to come around each other if thats the case
Of course you buy from a reputable dealer and quarantine, but still, things happen. Yes, boas and ball pythons are both pretty relaxed snakes that aren't likely to show aggression toward each other, but that's not really what I'm concerned about. Yes, boas and pythons have nearly identical husbandry requirements, but from what I'd read, you hadn't settled on a red-tailed boa (basically, that comment was aimed at housing different species together in general, not specifically at balls and RTBs). And finally, I understand that it CAN work and has been done. What I don't understand is why you would bother risking it. They would never live together in the wild, so I don't see any reason for them to in captivity.

The reason people are "tunnel-visioned" (which to me is a horrible choice of wording, I would go with "cautious") is that there have been negative consequences for people that did this in the past. Those people in turn told of their mistakes so that we could learn from it.

If I came off too aggressively in the first post, I apologize, it was not my intention. However, I'm sick and tired of people doing things like this either out of convenience, or because it CAN work (rather than it DOES work). Again, there's no guarantee their health will be compromised, but there's always that chance.

I don't think a keeper's living/wall space should ever be put above the animals' welfare.