Please some help in general breeding :)

[lady_juno]

Hi Everyone! To start up, I m from Germany and I m having trouble asking questions in german ball or reptile forums bc in general everyone is so unfriendly and will tell you, well if you dont know these things.. dont breed and wont help.

I d like to start breeding bp this upcoming season, and basically done most of my homework when talking about humidity, temperature, body weight of the breeding balls,behaviour of the female when gravid, feeding and care of the eggs.

What you dont find very much information about is the actual thing. I ll be keeping my snakes in racks with tags and information sheets about the typical snake in it on the rack as well.

I hope I m not asking a question that has been asked and I ve been to dumb to find it yet.

How does the actual breeding come along? Do you switch males to the female racks or opposite? When do you take them back out? Does a lock up mean youve been successfull and you can leave the female alone after that? How will you know this female wont breed to this male? Do you need several lock ups? When can you tell a female is in the perfect time to breed to a male and you might have success? The whole topic "ovulation" leaves a big question mark over my head. In humans ovulation means its the perfect time to try to become pregnant, but how is that with ball pythons? I m sorry if my questions sound stupid but I cant find very much answers to those questions and I d be more then gratefull if anyone is willing to help! Or an overall "to do List" during breeding season would be helpfull as well. Here everyone I ve talked to has seen me as an oponent and told me to find out for myself. Thank you for your answers! I m open to IM as well

[The Serpent Merchant]

Welcome to BP.net!

I would start by reading these threads:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...-Breeding-FAQs

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...om-the-8-Ball!

And for good measure:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...ius)-Caresheet

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...Basic-Genetics

This is a very kind online community. Feel free to ask anything and we will do our best to explain things.

[lady_juno]

Thank you so very much ahead! I ll start reading right away , just noticed though I ve read these allready before I started asking Very helpfull in an overall, so thank you, theres always more to learn, but these are things I allready know

I m gratefull people here are so friendly, I ve read a few posts before registrating and its entirely diffrent then what I m used to

[The Serpent Merchant]

I want to start this post by saying that I have not bred BP's yet. I will be breeding for the first time this fall as well.

I think that most people introduce males into the females cage

Most people will leave them together for a few days then separate them for about a week. This gives them time to recuperate and gives you a chance to offer food to them.

A lock up is a good sign but does not mean that the female is gravid (pregnant). A female can become gravid after one lock up or can go an entire season of locking up with no results.

Check out these videos, they go over this far better than I can:




(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPbQZ...e_gdata_player




(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkvkJ...e_gdata_player



(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVIu9...e_gdata_player



(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EknLj...e_gdata_player



(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhwC-...e_gdata_player



(link to video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlX9y...e_gdata_player

[lady_juno]

Oh wow, I didnt even know these yet.. got some watching to do, I only knew snake bytes tv yet.. thank you so much

[The Serpent Merchant]

These might be of some use as well:



(Video Link)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mYg2yTSfwE&feature=plcp



(Video Link)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VSmfukoNVw&feature=plcp



(Video Link)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jRR6uuk4w4&feature=plcp

[TheSnakeEye]

How does the actual breeding come along? Do you switch males to the female racks or opposite? When do you take them back out? Does a lock up mean youve been successfull and you can leave the female alone after that? How will you know this female wont breed to this male? Do you need several lock ups? When can you tell a female is in the perfect time to breed to a male and you might have success? The whole topic "ovulation" leaves a big question mark over my head. In humans ovulation means its the perfect time to try to become pregnant, but how is that with ball pythons? I m sorry if my questions sound stupid but I cant find very much answers to those questions and I d be more then gratefull if anyone is willing to help! Or an overall "to do List" during breeding season would be helpfull as well. Here everyone I ve talked to has seen me as an oponent and told me to find out for myself. Thank you for your answers! I m open to IM as well

I throw my male into the females tub. I think most do this as well. I usually leave him in there for about 2-3 days, depending on if he locks up or not. I then rest him for about 3 days. Some people do 1 day on and off. I don't like this because I've had lockups after the first 24 hrs. A lockup though, does NOT mean she will automatically become gravid and develop eggs. I started pairing in late October and am just now seeing signs of the females developing eggs. So thats months of pairing up and locking up.

You will know if a female won't breed a male if no courtship is seen. Most snakes lock up for at least a couple of hours, so there's a good chance you'll catch them. My boy locks up for about 10-12 hrs and when they're done, that she doesn't want anymore, she'll sit on one side of the tub and him on the complete opposite. This is when I separate them. Now if they don't lock up it doesn't necessarrily mean it's the females fault. Males can be at fault too. But unless the male is an over aggressive breeder, they'll both just go when they're ready. For example when I first paired up my Pastel Lesser and Mocha, the Mocha wanted nothing to do with him. I thought that maybe he was still too young. I tried another female and he locked up. For the next month I kept feeding the Mocha and then suddenly she allowed him to lock up with her, so it's really all up to them. I don't know if she was waiting to gain a few grams or if maybe she let him breed her after he bred something else. W.e it was, it worked out perfect.

Ball Python ovulation is different than human ovulation. When a ball python ovulates, it is because she has locked up and his sperm has done it's job. Ovulation means she is in the beginning stages of "pregnancy". When an ovulation occurs, any pairing with males should be stopped, cus she will soon be dropping her eggs.

My advice to you and to make sure you have everyhting covered from A-Z before you begin. It's not as easy as it looks, but it's not rocket science either. Good luck!!

[lady_juno]

Thats what I m trying right now.. I still have plenty of time till next breeding season, so what I m trying to do is inform myself really about anything that I should know. I will probably learn alot more into the years and from experience but I want to be as prepared as I can be

That was very helpfull, one thing I havent quite understood yet from the posted videos etc is the follicle growth all the way into ovulation. I got the ovulation part, it means the follicles are developing into eggs.. means whats done is done no more mating.

I ve also seen that the follicles develope into about golf ball size until the time has come when they can be fertilized and hopefully develope (ovulation) into eggs.

So do you mate them over months and months (mating season) to stimulate follicle growth? Because it seams that just like in humans the actual period when a female is fertile is a short amount of time, the time when a follicle reaches about golf ball size and moves downwards to be fertilized. Maybe I m mixing something up or something, I m just not getting this part in the female straight yet.

Thank you to all the posters you ve helped me so much allready and cleared out about 90% of my questions allready!

I ve got another one though about the heating. Here you wont find much about it in detail. You can buy ready to use racks if you look for them long enough, but they just take too much money for it in my opinion (starting from around 300€ for a rack with 6 tubs with included heating not saying what size tubs they use) I m not trying to be greedy the best is good enough but I think I can do better financial wise.

I can only tell you the sizes in cm, sorry! I was planing on using boxes aprox 80cm length, 20 highth and 30 deep. I was planing on using heat mats as heating, I dont quite know what amount of watts the heat mats should have to gain the proper temperature. I ve asked in zoo shops etc but they cant tell me bc racking is just gaining popularity here, and breeders wont give you like I ve said before any info.

[The Serpent Merchant]

Check out this thread I wrote the other day on cage heating. It might answer your questions about the heat mats (also called under tank heaters)

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...t-Thermometers

We tend to measure the size of tubs by volume and not dimentions (usually in quarts) for breeder size females most use 41 quart tubs such as the CB-70 tub made by IRIS. the CB-70 measures 85.1 cm long, 45.1 cm wide, and 15.2 cm tall (if my conversions were correct )

As for your question about follicles. I'm not 100% sure but I believe that follicles will grow in a female regardless of being put with a male.

[Herp_Herp_hooray]

Ball pythons vol.2 by VPI consider it our bible...