50% SD Retic Male questions

[Himitsu]

I went to the last NWReptile Expo here in Oregon at the old venue just in search of some ceramic frogs for my mom (she is completely frog obsessed), and ended up coming back with a 2011 (his breeder had been debating on holding him back) 50% SD male retic that I fell in love with. I wasn't supposed to get another snake so long as I'm living with my parents, but they let me keep him. I talked to his breeder a lot, although I did not catch the actual local that his SD blood came from, and got the basics of his temperature and humidity needs. His hot side when I measured it with my temperature gun was 88, his cold side was getting down to 75-77, and the front (only the front) of his tub likes to try and fog up a bit, so I believe I have that down just fine. If I am mistaken on that please tell me so I can fix it.

Now my questions come. As I said, he is 2011, and she said he was hatched mid to early 2011. After watching the video from this thread: http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...ght=retic+care I can't help but feel that he is really small for his age. He is only 4 feet long (2 inches shorter than that when I used a string to measure him, but he also wouldn't hold still so I could easily add or minus a couple inches from that...) and when I weighed him a week ago he was 513 grams. She was feeding him once every two weeks (which I have done since I got him), and told me he would get 8-9 feet max. I am confident I can handle a snake that big, otherwise I would not have gotten him. But should I bump his feedings up to once a week? Once every two weeks just seems too little IMO, and even if he got a bit bigger than nine feet I still believe I could handle him just fine. Also, he is currently staying in the tub above my Ball Python (he's in the top tub since his temperature requirements were slightly lower than hers) in one of these racks: http://www.reptilebasics.com/iris-sw...y-or-back-heat. About how much longer will that work for him? And when I do need to migrate him from there, should I just get him a T8 (or would he need larger?) or get the next rack size up (http://www.reptilebasics.com/iris-cb-70-rack) because I do plan on breeding ball pythons some day and will eventually need that? Also, is it alright to keep him in the same rack as another species (my ball python)? If he is alright staying there for now I would prefer it since while I do have the money to get him a completely separate enclosure if he is fine where he is I can hold onto that money for if something unexpected comes along. Also, I was wondering what was a good quality snake hook that I could use with him? I bought a cheap one from a local pet store to use for now, as well as 10" feeding tongs to minimize the chance he will get me during feeding (I also open his tub with the snake hook so my hands aren't anywhere near it when it opens), but it's very strong and decided to try and come apart on me the other day. Longer feeding tongs would also be handy. Does anyone know any good quality ones I should get?

I will get pictures of him up in this thread soon, but he is currently going into shed and I don't want to disturb him.

[Wes]

4ft is definitely on the small side for a two year old 50% SD. Mine are about a year and a half and about 5 1/2ft to 6ft. You can certainly bump the feeding schedule up to once a week if you would like. I feed mine a small rat once a week and usually give them two small rats on one of those weeks about once a month.

P.S. We need some pics

[Himitsu]

He did shed this morning, although not all in one piece. He is currently in his hide so I'm going to leave him alone for a bit, but I will try to get pictures of him around noon. Otherwise it will be a couple days before I can get them up because today is feeding day. He did stick his head out of the hide, though, and it doesn't look like either eye cap was retained, but I will double check and make sure when I take him out that none of it stuck.

[Himitsu]

I had to fiddle with my camera's settings to try and get at least close to his natural coloring. It's just a digital point and shoot, nothing fancy, and I used a white sheet over a chair by the window as a backdrop (how my mom used to take pictures of Chihuahua puppies when she bred them). The first and third pictures are closest to his actual color. And here is my boy, Loki:





I love the two dots on his head.


And a couple of him with my 1300g ~3.5 foot long Pinstripe Ball Python as a comparison.




Pictures uploaded with ImageShack.us

[reptileexperts]

Here we go - the video you linked back to is mine - and my animals are fed a VERY sturdy diet that keeps them growing but staying slim. Mine are also females, that show just how large of a difference it makes between males and females.

1) Breeders who keep their snakes back will usually do so on a very minimal diet - after all, the benefit of SD is that you can keep them smaller and on lighter food plans, and the snake SEEMS to do just fine. Travis kubes held back a sibling to my 2012 Tiger, and the sibling female is less than 3 ft, and weighs about 300 grams. . . Mine was above my scales limit, is at 7', and is eating rabbits weekly now. Again, different feeding schedules.

2) If you want your snake to achieve a larger max size, start feeding heavier - not till the point that the snake becomes obese, just to see some steady growth. IF your snake starts to retain weight, and not adding any length, slow your feeding back down. I feed every 4 days for my retics that are under 1 year of age, and every 7-14 days for the rest (7 for the females, 14 for the males), and only till they start gaining weight. Then I pull them back even further, one SOLID meal for 2 weeks for the females. And the males stay on a normal meal every 2 weeks.

3) your temps are fine. The front of the tub fogging up is from either using hot water, or cypress? or possibly just water that spilled and fogged up. Humidity should be around 60-70%, pretty easy to achieve around the water area and a little bit of misting. If it fogs too much just add some holes. I keep my retic hot spot (the hottest point in the cage) at or around 92 +/- 1 degree. The cool end never gets lower than 76-77 (ambient of the room).

4) Great hooks - midwest tongs.com, ok hook for training with - Reptile Basics 24" I believe it is, works FANTASTIC its their small reptile hook. I use it for 12' retics :-) Just enough to wake them up then I pull them out with my hands.

Good luck

[Himitsu]

Here we go - the video you linked back to is mine - and my animals are fed a VERY sturdy diet that keeps them growing but staying slim. Mine are also females, that show just how large of a difference it makes between males and females.

1) Breeders who keep their snakes back will usually do so on a very minimal diet - after all, the benefit of SD is that you can keep them smaller and on lighter food plans, and the snake SEEMS to do just fine. Travis kubes held back a sibling to my 2012 Tiger, and the sibling female is less than 3 ft, and weighs about 300 grams. . . Mine was above my scales limit, is at 7', and is eating rabbits weekly now. Again, different feeding schedules.


2) If you want your snake to achieve a larger max size, start feeding heavier - not till the point that the snake becomes obese, just to see some steady growth. IF your snake starts to retain weight, and not adding any length, slow your feeding back down. I feed every 4 days for my retics that are under 1 year of age, and every 7-14 days for the rest (7 for the females, 14 for the males), and only till they start gaining weight. Then I pull them back even further, one SOLID meal for 2 weeks for the females. And the males stay on a normal meal every 2 weeks.

I was thinking of trying once every ten days, but I think I will start feeding him once a week as soon as I get through the frozen mice and rats I have left from the last time I ordered (about 10 more weeks of rodents). If it looks like once a week is too often I can always push him back to every 10 days. I will also probably be able to get some baby bunnies from my cousin soon. She raises meat rabbits and does have some litters lose one or two from the cold. I know I was warned about feeding rabbit to my ball python because she might become hooked on it, but have you ever had any problems of getting a Retic to eat rats after giving it rabbit?

3) your temps are fine. The front of the tub fogging up is from either using hot water, or cypress? or possibly just water that spilled and fogged up. Humidity should be around 60-70%, pretty easy to achieve around the water area and a little bit of misting. If it fogs too much just add some holes. I keep my retic hot spot (the hottest point in the cage) at or around 92 +/- 1 degree. The cool end never gets lower than 76-77 (ambient of the room).

Thanks. I just wanted to make sure it wasn't too warm or cold for him.

4) Great hooks - midwest tongs.com, ok hook for training with - Reptile Basics 24" I believe it is, works FANTASTIC its their small reptile hook. I use it for 12' retics :-) Just enough to wake them up then I pull them out with my hands.

Good luck

Thanks for the links and advice. I will definitely look into which of those I would prefer. The one I have already will work until I get a new one, it just likes to try and come out of the handle.

[reptileexperts]

Nah, its harder to get a retic ONTO rabbits than off of them. A retic will normally always eats rats, regardless of what your snakes pallet has been trained too. Rabbits promote fast, healthy, growth. 6 of my retics are on rabbits, and while they are costly at $4-8 a hit, it beats feeding Jumbo rats at $3 x 2!

[Neal]

Just out of curiosity, what does a SD run? What's the cheapest price for any of the morphs?

[Himitsu]

Nah, its harder to get a retic ONTO rabbits than off of them. A retic will normally always eats rats, regardless of what your snakes pallet has been trained too. Rabbits promote fast, healthy, growth. 6 of my retics are on rabbits, and while they are costly at $4-8 a hit, it beats feeding Jumbo rats at $3 x 2!

I'll have to see if she has any so far and if so how many. If she has one for him, I might try it next week when he wouldn't get fed (I opened the last two packages of F/T I had, one jumbo mice and one weaned rats, and divided them up so he'd get a rat every other week). The reason it's only weaned rats is I got them almost a year ago, when I wasn't sure I could get my ball onto rats and I didn't want to have 3-4 packages of rats she wouldn't eat... I'll have to see how it goes. :)

[Himitsu]

Just out of curiosity, what does a SD run? What's the cheapest price for any of the morphs?

He isn't a morph (although he is poss het for Amel), and he was only $75... I'm not sure what morphs run.