The sheer stupidity of people thinking they know anything based about retics based on keeping a handful of animals is laughable.

The fact that you people seem to think 24-25' is an achievable size by a retic is also mind boggling.

OP, I'll back PP's advice, as well a lot of very experienced retic keepers and breeders will back PPs advice on keeping a retic small by not stuffing it full of food.

As for "reptile expert"- a degree in herpetology means nothing to me, unless you did specific field studies on the ground with retics, and retics alone, you can have a herpetology degree and still know nothing real about a retic, just like most vets are idiots who know nothing about reptile veterinary procedure.

I'm not saying the animal will "top out", as there is no "topping out", but getting an animal to a certain size and then breeding it, will decrease its possible size. I have a 13' female, pure mainland, that was fed light (by another owner), and bred just under 3 years (2 years 10 months), and 12 foot. She lays a healthy clutch of 20-25 every year, and in 2 years with me, has gained a whopping 1 foot, after heavy heavy feeding to see if breeding has any effect on overall growth.

The idea that any snake will "top out" is silly, but I was giving averages here team- if fed light, the female will hit 12-14' and slow way down, 14-20' are slow growth times, that by the time they start getting into those sizes, you are years and years down the road.