Weight gains male vs female?

[frogvet]

Hi,
Some background: experience with husbandry of a large variety of species of both snakes and lizards. Had some serious success breeding bearded dragons for a few seasons and I really want to experience it again, because what is cooler than watching critters hatch and grow!? I have my first pair of beautiful recessive balls with so dominant and co-dominant genes in the mix. I watched my male go from 100g to 280g in about 5 months. is he on track? What should I expect to see from my female (currently 100g) in terms of weight gains? what are signs of obesity vs healthy weight? I ask this for 2 reasons. Excitement (rest assured they will not breed until appropriate) and I want to make sure these guys are getting what they need.

Thanks for your responses.

[Eric00]

I'm still new here so take what I say for what it's worth, I have two females that are about 12 months and the other 14 months. They came from different breeders and they never skip a meal since I've had them. The 12 month old is much smaller 350 grams, and the 14 month old is 750 grams. The only difference was the breeder of the smaller one was doing weekly under sized meals verses the breeder of the bigger one was already on rats 10-15% of snakes body weight.

[AlexisFitzy]

Growth depends entirely on the snake. You could feed two snakes the same amount of meals each week but they will grow at different rates because they are different snakes. Also since bps going off feed and missing meals here and there is really common that affects growth rate as well. So as long as your snake is eating growing and shedding its doing well, it's going at its very own special pace your snakes sound they like are doing well! You should post some pics of them.


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[cchardwick]

The real question is, what do you feed, how many and how often? I actually feed twice a week, and some snakes get all the leftovers that the others won't eat, so they grow the fastest. The more you feed the faster they grow.

[cchardwick]

I actually just bought a 1000 gram male that is four years old, perfect size for breeding. I also picked up a female from another breeder that's the same age and she is 2800 grams, also perfect for breeding LOL. Take a look on Morphmarket and look at the ages of snakes and their weights and you will be shocked, it's all over the place. I got a ball Python normal for free that was a year old and was being fed one small fuzzy per month! She was literally just a little bigger than a hatchling. She immediately would eat multiple large adult mice in one sitting and by powerfeeding multiple large mice twice a week she was over 500 grams in just a few months. I'm not sure there really is a 'normal' rate of growth. I'd say generally people will feed once per week out of convenience. Some of it depends on the snake and husbandry, if it's a picky eater then you can't get the weight on that fast. Many of my snakes will often take only live, so I offer frozen thawed, then maybe fresh killed, and if they still refuse I'll give them live rodents that I breed myself. All of them almost will always eat using that approach. I don't think you can ever really get an 'obese' young snake, they usually just grow longer much faster until they kind of max out and start putting on girth as an adult.

[AlexisFitzy]

The real question is, what do you feed, how many and how often? I actually feed twice a week, and some snakes get all the leftovers that the others won't eat, so they grow the fastest. The more you feed the faster they grow.

Hate to break it to you friend, but over feeding a ball python or any other animal for that matter isn't good for the animal. Feeding twice a week for young snakes up to a certain weight about 500g is okay but once they pass that point once a week is plenty. If snakes are overfed they can build up fat deposits on their organs and it can shorten their lifespan. A nice slow steady growth at the animals own pace is what is best.


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[cchardwick]

Some people say a slow rate of growth is best, but if you talk to pro breeders they will always feed breeder females twice a week for their whole life. The bigger they are the more eggs you will get, and they say that they don't think it shortens their lives. They also say it's best to slow down with males and keep them around 1000 grams or so, not any bigger. Easily done by controlling the feeding.

Also keep in mind that it's natural for ball pythons to fast for months. In my opinion it's better to feed them hard when they will take it so that they can keep body condition when they fast.

[frogvet]

Young girl is on rat pinkies and the dude is on weaned rats. I got some opinions from very professional feeder suppliers to size their prey appropriately. Right now I aim for 1x week but the new girl turned down the first 2 and i did like you do, let him take the scraps. He crushed the pinkies so no waste at least. I might try feeding every 5 days or so if it is safe for a young growing snake.

[frogvet]

Yes, I know that ball pythons can easily have a poor body condition score. They are characterized as being thick snakes so I think sometimes obesity just gets filed under "big snake" and not thought of.

[frogvet]

Thank you for all of your constructive responses. So refreshing not to wade through a bunch of yelling on the internet. So it seems that the general consensus is that ball pythons are each individuals and will therefore grow at their own rate and that it will be difficult to "overfeed" a young ball python that wants to take food items. My plan now is to start feeding the girl twice weekly or every 5 days. If she keeps taking prey items I will keep giving them until she starts creeping into the 500g range or turns them down. I dont worry about my male so much as he is already 1/3 the way to breeding weight but perhaps I will increase his feedings too. It seems that there may be a couple more seasons than I thought before the girl is >1500g so perhaps I will consider picking up a proven or older snake so I can plan a clutch within the next 2 years.

Figured out the pictures. here they are: Male- ALbino het red axanthic Female- Albino spider

Thanks again,