First breeding project(s)

[Ckittman]

Hi, I'm pretty new to the ball python hobby. I've had kleo my mojave female for about 6 months and athena my yellowbelly het pied female for about 3 months by now. I'm starting to look into breeding. I want to do it for the enjoyment and experience out of it, but I'm hoping to plan it right to where i can make enough profit to not go broke funding this lol. I've read up on about as much as i can from here and other places. Also watched all of the Balls2u videos. I really like his way of explaining things. So this post is really just a chance to hear some others opinions and experiences.

My plan is to set up two projects at one time. One being in the pied, and the other with mojave/ghi. I'm in love with my girls so they both are for sure staying and being part of this. My plan is to get 2-3 females and a male for each project. My budget is around a grand for the remaining snakes needed.

Okay so for the mojave/ghi project i think i'll get a ghi male, and another mojave female with another gene like spider.

For the pied project i want to get a male pied, possibly another yellowbelly het pied female because pumpkin pieds are one of my favorites. I think my favorite morph so far is the banana pied, but they're expensive right now even the hets. So i thought maybe i could get a female banana and go the long route using the male pied then breeding back to a baby banana het pied. Using a female banana would also pass up the whole sex gene thing.

So mojave/ghi
1.0 ghi
0.1 mojave
0.1 mojave and (open to possibilities)

Pied
1.0 pied
0.2 yellowbelly het pied
0.1 banana maybe

I'd love to hear yalls opinions on this plan, and what you would do differently if it was you. Thanks for all responses



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[BigDaddyVader85]

I’m in the process of building up my breeding stock as well. I have a beautiful male spider and just picked up a 1200g female bumblebee. I am also looking into getting some pieds. Spider pied (spied) looks incredible. Good luck with your journey into breeding!

[Crowfingers]

Sounds like there are some neat combos in the mix. I don't breed (snakes) or really have a lot of knowledge in pricing, but $1000 for those remaining snakes seems like a little bit of a long shot. I could very easily be wrong though. However, have you budgeted for the rack systems or tubs to house all the adults and babies, incubators, rat/mouse colony of frozen supply, freezer for the foods, and all the equipment needed to heat and regulate each one? In the long run, the snakes themselves are a one-time buy, its the supplies that will start to add up - especially if you have to raise them all to breeding age first.

Also keeping in mind that breeding any animal, unless on a decent sized scale or very high quality young, is rarely a good way to make money. You could be stuck with hatchings for months to forever, normals sell for next to nothing as do some other single gene morphs that I have seen.

[Ckittman]

My AP rack with heat tape, and a thermostat for my breeders should be in within a month. It'll be a couple years before i need the hatchling racks. I have an incubator already. With two snakes rightnow it seems silly to breed rats, but when i get over 5 i plan on breeding ASFs


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[Ckittman]

I dont plan to make money. Just want to try and after the initial cost keep the hobby as close to self sustaining as i can. I think with the right pairings, planing, and keeping things small and manageable i can do it


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[cchardwick]

Ball pythons and reptiles in general are hands down one of the best ways to make money if you want to breed any animal. There is quite a bit of overhead to keep these reptiles going, I have about 50 snakes and 50 tubs of rats, right now it costs me about $4,000 a year for bedding and food for my rats and bedding for the snakes. You can reduce your costs if you use cheap or free bedding and low cost rat food. The hard part would be to buy in too fast without selling any animals for the first few years, the cost of feeding and upkeep can make you go broke before you even get babies. Something to keep in mind...

As with any animal breeding project it's all about breeding stock. Say for example you get an average of 6 eggs per year. If you buy $15 breeder snakes you'll get $15 x 6 = $90 per year for the babies, you may not break even. But if you bought $400 parents and the babies were worth $400 you would make $400 x 6 = $2,400 per year. It's the same if you had $10,000 snakes and made $60,000 for the hatchlings. The more you spend up front the more you make, assuming the supply and demand doesn't drive the prices down (which it will to some extent, more for certain high demand morphs). It's the same with any animal, I buy grass hay for my cattle and travel to a lot of different farms to get it. People breeding donkeys don't make much money, but you wouldn't believe what the ranches look like for people breeding million dollar race horses! It all depends on your budget too, maybe start small with as much as you have and trade them out down the road for something better.

Personally I think it's better to buy one female for as much as you can afford and keep high end snakes with as few as possible to start. Sure you can fill your rack with hets but in a few years you will be producing tons of hets instead of visuals (or tons of cheap snakes instead of a few high end snakes). Holding back more valuable snakes down the road will make you more money in the long run with a lot less work and overhead.

As far as moving the normal and single gene hatchlings you can always find a wholesaler that will take as many as you can produce. These guys sell to pet stores nation wide and just turn a profit on everything you produce and always will take as much as you can give them. Some people even prefer to wholesale the whole lot of hatchlings and don't even bother with selling to other people, you don't get as much money but you can get rid of all your snakes fast with no hassle at all.

[Ckittman]

Thanks @cchardwick, do you think it would be cheaper to breed my own rats when i get up to 5-6 snakes? I guess there is always a possibility of finding some other people near me that may want to buy some feeders from me too.


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