Progressing from one BP to small breeding....

[frankhermens]

I just started keeping one 0.1 Pastel Spark and am completely sold. What a fantastic animal! So, I've been reading a LOT and I'm thinking about progressing to a small breeding project. Now, this leads to some questions while preparing for such an adventure...

Off course the basis should be a rack and an incubator. My main concern now is about the rack and the tubs. I’m thinking of starting off with 1-2 males and 2-3 females, either het- or homozygote for a limited amount of morphs.

Now, how many tubs and what sizes should I start with? I am assuming 5-6 adult tubs for the breeders and 20 for the future offspring? And would two sizes be ok, or would you recommend 3-4 different sizes so they can grow into a different size during the years?

Since I’d like to start small I would prefer just one rack that would fit them all. Are they available? Most racks I see just have one size per rack. Any advice on that?

Or is it possible to keep more offspring in one big rack to reduce the need for more smaller tubs?

(questions about an incubator follow later…. ;-)).

Regards!
Frank

[artgecko]

welcome to the joy of keeping snakes and also good on you for doing some research before jumping in head-first to breeding.

I have been keeping for about 5 years now and only just started my first breeding project. That said, I can help you with some of your questions and hopefully more experienced people will also give you some input.

For gender ratio, a ratio of 1:2 or 1:3 is the most economical (1 male / 2-3 females). Since you are starting out with your first project, I'd honestly opt for 1:2 and see how it goes before adding more animals. This is what I am doing with my first project to "test the waters" in my local area for sales before I attempt to produce more clutches.

For racks,plan on housing hatchlings individually after they shed out the first time.
Housing together could result in some being eaten by others.
Same for adults, plan on having 1 available slot for each.
AP and C-serpents both have great products. A CB70 or V70 is a great size for almost all adult females and could also be used to house adult males. For hatchlings / juvies, there aren't many options out there. AP has an Iris 375 juvie / hatchling rack but I think I read somewehre that those iris tubs will be discontinued or have been. C Serpents has a combo rack, but I'm not sure if the shorter tubs would work for BPs... I think it is mainly used for KSBs. That said, I'm sure you could get something cutom from C-serpents, especially if you live near one of the shows he vends and can pick up your order at the show (I have a custom cage and a couple racks by him and love them).

All of the racks from AP and C-serpents can be ordered in different numbers..so getting a 3,6, or 10 stack would be available. If you want a custom number of slots other than what they offer, I'm sure both companies could accommodate you if you special order.

One thing to keep in mind with racks, the close-sided ones (like the ones above) hold temps better in a cooler room. The open-sided racks do better in a room that is much warmer. Also, some racks come with tubs and others do not. The C-serpents racks above come with tubs and the AP racks don't (you have to order them separately). The "vision" tubs are nicer.. clearer and more durable than the iris or sterelite tubs. However, they are crazy expensive to order, so if you want vision tubs, I'd order from C-serpents that includes them in the price.

Right now, I have 2 racks from c-serpents, a V70 rack for my adult females and a "sub adult" rack. I use the sub adult rack to house my growing snakes.. Right now I have a couple females that I'm growing up for my breeding project who are in the 200-300 gram range in there with hides. As they get larger, I can change hides out or remove them so they have room before I move them up to the V70. When my females are ready to breed, I will also purchase a hatchling rack. I think between the hatchling, sub-adult, and V70, I should be fine. Ideally, I'd like something like the AP Iris 375 rack, but haven't been able to find a similar option in the Vision tubs that I like.

Four more things for you to consider before you jump in to your first breeding project :
1. Investigate your local laws. make sure it is legal to keep BPs in your area and check local and state laws on licenses required, etc. Also busines licenses in your town and how they approve "home-based" businesses, etc.
2. Investigate your local market: See how well snakes sell in your area, if there are shows you could vend at, or if there are local pet stores you can sell lower-end animals to. Alternatively, check out shipping and all that is involved and decide if you want to go that route.
3. Exotic vets: Are there any in your area and how much do they charge / what do they offer? This has been an issue for me already and it pays to see if you have vet care available should your females become egg bound, etc.
4. Food- You will need to feed / house the adults and young.. The young will need to be fed several times before you let them go (most people feed 3-4 times at least before selling). Do you have a good source for f/t feeders that you can afford? Do you have a local source for live in sizes hatchlings might need or are you willing to raise your own feeders?

Right now, I'm in the beginning phase of my breeding project. I am growing up my 2 starter females. After they've been with me for a year, I will look for a male to go with them. At that point, it will be at least 1 more year until the females are old / large enough to breed and by then, the male should be too. I plan to have all necessary racks ordered by that point and am planning on starting up a small colony of mice and rats to have live feeders available for the hatchlings first few meals before attempting to switch to f/t . I'm already running into issues with #1 I listed above, my city having no laws I can find about home-based businesses, but I am hopeful that I can figure that out before I breed. My state requires a dealer permit for numbers greater than 30 animals sold per year, so i will try to stay below that number.

Good luck with your new hobby. I'd just take it very slow and make sure you find the exact breeder females that will work in your plans then take a lot of time to find the perfect male to go with them. In this hobby, we often don't make any money or at least, make any profit over our expenses, so it pays to keep and breed what you like and want to keep.

[mdb730]

Starting small with the morphs you like is a great way to take the next step in the hobby. There're a few hybrid racks out there such as animal plastics that hold two 15qt or one 32qt, depending on the rack it can also hold three 6qt tubs. A 7 level hybrid rack and ratio of 1:2 might be enough for your needs but the old saying you can't have just one chip comes to mind with BPs and breeding, next thing you know you're holding back hatchlings adding new genes and buying/building new racks.

[frankhermens]

Thanks for your elaborate replies! I will definately dive in to al this information. The rack systems do look very nice. After watching another vid of Olympus Reptiles on setting op a recessive breeding project, a 1:2-3 ratio would indeed be perfect. Especially when the females are het for some of my favorite morphs, it would give me a lot of combination possibilities in the future.

Food is allready taken care of, in that I have a mouse setup right now and expanding to rats is not a problem. Selling my future offsrping is something I haven't thought of yet... ;-)

I will be looking for some V70 tubs for the females, a smaller one for the male and a bunch of small tubs for the offspring. First I will dive into the websites mentioned and gather more info there.

Thanks!

[treaux]

One nice thing about being a hobbyist breeder is that you have a lot of time to get things together (unless you are planning on buying adult/breeding size females from the start). Since you're new to BPs, I'd focus on learning the genetics and combinations and "buying high" so to say when it comes to the genetics of your snakes. The last thing you want is to have low-value normals or single gene snakes that you can't sell. Getting multiple gene combos or visual recessives that will produce a more or all highly desirable offspring is a good goal.

Invest in a sub-adult/adult male rack now to grow your BPs in. You won't really need a big V70 rack until your females really get big (which is likely 3 years away if they are babies now). Then you can get a hatchling rack when you know babies are on the way. I bought all my racks from reptile basics and struggled keeping the temps correct in my old unheated house. Keep this in mind as the best thing you can do for keeping a collection of BPs is to have them in a single room heated to your desired ambient temperature. Since I have moved, I now have a house with central heating and a bedroom dedicated to my reptiles with a dedicated space heater to keep it up to temp. Since I have done that, I have bred my first two clutches with great success.

Lastly, decide how much you want to get into breeding. Some people do it as a business and others do it as a hobby, and there are many shades in between those two as well. I worry about the sheer amount of people buying and breeding tons of BPs. Considering how long they live and how reptile keeping is not for everybody, I feel like we don't need any kind of breeding focused on quantity.

[frankhermens]

These are very wise words.... I have thought about exactly these matters myself...

First, I have been diving into the genetics al lot already. My background as a physician makes it quite ease to onderstand dominant, co-dominant and hetero- / homozygocity. And I think your plan is excellent. I was thinking of buying 2 males and 4 females with as much codominant traits as I can afford and preferably some het factors a well. Off course one needs two het factors to become visual, so that has to be taken into account.

I was planning on buying adult BP's, so I don't have to wait three years to do some breeding. But I'm a bit hesitant about that. Maybe I have to let that depend on the availability of the BP's I like.

As for setting up a separate room with a desired room temperature, that is unlikely to happen soon. Al the rooms are filled up with kids... ;-). The first rack will be on my daughters bedroom, since she's really into the snakes as well. Right now, I don't really have other options.

[treaux]

There are genetics calculators available if you just google it that make it really easy to see what your odds are when pairing different genetic combinations. Keep in mind if you are breeding co-doms (unless you buy a super), you will always have a chance of making normals and you can always have bad luck and get a bunch of normals even if it was only a small chance. Once nice thing about breeding recessives is that if you use visual recessives, you will always get more visuals when you breed them and at minimum 100% hets if you breed them with something else. This will make them much easier to sell. If you want something easy to start with, I'd highly recommend buying a female piebald (or other visual recessive) baby and letting her grow up before breeding. These will cost you way more to buy an adult and you won't regret it several years from now once you are breeding. I bought co-doms when I started and ended up wishing I had gotten a piebald from the start, especially because that's what I had really wanted and opted not to because of the price.

Also, keep in mind breeding is a slow process. It took me a solid year from when I started pairing my snakes to when I finally got babies.

[frankhermens]

Yes, I have seen the genetic calculators. WOB has an awesome one I think. I'm really liking the Ultramels right now. They are pricey, but a visual male with a het female combined with some co-doms would be something I'd consider.... :-)