Behira - 2016 Female Ivory Ghost - First BCI

[dakski]

Well, Behira and I, kind of hit a snag with Katie today.

We (me and Katie, not Behira) went to the local reptile store today to get some food for the Leopard Gecko's (Dubai roaches). Adam, who owns the store, and I've known for a while now, had a big tank with a large female BCI (anery) and a male albino (Sharp, I believe) that he's trying to breed.

Katie saw the female BCI and asked what it was. Me being totally honest, as I always am, and having shown Katie pictures of adult BCI females, and discussed it with her when she picked Behira, a female, etc. says, "oh that's a female BCI, like Behira, except Behira is a ghost so she's hypo anery and not as dark as this one."

Apparently, that was the wrong answer, because Katie freaked out!

This happens to be a large female. My guess is over 20 pounds. Knowing Behira's parents' that (20 pounds) is about the largest I am expecting Behira to be, but who knows?

Katie could not fathom how our "big" (in her mind) 1,000G Behira is going to be 7,000+ and 7FT+. It hit her hard.

She thought we saw adult BCI's at the show where we met Behira's breeder, but I am pretty sure he showed us pictures of adults and had some 3 year old male BCI's. I would never intentionally mislead Katie and have told her from day one that Behira will be big and it takes 5+ years for her to reach adult size. I guess Katie thought a 3 year old 2K gram BCI was big at the time.

I don't want Katie to resent me or Behira, and I will see how all this plays out. She seemed a little calmer tonight and even held Behira. However, she's mentioned a few times in the past few weeks that she's already getting big. Further she's darkened up a little which somehow makes her seem scarier to Katie and did nail me with a food response bite once. She also is an aggressive feeder.

Behira has never shown aggression or defensiveness and is totally chill while being handled. The hook training has gone great and she snaps right out of food response mode if she's even close to it. I can read her well now and I am not scared of her, even her at 7K grams plus.

However, Katie, who seems to read the other snakes fine, gets scared if Behira pulls her head back while being handled and enters anything resembling an "S" position. It's obviously incidental to me, and she has a happy tongue, and hasn't tensed, etc. However, Katie gets a little fearful.

Seeing that big female today really shocked her and intimidated her.

Again, I am going to give it some time and we will see what happens.

I just feel really bad that Katie thought she had all the info, but obviously did not.

She feels I was a little pushy with getting Behira, and I probably was, and probably just said "whatever" when I said Behira is a female and gets bigger than the males. Somehow, in her mind, that meant a little bigger than what she saw at the show, not BIG.

Anyway, and advice would be appreciated, and I'll keep everyone in the loop. Sorry I rambled, but I just mostly feel terrible for Katie, and a little scared that she will always be upset about having her. That probably isn't rational.

Here are the pictures from tonight.

Branch a la Katie

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