NY Metro Reptile Expo Tomorrow

[Lord Sorril]

How do you guys feel about reptile giveaways?
Seems like irresponsible marketing to me.

Depends on the terms.
-If it is buy 2 and get 1 free-you can just ask not to get the free one.
-When I bought my original Lavender Albino ball python the breeder had a promotion for a free matching Het Female to go with any recessive male purchase. Good deal for me.
-I won a door raffle prize at an expo and the award was a $100 gift certificate to a vendor AND a red-tail boa. I asked for them to keep the boa and give me the certificate and they said it was a 'package deal'--so I was forced to decline.
-One of my distributors gave me a gift box during one of our exchanges. It was around Christmas so I thought it was cookies or something. After he left I opened it and inside was a deli cup with a vine snake-I was super mad. I made him drive back to take it. I told him not to give me any more 'gifts'.

[Gobuchul]

I like it!
I'm not sure if it would be heavy enough to deal with the lifting strength of a ball python, but, I can think of a lot of different reptiles that would benefit from this design.

I have 2 of these in my ball python's enclosure. She does lift and move them around a fair bit, but most of the time they seem to work. She probably would like something heavier though, and I don't currently use the humidity feature.

Edit: The few times I've put some water on it it hasn't spilled, but I imagine if full it would.

[Homebody]

I have 2 of these in my ball python's enclosure. She does lift and move them around a fair bit, but most of the time they seem to work. She probably would like something heavier though, and I don't currently use the humidity feature.

Edit: The few times I've put some water on it it hasn't spilled, but I imagine if full it would.

My Children's python is a gentler breed, but, if he does spill it, no harm done. It'll just raise the humidity faster.

[Homebody]

Depends on the terms.
-If it is buy 2 and get 1 free-you can just ask not to get the free one.
-When I bought my original Lavender Albino ball python the breeder had a promotion for a free matching Het Female to go with any recessive male purchase. Good deal for me.
-I won a door raffle prize at an expo and the award was a $100 gift certificate to a vendor AND a red-tail boa. I asked for them to keep the boa and give me the certificate and they said it was a 'package deal'--so I was forced to decline.
-One of my distributors gave me a gift box during one of our exchanges. It was around Christmas so I thought it was cookies or something. After he left I opened it and inside was a deli cup with a vine snake-I was super mad. I made him drive back to take it. I told him not to give me any more 'gifts'.

I'm not concerned about how this marketing ploy would affect you. I'm concerned how it would affect an unsophisticated buyer, a buyer that thinks that more reptiles = more value. Too late, he learns that is not necessarily the case. He's left with remorse, and the giveaway animal suffers.

[Homebody]

This boa was my "Best of Show."



The runner-up was a massive Chinese rat snake. None of my pics came out, but here's a pic of another specimen for your reference.



The honorable mentions:

[dakski]

Labby BI's are cool. Really nice looking snake.

The red skink looks awesome.

Thank you for posting pics.

[Lord Sorril]

Cool pics of the Expo!

I think the mood lighting is amusing, I don't think it would be great for taking photos though...

[Homebody]

The highlight of the show for me was chatting with Dr. Zach Whitman, DVM of Conservation Herpetoculture. He was selling Anthill pythons. We bonded over our mutual love for small pythons and boas. He confided to me that he's planning to breed Bromeliad Boas in the near future. These small arboreal snakes from Central America have only been successfully bred in captivity a few times, so, if he's successful, it'll be great news to those, like me, that love the small ones.