The hatchling season in Africa starts in late feb/early march. The babies that come in to the country around April are usually the strongest healthiest farmed babies that you'll see all year. As you get later and later into the year the pickings get slimmer and the quality of the babies goes way down. Farmed babies being delivered this time of year are often the runts, slow feeders, or just lower quality than the stuff delivered in the spring and were held for a while to give them the chance to become better established before being sent out.

Farmed is not the same thing as captive bred. In Africa, pregnant female ball pythons are collected over the winter and allowed to lay their eggs in captivity in "farms". The eggs are then incubated and hatched and the babies are shipped out to the US, Canada, Europe, etc. The process of shipping over seas can be very stressful on the babies and if they are given the chance to drink water while on the "farms" they could have parasites. Farmed babies also sometimes change hands many times before winding up in pet stores, so you never really know the conditions they encountered along the way. Many farmed ball pythons will do fine and make great pets, but there is definitely a higher risk factor than with a captive bred animal, especially for a ball python that is being brought in this time of the year.

Ball pythons can be sexed the second that they leave the egg.

Hope this helps.

-adam