Not intent on breeding?

[Patrick Long]

What an excellent topic Ed! My thoughts....

For me it's about lines we make and want to cross (sometimes far too quickly). It's about comments like "my snake is just an normal" like a member has to feel sorry they have a lovely pet snake that happens to be exactly and perfectly perfect as it is!

It's about breeders that do share wonderful morphs and of course we all get excited but the reality is their hours of chipping snake crap off tubs. None of us want to read posts about exactly how many pounds of urates Kara has moved this year but that is the reality and it isn't all that exciting. It is in fact boring to clean snake poop but you do it as a part of the responsible care of the snake.....one snake or 1,000 snakes....normal or morph.

Lines are in the end things that seperate a group of people. They do sometimes encourage people to cross a line too fast in order to be "in" a part of that group they perceive as more valued or more interesting. In the end though, your 1 pet snake or NERD's 1,000's of snakes, your lovely normal or Kev's lastest blow your mind morph.....it's a ball python. Enjoy it for that, enjoy the people here who love this type of snake, don't give a spit for lines anyone else draws, draw your own.

Okay who wants to come help me clean up some urates!

What a perfect post!

[Kalitta]

My first experience with a ball python was my friends rescue, knowing how much can be spent on just vets if something went wrong. I spent a lot of time researching and looking up information on the web. By the time I had gotten all the information I thought I needed, I couldn't find a snake for sale in pet stores.

Bobo is my baby. I love him, and handle him daily except for when he is shedding or after eating. I've had him years with no intention of breeding. I've done a lot of 'teaching' friends about ball pythons and quite a few of them have told me their interest in getting one. After doing research on breeding, i got an incubator, another tank. and made the mistake of buying a W/C gravid female... taking a short cut in the hopes of learning more about taking care of eggs in incubation, and than being able to breed my male with the female another year.

I'm learning the hard way about those vet costs again, it's going to cost me 50$ just for an exam on my female, and has cost me 40$ in tick treatment. And if something is wrong with her, that's more money I will be spending. I may not have had her as long as i have had Bobo, but she is a beautiful snake that doesn't deserve to be treated like a 'project' that may cost too much. I don't have the money for another snake right now but I am looking forward to breeding in the future.

I have a list of 10 friends who would love to have a 'normal' ball python as long as it was the offspring were from my Bobo because they all love him so much. The money is also a draw, but I realize a lot more has to go in and taking a loss for a few years before I could even hope to 'get rich' on the luck of nature.

My snakes are pets, any snake I get after this even for breeding purpose will be pets. I'm proud of my snakes and I thrill to feel him snaked around my arm. When i can handle Hadiya more, I will be glad to have her hang out around my arm and draped around my shoulders. They are displayed proudly, and any time someone asks about them, i could go on for hours.

[Argentra]

Some great replies here so far! I guess I'll add my own take on things...

If there is any desire to breed the darling, wonderfully recovering pastel male I was given...it would ONLY be to get my dream morph: the Bumblebee. As someone else already said, since Bees are still quite expensive (and so are Spider females for that matter) breeding is one of the cheaper ways to get your desired morph. However, since I would have to procure a spider female first (something I would not mind at all, they are pretty snakes with some nice high white) AND wait a year or so for the little pastel to grow more...

Basically, my snakes are my pets. Period. I have some plans to breed corn snakes, but have those plans on hold due to extreme money problems. Even if I did end up breeding, though, my corns would be my pets. That's why I ended up returning the CandyCane proven breeder female I had: she was far too mean. A breeder might not care...but I do.

As for my normal female BP, I have absolutely no plans for breeding her. Not because she's a normal, but because she is my pet.

Oh, and I just gave my littlest corn snake a nice 'hug' this evening, and the same to my ghost and amel corns last night.

[Monty]

ill help clean urates if i can take home a present i have loved ball pythons since i was 8 thats all my projects were about in school

[drgonzo]

well, i've only gotten a ball python two weeks ago and i don't plan on breeding at all. i've thought about it but i don't plan on it and since this is all relatively new to me i think i have an idea of why people (myself included) have thought about breeding. i never thought about breeding because of the money i can make, i don't think money ever even came to my head when i thought about it(unless we're talking how much of it we'd need to start breeding ).

it's natural human behavior to want MORE. we aren't ever just content with what we have; we're always wanting more. to me, taking care of a ball python is FUN. so wouldn't that mean taking care of more then one ball python be even funner? and here is where breeding comes in.

[autumn75]

I'm a new BP owner and I would never consider breeding. I love having my snakes on display, in large tanks that are the focal points of my rooms.

I read so many posts about people having rack systems or getting them and it makes me wonder what's the point in having snakes if you can't see them.

Breeding is way too much work. Kudos to the breeders who choose to undertake such a task, but it's not for me. I'd be sick with worry over the thought that a snake I helped bring into this world may not be in a good home, or might be sitting at a pet store, or getting yanked on by little hands!

I'd much rather spend an hour or more holding each of my snakes a day than rushing around tending to cages.

I've worked with too many different animal rescues over the years. I've seen first hand what happens when you get too many people trying to make a buck... the animals suffer... and it's not fair to them!

If I want to add to my collection, I'd much rather hand pick that one or two instead of hoping to get one I like and being left wondering how I'm going to re-home the others. If I run out of room to add more tanks... well there's always expanding my skin art collection... less mess that way and more affordable way to collect the morphs I really like!

My pets are my babies... and there isn't a single one of them who has to worry about being a parent.

[Laooda]

What an excellent topic Ed! My thoughts....

For me it's about lines we make and want to cross (sometimes far too quickly). It's about comments like "my snake is just an normal" like a member has to feel sorry they have a lovely pet snake that happens to be exactly and perfectly perfect as it is!

It's about breeders that do share wonderful morphs and of course we all get excited but the reality is their hours of chipping snake crap off tubs. None of us want to read posts about exactly how many pounds of urates Kara has moved this year but that is the reality and it isn't all that exciting. It is in fact boring to clean snake poop but you do it as a part of the responsible care of the snake.....one snake or 1,000 snakes....normal or morph.

Lines are in the end things that seperate a group of people. They do sometimes encourage people to cross a line too fast in order to be "in" a part of that group they perceive as more valued or more interesting. In the end though, your 1 pet snake or NERD's 1,000's of snakes, your lovely normal or Kev's lastest blow your mind morph.....it's a ball python. Enjoy it for that, enjoy the people here who love this type of snake, don't give a spit for lines anyone else draws, draw your own.

Okay who wants to come help me clean up some urates!

Apparently I can't give you any more rep-points right now! But I am stealing a quote from you! ;}

[frankykeno]

Awww Laura, that's sweet of you to want to use some words of mine and Pat, thank you for your kind words.

Autumn, the point of racks is to make it possible to have the numbers of snakes we do have. For some snakes, racking might not be an appropriate environment but remember we are talking about ball pythons. These are snakes that in their natural environment, where they can choose where to live, they choose tight, dark rodent burrows and also to live deep inside african termite mounds. They don't make a particularily good display snake actually.

Monty, your present for coming to help me clean snake tubs is.....drum roll please....

ALL THE FREE URATES YOU CAN STUFF IN A SACK!

[sneakerpro]

Autumn, the point of racks is to make it possible to have the numbers of snakes we do have. For some snakes, racking might not be an appropriate environment but remember we are talking about ball pythons. These are snakes that in their natural environment, where they can choose where to live, they choose tight, dark rodent burrows and also to live deep inside african termite mounds. They don't make a particularily good display snake actually.

I can't quite agree with this. If you are a 9-5 person who is in bed by 10 every night, then no they aren't a good display. I work from noon-9 everyday, so by the time I get home and am winding down my BP is out and about. He displays quite nicely after about 11pm.

[belvis]

If people did not have hopes to breed---------the Ball Python market would fall faster then me on ice skates.

Probreeders show us their awesome combo's--out of price range for a lot of people-------they make a sale off people having a hope of making this beautiful creature-----


If someone wants to breed----they can do what they want----if someone spends 3k on a clown with hopes of breeding and it dies cause they can't keep it-----what happens----they are out 3k, the original breeder made some money to cover his/her overhead.

People will do what they want.

Wish them the best of luck and move on.

I've had Bp's since 1998---------my collection grew and grew but I did not breed. If i would have, at that time----it would've been a disaster.

I cut down my collection, decided what i would focus on breeding, developed a business plan and started to pick out my "ALL STAR" Team.

I decided to breed due to the excitment of life and to sustain my hobby. My wife and I had many nights talking about it. She is newer to the Hobby, but has grown to love it. Hopefully all will go well

Best of Luck To EVERYONE

Lance