Opinions on breeding young / small females

[RuGGeR]

at what point does age come into play? if you have a girl in her 3rd winter @ 800-900 grams do you wait go for it and what if she is only 1100-1200 in her 4th?

if you look at people grown women that have perfectly healthy babies and no problem with child birth range from our little people of 3ft to women of 7ft+ and all most likely will birth a avg size new born baby.

are there the little bps? we have seen the giants

A very good point there boss.....

[blackcrystal22]

If there is a high risk, I just won't take it.
When I do breed, I will not breed until it hits 1500+ grams or is 3 years old.

[hobbyist]

Ok, So I have a question for readers of this thread/forum

I have to temporarily house two of my snakes together while I order heat tape and build an enclosure for them as well as other snakes coming in. I have a full grown 5' and over 1500 gram male, a 2.5' young male, and a 2' young female. The female i'm estimating is about 500 grams. I am going to house the two in a 100 gallon tank with 4 hides- two on each side of the temperature gradient. They have all been near each other, and quarantined adequately.
I'm worried that if I stick my female and the young male in the cage together, that they would attempt to breed- and possibly jeopardize the female's life if she becomes egg-bound. I'm not even sure if she's capable of breeding yet- nor the male for that reason. I dont want to stick the big one in with the others, because i'm worried about size problems.
It's only temporary, a few weeks at most.

What should I do?
thanks

[greghall]

Ok, So I have a question for readers of this thread/forum

I have to temporarily house two of my snakes together while I order heat tape and build an enclosure for them as well as other snakes coming in. I have a full grown 5' and over 1500 gram male, a 2.5' young male, and a 2' young female. The female i'm estimating is about 500 grams. I am going to house the two in a 100 gallon tank with 4 hides- two on each side of the temperature gradient. They have all been near each other, and quarantined adequately.
I'm worried that if I stick my female and the young male in the cage together, that they would attempt to breed- and possibly jeopardize the female's life if she becomes egg-bound. I'm not even sure if she's capable of breeding yet- nor the male for that reason. I dont want to stick the big one in with the others, because i'm worried about size problems.
It's only temporary, a few weeks at most.

What should I do?
thanks

no if the female is not ready she won't lift her tail & breed,no folicals no eggs to be fertilize & bind.

[Sebrina]

I started gathering in 06'ish I did get one that was an 05. My females are now roughly 1600+ grams and ready they weren't last year and waiting for a good end result is much more satisfying than rushing and killing your snake (in my opinion).

If you can't get a clutch THIS year due to a small female buy a regular full size female a few years older and a chance hey it's better than killing a small snake. Not to mention most simply won't breed.

[SGExotics]

i always, and will continue to always wait till the female is over 1500 grams to be on the safe side, my the females breeding right now are over 1500 grams...

[Gloryhound]

Ok, So I have a question for readers of this thread/forum

I have to temporarily house two of my snakes together while I order heat tape and build an enclosure for them as well as other snakes coming in. I have a full grown 5' and over 1500 gram male, a 2.5' young male, and a 2' young female. The female i'm estimating is about 500 grams. I am going to house the two in a 100 gallon tank with 4 hides- two on each side of the temperature gradient. They have all been near each other, and quarantined adequately.
I'm worried that if I stick my female and the young male in the cage together, that they would attempt to breed- and possibly jeopardize the female's life if she becomes egg-bound. I'm not even sure if she's capable of breeding yet- nor the male for that reason. I dont want to stick the big one in with the others, because i'm worried about size problems.
It's only temporary, a few weeks at most.

What should I do?
thanks

For around $75.00 + the T-stat (which you probably already have for the 100 gallon tank.) you can build a nice 32qt 3 tub rack. Price includes flex watt and tubs. As a general rule for building buget racks I put the price down as $25 per level + the overall cost of the T-stat, but if you go less than 3 levels the cost overall goes down, but the cost per level goes up and vise versa if you go taller. If I put my mind to it I can easily build one on a day off. At this point no reason exists to do what you are intending to do since you already have some kind of seperation due to quarantine that you can keep up for another week or two while you build the rack.

On the other hand if you do have to do it you should be OK as far as actual breeding possibly taking place since the female will not cooperate. The only additional issue I see here is you will have 2 males and 1 female in an enclosure if I am reading it correctly. I'm not sure if this may cause some fighting between the males as part of the mating ritual. I have never personally put two males together in one enclosure and do not really have any intention of trying.

[MattZ BallZ]

my thoughts on the size is if shes ready she will go, if not she will not. but with my animals i wait till i know her weight is up and if i feel she can handle it, im thinking weights of around 1300g and up. by that size they typically are big enough to breed but remember that a snake could be 1500 g but not have a good fat reserve and may not be a good idea to breed as she will have trouble with the fasting. if any of my snakes miss meals and or goes off feed and depends how long i take her out my breeding plans, unless she begines to eat again. so far so good i got some females from 1350g to 3500 g breeding this season but they are still pounding food back with no problems so im sure the smaller ones will put on weight in 2 or 3 months of feeding before they go off feed for the lay. but typiccaly after laying females become rat heads (crack heads) lol and start eating like theres no tomorrow.. well thats my thought on the topic feel free to comment..

[Lexcorn]

Ya,

I am one of those who fall under the cautious heading.

My preference is to postpone breeding until the female is 1800 - 2000grams minimum.

Not a huge number of years behind me in the B.P. breeding, however, many with regards to the corn snake.

Again I prefer to wait until the corn female is around 500 gram.

Although the ever quoted mantra jumps to mind " All the 3's" - i.e. 3 foot length, 3 years old & 300 grams

I consider the age of the animal to be relevant as I feel the 3 years allows for the individual to, not only, sexually mature, but, also, mentally mature.

The other words of wisdom are quite optimistic as a 300 gram female corn is not a large animal.

One previous poster suggested that to wait another year is not a bad thing in a Breeding Programme & I agree with this statement.

A larger female, whatever the species, should provide a larger clutch of eggs & that is definately worth the wait.

I would stress, however, that each indivdual will make up his/her own mind as to the time to breed a female B.P.

There is a risk inherent with any breeding be it animal or human.

Lex

[Kryptonian]

I would rather wait till shes at least 2-3 years and 1500+ grams. I think, whats the hurry? If you are in it for the hobby then it will be worth the wait then you know you have a nice healthy mature female who will give you a nice healthy clutch of eggs that will hopefully hatch some good sized healthy babies. Sounds like more fun that way then breeding to small and then worrying about the female. I dont power feed for the same reason. I want my girls big and muscular and in perfect shape to have babies, not fat from over feeding just so they look big. Each one of my girls is a pet not just for breedng and Id feel awful if one got sick becuase i bred her to soon.