Large Orders Of Ball Pythons

[josh@outbackreps]

The numbers of animals that go into the the pet trade are staggering.
In the spring the U.S has about 50,000 c.h balls come in within a few week period, and come this time of year they are almost all gone. We have stores and jobbers calling all the time looking for normal baby balls and we cant come up with the numbers they are looking for....

That said the numbers that are imported each year are getting smaller and smaller 3 years ago there were 80-100k coming in each year.

Last year the importer I bought mine from brought in just under 15000 babies this year he got 3500. This year the importer I bought mine from brought in about 5000 3 years ago he brought in between 35-50k a year.

When Pet-co has 990 stores nation wide and they sell say an average of 30-40 ball pythons a year you are looking at 30-40 k just to pet co.

Not to mention all the mom and pop stores, wholesalers, and show vendors that sell c.h and w.c balls every year.

The demand for c.h, w.c and gravids will always be there as people will always want to try them. W.C balls can do just as well as c.b as long as they are taken care of properly....

Stopping imports is not the answer.

[DutchHerp]

per cites export from Benin
60,000 farmed
1000 wild-taken

per cites export from Ghana
7 000 live, wild-taken
50 000 live, ranched
200 live, captive-bred

I know some of you guys are all pro-export, but don't these numbers sound slightly high?

Benin+Ghana= 8,000 (!!!) wild-taken snakes. I think we can all assume the 110,000 farmed/ranched BPs are not getting the best of care, to put lightly.

If you all love these animals so much, why support a system like this?

[nixer]

I know some of you guys are all pro-export, but don't these numbers sound slightly high?

Benin+Ghana= 8,000 (!!!) wild-taken snakes. I think we can all assume the 110,000 farmed/ranched BPs are not getting the best of care, to put lightly.

If you all love these animals so much, why support a system like this?

thats taken from 2 countries to the rest of the world!
ive never been to a farm, but those eggs that are collected and hatched then sent here aka captive hatched


im not pro-export but i dont think they are high. if you dont like it then stop buying anything at petstores or anyplace that deals with any imports period.

[DutchHerp]

thats taken from 2 countries to the rest of the world!
ive never been to a farm, but those eggs that are collected and hatched then sent here aka captive hatched


im not pro-export but i dont think they are high. if you dont like it then stop buying anything at petstores or anyplace that deals with any imports period.

I've never bought anything at a pet store and I buy only from responsible breeders.

I already said I didn't want to hijack the thread. However, I will reply to any posts related to what I've said.

[josh@outbackreps]

I know some of you guys are all pro-export, but don't these numbers sound slightly high?

Benin+Ghana= 8,000 (!!!) wild-taken snakes. I think we can all assume the 110,000 farmed/ranched BPs are not getting the best of care, to put lightly.

If you all love these animals so much, why support a system like this?

For one, those are the numbers for export for the world not just the U.S
Second that is what is allowed, not what is actually taken, the demand is not as high now so less animals make it onto the market.

Everyone seems to think that 50k animals going to the pet trade is going to damage the wild so bad, but what about the 46,000 blood pythons that are skinned each year, and the 437,500 retics that CITES allowed for skins in 2002 alone.

There are tons of reptiles being slaughtered for the meat and skin trade each year legally and illegally, so ball pythons being exported in manageable numbers for the pet trade should not be #1 on everyone's "hit" list when 8-10million red-ear sliders are being exported for meat, along with millions of pounds of other turtles....

Just something to think about.

[Gloryhound]

I don't have anything against wild caught. I don't think I am ready to take care of a large group shipped to me in one bag yet, but I do have one CH male that I got from J&J and he definately rocks. Granted he was already established and a proven breeder. While he is what most would call a banded, I have yet to see a banded that looks anything quite like him! May be this year or next we may try 10 or 20 captive hatched and see how it works out. I think it would be a lot of fun opening up a baggy of snakes and seeing if anything interesting is inside. Then even if nothing pops out as interesting how do you know if they are not het for something interesting and how would you go about playing with that. All that makes it interesting even if the odds of getting something is worse than hitting the lottery. Oh, wait! Isn't that was Michael Cole calls it?

[DutchHerp]

For one, those are the numbers for export for the world not just the U.S
Second that is what is allowed, not what is actually taken, the demand is not as high now so less animals make it onto the market.

Everyone seems to think that 50k animals going to the pet trade is going to damage the wild so bad, but what about the 46,000 blood pythons that are skinned each year, and the 437,500 retics that CITES allowed for skins in 2002 alone.

There are tons of reptiles being slaughtered for the meat and skin trade each year legally and illegally, so ball pythons being exported in manageable numbers for the pet trade should not be #1 on everyone's "hit" list when 8-10million red-ear sliders are being exported for meat, along with millions of pounds of other turtles....

Just something to think about.

You are completely right. I am against all of this, too, of course.

I only started talking about BPs in particular because this thread is about them and Ball-Pythons.net is probably the place to talk about them.

[aaschmitt]

thinking of all these imports is obviously a debateable topic. i personally lean towards pro import, as said before all our bp's are from imports somewhere in their bloodines, but thinking about all the genes pouring into our passion for morphs is so enticing to think that ONE of these importers is payin attention lol and going to take notice of new and existing patterns and can not only add to our somewhere/somewhat limited gene pool but introduce even more possibilities for our morphs as we discover/introduce more of the vast range of flavors of bp's

[wolfy-hound]

The wild populations are doing very well. There are studies that have shown the wild populations of ball pythons has gone up from 10-15 years ago. I believe it was theorized that the more farmland is cleared, the more rodents will breed, and the ball python is a predetor on rodents, so they have more territory now.
The amount of imports doesn't seem to affect the wild population, and the imported babies can thrive with proper care, and have not been shown to harbor disease.
Having taken care of most of the myths about imported BPs...
You might call up either Neil Golli or Micheal Cole of BallRoomPythonsSouth to ask their advice on getting large amounts shipped into canada. I think both of them do shipping to other countries, but if they can't, they would probably know who to call.

[DutchHerp]

Does it bother any of you that the C.H. and W.C. snakes you get were not getting good care in Africa? Just wondering...