Can you house a male with afemale?

[cinderbird]

Hey. We bought a male ball today and put him in with our female.. i dont want lil babies.. what can i do? i havent got another tank to put him in and i really dont want to take him back. is there anyway to keep them from breeding?

Let me try to answer your question:

there is nothing you can do to stop them from breeding if they have the mind to do it. Females do not have to be cooled to breed.

ball pythons are solitary creatures. they do not crave friendship or companionship. People often anthropomorphize their pets.

housing two balls together, with one unquarentened, is extremely irresponsible. they can transfer diseases between eachother, and when one gets sick you will have to treat both. if one has weird or runny stool you will have to play a guessing game as to who is having the problem, or if you're a responsible pet owner you will have to treat both and that means 2x the vet bills, same thing with any regurgitations.

a note on pet stores: they RARELY do anything correctly. they feel that a "one size fits all" for snake keeping is appropriate and should be used. This has been proven wrong. Please, the breeders and keepers on this website for the most part have a much better understanding of the needs of these animals than some uneducated pet store clerk.

Males can breed extremely young (400 grams is not unheard of). And your female is obviously at breeding size. If you arent prepared for eggs and the babies that may follow, you should really separate them. Females can become egg-bound and that can kill them or requires an experienced vet to take care of and is a surgical procedure. Males can experience injuries to their genital areas during breeding that may take vet visits and antibiotics to take care of.

If you aren't prepared to do what is right for the animals, perhaps you should rehome one of them. I know you stated that you "fell in love" with one of them, but it is a much better decision to make the RIGHT decision for the animal even if it means that you might not be happy.

Domination in snakes is shown as them appearing to cuddle. Snakes do not cuddle. Your larger female is bound to dominate the smaller male, this will stress him out. Stressed snakes get sick easier.

You will have to separate them to feed them.

Cannibalism is possible and has been documented in ball pythons.

Solutions:

you really should quarantine. See if a friend can watch the snake while it is in quarantine away from your current snake.

divide your current enclosure to house two snakes. Keep in mind you may have to buy a bigger enclosure to give them both enough room.

give the new snake back. If you cant come up with a feasible solution to this problem to keep both snakes, then it is detrimental to their health to keep them both like that.


I hope this helped. People get kinda uppity on these forums because they care so much about these animals. Housing two un quarantined animals together for no reason other than the OWNERS benefit is not a good idea. A lot of keepers find this out the hard way, we are trying to help you do waht is best for you and your animals and keep them healthy.
Please look past that and do waht is best for your animals.