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Any Ball Python Breeders Around?

St. Phatty

Active member
I got your Ball Python right here !!

It was inevitable someone was going to say that, thought I should just get it over with. :tiphat:
 

MedGrowerTom

Organic Dank Land
Veteran
... until released in the everglades when they become unmanageable!

nah, don't have to worry about that with us. But I hear ya, ppl been getting rid of pets in the wild for ever. Least the ball pythons don't get as big as others.

When I was a kid, we took in a Savannah Monitor, caiman alligator, all kinds of crazy birds, dogs. My dad would take them before others let go outside, we would keep until could find a proper home. The caiman was the sweetest, had that almost a year before a zoo took it(a worker kept for himself, didn't actually go to the zoo)
 

St. Phatty

Active member
... until released in the everglades when they become unmanageable!

I spent a few years concerned about feral cats. Partially because of the hyper-ventilating from the spay-neuter folks (many of whom mean well.)

Then last year we had a visit from a mountain lion. Which ate 2 or 3 of our outdoor cats.

As long as there are apex predators that can eat the ball pythons, the predators will eat & multiply & nature's balance will be restored.
 
Majority of the morphs wouldn't even make it in the wild beyond hatching or birth with the live bearing species of snakes. They lack the traditional colors and patterns that camouflage them throughout their entire lives. Without this they are much more likely to be prey.

I was into herptoculture before it became a trend back in the 90s and I have really enjoyed watching the progress of captive breeding, be it just the normal Ball Python. I recall when very few if any successful breeding took place with the import and that on occasion we saw imported impregnated specimens that were usually caught by the middlemen of the industry, as it was often a ten fold + profit increase with hatchlings for sale. Even though they were captive born so to say, those imported young ones often refused to eat just like the juveniles and adults caught in the exchange. Mass numbers of the imports died by the thousands and thousands more died after being sold as pets. It was a pretty heartbreaking time back then and I still recall that Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup became the first real piece of the survival of the "Instantly Domestic" specimens that refused to feed on the typical feeders from mice and rats. All it took most times was a quick dunk into a can of Campbell's Soup. The soup broth and the snakes natural diet correlated with the import accustomed to feed on birds and other prey items unlike the common lab rodents. This also worked as well with Mangrove Monitors and other lizard specimens that refused to eat.

After having been involved with this all back into the 80s it is a great pleasure to see the many captive bred lines and the diversity within it all that the Ball Python has given us.
 
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Hempy McNoodle

Well-known member
In my teens I was really into snakes and I bred Vietnamese Blue Beauty Snakes. I had the largest specimen known (I think he was 11.5', if I remember correctly). Cool thread. I don't keep any animals these days, but love searching for them in the wild. My favorite species to find is the California Mountain Kingsnake (Lampropeltis Zonata). As far as ball pythons, I think the piebald ones are the coolest. I remember when they were selling for over $25,000 ea!
 

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