There are way too many people selling “ready to breed” female ball pythons with weights listed well below 1500 grams and only 2 years old. Does anyone even care about their animals or are they just trying to turn a quick profit??
Also when they write “ready for your females now” or “pair her up this season”… No quarantine?>??? Health and good practices out the window cause its ‘just and animal’ … Keeping these animals is a privilege and a lot of these people should be revoked.
Stop supporting these unscrupulous people and maybe this hobby can be saved.
I ignore listings that are like this, or ones that are very similar…
They are bad practices and there are a lot of bad actors in the hobby. For quarantining at least in my policy is that the buyer is responsible for understanding that the animal must be quarantined for a minimum of one month. I do not advocate for breeders or sellers that push the-
-thing… but again a lot of it is up to the buyer’s responsibility. The breeders and sellers should outline this but I know a lot don’t. I also know that there are breeders who don’t care about quarantining just because they haven’t had anything bad happen to them yet and throw cation out the window.
Same goes for “RTB” females or males for that matter… there is the reccomended 1500 gram weight for females and 800 gram weight for males and the age reccomendation that follows. Bad actors in the hobby don’t listen, and buyers need to be educated not to listen to or follow the bad actor’s practice.
After all it is the buyers that keep the breeders/sellers in business.
This isn’t a problem isolated to only ball pythons. This is an issue that plagues ANY animal species and you will still find breeders raising cats or dogs the same way.
The downside with reptiles is that many people got in during the pandemic. There isn’t enough research being done. People aren’t familiar enough with the species to know that serious diseases can exist. (Heck as a veterinary technician, most new cat owners don’t realize feline aids or herpes exist)
There has definitely been an uptick in people wanting to make back some of their costs by selling these animals as a commodity…and this has to do with the oversaturated market as well. You will also see this in crested or leopard geckos, hognose and other ‘popular’ species. Jumping spiders are a whole different mess now too.
When I started seriously keeping leopard geckos quarantining was always recommended and I would follow 90 day protocols. There’s some leeway now with BPs because testing for things like IBD didn’t exist before…but the 90 days is always something I personally recommend and follow for myself.
I don’t bother with 90% of the RTB ads. The ones I have are proven females.
There’s some sellers that haven’t updated the weights on animals they posted before trying to tempt a sale with ‘rtb’, but any breeder that has the weight written as less than the guidelines Christina mentioned above are breeders I don’t personally shop or recommend to others.
Many of the people shopping for these ads are people looking to get into the MLM mindset that became popular with some of the old-school breeders or especially so in the pandemic. And many of them will end up getting out because it isn’t the easy $$ they thought. =\
There is also the weird outliers. I have a 6 year old girl who has never broken 1300g. She laid a clutch of slugs.
Madam. Please no.
I cringe when I see these ads. Rtb, sure, but selling off breeders(?). Not young adults but "old"er breeders.
Just laid a clutch of (no.) already back on food. Grr.
I am a hobbyist. I have a few adults but no long term goals, I wouldn’t sell them just because they “don’t fit with my breeding plans”. If anything I would find appropriate/complementary genes and add to the group.
BUT, sometimes you have to re-home proven breeder females to make room for their holdback daughters. I have a very strict (and relatively small) head count limit due to space limitations. I hate to start over on the 3-4 years it takes me to grow a female up and hatch her first eggs but it’s necessary to advance my projects. My animals are far from cutting edge so I often end up giving adult females free to local startup breeders.
Also, if they have laid in last say 6 months not really ready to breed (after quarantine) but still a jumpstart compared to a hatching female needing YEARS of feeder rodents.
I work with corn snakes, and the same problems pop up. RTB doesn’t necessarily raise a flag by itself, though. There are valid reasons to part with animals. I’m in this for love, not money. I still have the first baby I produced in 2009. And a foundation dam who was a hatched in 2008 whom I bought as a hatchling. They’re solely pets. But mine are ALL pets, every one.
But I’ve done as @rlremington said, parting with younger breeders because I’m keeping offspring. I’ll be advertising some young adults quite soon because I’ve got to pare down projects due to family health issues.
I always follow and advise 90-day quarantine protocols - and I mean real quarantine. Still, it’s possible to buy an adult early in the year, go through quarantine, and breed afterwards.
It comes down to asking good questions of the seller. How long have they had the animal? What health and feeding info do the have, as well as breeding info if it applies? It can be hard to know the age of reptiles by looking, though very senior citizens may show signs such as cataracts. Can they document the age and growth of the animal? It’s my responsibility as a buyer to ask such questions. It’s my responsibility as a seller to answer them as completely and truthfully as I can.
