Hey all, could use some insight on a situation, and some ideas of what to do. Long story short, looks like a breeding loan going to crap.
A buddy of mine really likes my red stripe hypo stuff. So he offered/asked me to take 3 females from him, it helped him out with some space and also helped me to produce more. He gave me a Yellowbelly het hypo, a hypo, and a citrus hypo (yes, the non-compatible kind.) He said all he wanted was a red stripe Yellowbelly Hypo female.
Now off the bat, there’s 4 problems with this scenario.
The 3 genetic snake from a het x het pairing is a 1/16 shot, with the specific sex, 1/32.
The hypo female immediately went off feed for at least 6 months. I needed to get a constant supply of ASF’s for her to eat anything. So with her bad eating habits, I didn’t breed her.
I can’t produce a red stripe yellowbelly hypo from a red stripe het hypo x hypo. I offered to breed my red stripe yellowbelly possible het hypo to her, but he said he didn’t want to deal with hets- the male eventually proved out to be het hypo for me
Citrus ghost/hypo is not compatible with orange ghost/hypo, so best case scenario would be red stripe 100% het citrus hypo 50% possible het hypo.
So now he’s impatient, since it’s been around a year and I haven’t received a clutch from either of his girls yet- all are still eating and breeding. We’ve been trying to come up with some type of compromise, best I could offer him is a red stripe cinny het hypo female, which he seemed cool with. Now he’s saying he wants me to give up some males, which, just no.
My biggest issue is that his I’ve been putting the money into these girls, feeding them, and have been putting my males sperm inside of them. So if I just give him back his snakes, my male could potentially be the father.
It is all well and good that he wanted that but the only way he would be guaranteed that specific combo is by breeding some combination of all homozygous morphs, and even then the odds-gods might laugh and bless you with all males. Nothing in breeding is guaranteed and if your buddy has been in this game long enough he should know that. And if he does not know that, then he should reconsider breeding.
As far as what can be done… There are two options as far as I see it; he leaves the animals with you until you get clutches from them and, maybe, end up with the combo he wants, or he takes his animals back. That was what was agreed upon at the outset so that is what you stand by.
It’s really not uncommon for females not to got that first season when on a loan, new environment and adjusting period can take a while.
50% of the females I have received on loans went the following year which is why making sure that the other person understand that prior to the loan is important and which is why everything should be in writing either the female stays until gravid or she stays for so many months.
Now because of it someone gets impatient and wants to change terms in the middle of it all if it was me I would save myself the headache and send him back his animals, because it’s not worth it, when people start to argue and are unhappy it only gets worse from than on.
Yes you have money invested, yes they might be gravid or retain sperm so write it as a loss and lesson learned when it comes to loans.
He’s definitely not new, which is part of what is currently driving me nuts as well. He even has multiple females that are 3-5 years old and never laid a clutch. I don’t know why he’s suddenly so impatient.
What I am tempted to tell him is that if he takes them back, anything red stripe is mine. If he’s even honest about if/when they lay and what comes out. It’s not like I’m trying to prolong this. I have a female of my own that’s been breeding since last August and she’s still eating and breeding. He has nothing to make red stripe hypos, why should he get in on a project, and ahead on some people, for nothing?
And asking for, seemed more like he was demanding, one of my males is just ridiculous to me. My visual makes are worth more than those females combined, and then some. Hell, I just sold a RS het hypo for 1500.
I don’t do breeding loans anymore because they aren’t worth it. I agree with Deb I would personally just send them back, and chalk it up to a loss. Breeding loans need long drawn out contracts with every possible scenario in writing. Even the sky is falling scenarios to protect yourself. I would not however give up one of your red stripe males unless you made him a promise to do so. Why would you lol ? Cause his girls didn’t lay so what that means he gets an animal for pretty much nothing ? You’ve done all the work to date. Spent all the money to date why does he feel he deserves one of your males ? It’s entirely your decision on what to do , but if it were me I’d just wanna be done with this loan ASAP.
That sucks, man. I know there’s always two sides to every story, but it really seems like he wants something for nothing from this side. And something very valuable at that.
You’ve got some nice red stripes. Coincidentally about a week ago I browsed your FB page after seeing just the hets on MM. Then seeing the visual hypo redstripes I gave your page a follow. It’s a good project!
Hope you find a way to resolve this without too much damage.
I would cut your losses, and never work with him again. Definitely do not give him one of your males.
His impatience shows his true character towards the snakes.
This is a response I’m going to send him, can I get some opinions on it?
That’s a lose, lose scenario for me. My males are untouchable anyway. I’ve got some options. 1. Just wait it out, I know it’s been a while but I can’t control follicular development. They’re breeding and it’s not fair to me either if I give them back to you after my male has loaded them with his sperm and I’ve loaded them with food. If they ovulate 3 months from now, that’s all work from my male and you’d get RS Hypos this year, which you wouldn’t have been able to get otherwise. 2. I can give you your hypo female, and trade to you my breeder yellowbelly het hypo, and one of my hypo females. That way you have essentially the same females that haven’t been bred this year.
Like I said, it wouldn’t be fair because you said I could keep those females and my male had potentially just put thousands of dollars in your pocket and I would get nothing. Let me know which you would prefer.
I agree those options are as fair as it gets. Some say you should cut your losses and I get that but why should you? After all you have time and money wrapped up in these snakes even though they havent produced yet. And I still can’t understand why he would think he is entitled to one of your males.