Hi all, I am wanting to get into breeding next season as my snakes will be old enough and I have questions. I have been doing some research on breeding and what all I will need, but any tips or tricks of the trade will be greatly appreciated!!
-I know the spider gene comes with problems, are there any other genes I should look out for/be aware of?
-How do I know I am accurately identifying the morphs of my animals? (I want to make sure I am giving people what I say I am)
-How do I price my animal based on morph?
-Do breeders often inbreed their animals? Like if two morphs come out of the same cluth that they want to cross, do they hold them back until they are old enough to breed? Same for if they want to breed a hatchling to one of the parents when it comes of age? Does it have any negative effects on the anima/is it common? (I only ask because google says it is common and I want to have all my facts straight)
-Do I have to have any sort of license to breed/ship ball pythons?
Thank you all so much in advance, I am glad to have the opporunity to ask these questions in this community and hopefully become a part of it!
That’s the hard part whether you do that for 20 years or are just starting, in general price is based on supply and demand, and based on your reputation in the industry you might not be able to sell your animal at the same price than someone well established.
What I do every year when it comes to pricing what I hatch is look at the market look at the highs and lows and price somewhere in the middle of it. Now it is harder to price something that was never produced before or is not available on the market.
-Do breeders often inbreed their animals? Like if two morphs come out of the same cluth that they want to cross, do they hold them back until they are old enough to breed? Same for if they want to breed a hatchling to one of the parents when it comes of age? Does it have any negative effects on the anima/is it common? (I only ask because google says it is common and I want to have all my facts straight)
Yes and reptile inbreeding/line breeding is very different compared to mammal breeding, people often do this when they work on double recessive projects, now it’s not to say that you should not when you have the opportunity bring new blood in.
-Do I have to have any sort of license to breed/ship ball pythons?
Depend on the state as far as breeding licence so you will need to check on your own state laws, for shipping there are 3 major companies that allow you to ship animals through fedex using their certification and saving you money compare to shipping with your own certified fedex account, but you MUST either go through them or get certified yourself, you just cannot go and ship casually like you would a normal package.
It’s definitely not as big of a deal as it is with mammals, but what I’ve learned is that a breeder should introduce new blood at least every 6 generations, ideally earlier. Because while it is not uncommon in nature and not particularly damaging, excessive line breeding can lead to an increase in malformed hatchlings.
To provide an example of what happens when it does go wrong, I attached a picture of my rescue project, Cupcake. Her breeder was… not a responsible person. Due to excessive line breeding, she is a genetical mess. Weak immune system, asymmetrical head, kinked spine and… well, she looks pretty small even before knowing she’s almost a year old.
Just to reiterate, I’m not at all saying line breeding in general is bad. I just wanted to add (to the really good comment that basically left nothing to desire otherwise) that, like with everything else, bad things can happen if you overdo it .
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