Just trying to get opinions on pairing my male Mojave enchi due to so many different ways I could go I have looked into many different paths I can go such as visual desert ghost or butter just have trouble choosing looking for insight
DG is a recessive trait so be mindful of that, if you pair with a non-het you will not get visual offspring.
Butter/Lesser is a nice trait, I work with Lesser and get really nice looking offspring… however I’d look for a female that has other Inc-Dom traits included with Butter, so you get more out of the offspring.
You will also have a chance to get BELs out of a Mojave x Butter pairing, you won’t be able to ID the offspring for traits other than Mojave and Butter without a shed test though… the unfortunate downside to producing pretty BELs.
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Also sit back for a moment and think about why you want to breed… offspring sit for a long, long time if your intention is to sell, you’ll likely end up only being able to rehome them for a fraction of their worth. You’ll likely keep a majority into sub adult or adulthood, make sure you actually have the funds and space for that.
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I was leaning more towards the lesser/butter but never thought of the inc dom traits. I appreciate your response I understand it’s difficult to try to sell ball python’s without being a known breeder but most of my motivation is to have beautiful snakes in my collection that I helped pair instead of bought if that makes any sense
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I was on the same boat. After doing a lot of research and realizing that I’m not yet educated enough with genetics (dominant, recessive,incomplete doms) and how they interact and seeing the amount of additional equipment, supplies, and time/care it takes to begin breeding I have decided to do more homework before jumping all in. I’ve been looking at all combos that include the genes that my snake carries and taking note of the looks I like, what prices those rtb females are going for, and really building a project within budget. Can’t forget that all of those babies are going to have to be housed and fed until you can get rid of them. As somebody that only wants to do it once as an experience with my kids, I can’t justify the spending just yet and if I decide to move forward I want to ensure I get the best looking babies I can by carefully choosing the pairing. Best of luck!
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I’d hold off on pairing him with anything for several reasons.
First, it would be wise to step back and consider whether this is really necessary and responsible. There are already so so many ball pythons out there, more than will ever find homes, and Mojave and enchi are some of the most common low value morphs out there. Unless you are 100% committed, able and planning on keeping each snake for the rest of their life (which could be up to 60!!! years), where are they going to go and who is going to care for them? Just because you have an animal and enjoy doesn’t mean you need to breed it, in most cases it’s generally best not to unless it’s to fulfill a specific niche or need.
Second, if you still decide to proceed, you’ll want to learn the genetics first - the inheritance models for each morph, how to identify it by itself and in combos, how to calculate what will be produced from each pairing and any issues and defects associated with the morphs and combos. For example, knowing that desert ghost is a recessive trait, so all that would come out of this pairing is normals, enchis, mojaves and enchi mojaves that are het for desert ghost.
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Also going to point out that you will also need to consider possible emergency situations. Males can injure hemipenes, females can eggbind. Even hatchlings can have a congenital issue and need to be cared for.
Currently, I have one juvie in my collection I hatched with a kink. I’ve had to put down another before.
It’s not always cute babies.
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Not a ball python, but I spent $2,000 this year on an egg bound snake (uterine malformation of some sort, as it turned out, so not really avoidable) only to lose her anyway. This was not a $2,000 snake by any remote stretch of the imagination, so this wasn’t some situation that only a professional breeder (or whatever you wanna call it) would get into. Breeding does throw serious complications into the husbandry of any animal regardless of their supposed value.
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