I am curious what everyone would say. Ive been wanting a black snake, but want to stay in the colubrid family. Im thinking the black pine snake is possibly 2nd biggest, but I am green to the reptile world and curious what others have seen put out there. I know the black milksnake is another one people have listed.
I would love to own an indigo, but i dont have the time to maintence its cage every 2-3 days when it decides to be a puppy on crack and smear its poop all over the enclosure walls, haha.
So do you want pure black and no other colors at all or just mostly? Are you wanting to stay with new world colubrids or are you ok with old world?
So black pine snakes seem like they will be one of the best options. There are also some eastern and western rat snakes that will get all black as well. They all do stay around the same size but the rat snakes do have greater size potential with the western ratsnake actually has gotten over 8 feet before.
Adding on to @logar’s excellent suggestions, a black milksnake might be an option also. I don’t think they get quite as large as some of the others but still a nice size. They start out with a standard milksnake color and gradually fade to black over the years.
that is a great suggestion I completely forgot existed! They also do get pretty big as the usually get to around six feet and sometimes even a bit larger.
Black milks are a great option. They can get quite large, upward of 180cm on the females. And the better part from, my perspective, is they have a great personality. I regularly show off my ~135cm girl to to young kids and people who are trepidatious of snakes because of her calm personality
Thank you all! Im just expanding my species as much as possible and trying to see what is out there. Doesnt have to be all black but you could say mostly black. I definitely have checked the black milksnakes and think they are also a fantastic species!! Also know about the black ratsnake too! Long thin noodles they are. If i had to be frank, been looking at the black milksnake or pine snakes to have a snake with more girth. But also staying in the colubrid family.
I really loved my black milk that I owned years ago. I would love to get back into them.
Another cool black colubrid is the black Jansen’s rat snake. I don’t really know anything about them and have never owned them, but you could look into them if you like the look.
You may already know this but black pines are federally protected. If you go the black pine route you will need to find a breeder that works with them in your state, or one that is willing to ship once you have obtained the appropriate interstate commerce permits. There’s a couple of guys on the Pit FB groups that will ship and even help you with the permitting paperwork/process if necessary.
That being said, black pine would be my choice also!
I have a local breeder with a state permit, so Im in the clear on finding a source (and he breeds blacks as far as I know). So they can definitely be on the table.
Keeled rat snakes look amazing, and they get huge. It’s my understanding that they do tend to be pretty spicy though. Not sure if that’s an issue for you or not.
ie. me