Sugar plums dancing in my head?
With the harsh realization that winter is upon us, or at least from a weather stand point. It’s not sugar plums that dance in my head this holiday season, but the promise of potential Boa and Python production. We’re in the full swing of breeding finally, actually for use it’s very early. Normally I don’t even think of putting males and females together until close to Christmas, but with our animals looking great and our anticipation for what we have to breed this season at it’s highest point in years, we decided to start breeding early.
When I say we just started, I mean we just started. It was only Tuesday that males went into females cages. To my surprise when we went back to check the following morning about half the males were already hooked up. Does it mean that we’re going to have a magical year? Who knows? While I have high hopes and maybe even higher expectations, I also realize that it’s way to early to break out the victory cigar.
I always say there are three “stages” when it comes to breeding snakes. The first stage starts at the beginning of the breeding season. You start to think that each and every animal that you have dreamed about producing and now have breeding will in fact produce. Did I mention that all your odds are going to surpass what even the great Gregor Mendel would predict. I’m not sure about your dreams, but when I breed a pair of double het for Lavender Snow Ball Pythons and get six eggs. Realizing that Mendelian genetics says I will get 9:3:3:1 or in this case one lavender snow out of every sixteen eggs, but I truly believe I will hatch at least one male, if not a pair for my six egg clutch. And the thought of a slug egg is something that “never” crosses my mind.
Enter stage two… It’s normally about half way through the breeding season and things are not quit popping like your earlier dreams would have made you think. As a matter of a fact, your males are getting lazy, the follicle growth is slower then what you hoped and that little demon called “doubt” has now crept in your head. You go from thinking every female is going to produce, to wondering if “any” of them are going to produce. You start to curse yourself for not backing up males and you wonder if there is any hope for this seasons production.
After getting off suicide watch. Stage three and probably the most realistic stage of all starts to settle in. Some females are swelling up, while others are lagging behind. You go from thinking nothing will produce to realizing that a good percentage, normally 60-70% of your females will in fact produce. Not all 100% fertile clutches, but the overwhelming majority will have good eggs.
So the roller coaster ride of being a snake breeder continues. There are so many ups and downs, highs and lows in the process that it can sometimes drive a sober man to drink. In the end we all produce what is a more realistic number of babies. We hit some odds and get crushed by others. Did you produce everything you dreamed of? Probably not, but you still end up producing, and that’s all that matters. Breeding snakes is not for the faint of heart, not for the person that wants a safe investment. It’s for risk takers like me. People that live off the adrenaline of crushing the odds and can handle licking our wounds when things go the other way. It might not be all sugar plums, but I can guarantee that there will be plenty of gravid snakes when this winter gives way to the warm air of spring…
