Question for breeders....

[RPlank]

This year is my first try at getting my BP's to breed. I started the nighttime temp drops in August, put them together at the beginning of Sept, and have witnessed copulation since. I started in August hoping to get eggs prior to next summer, when everyone else has them!
I have two questions:

1) Has anyone else attempted/succeeded in adjusting the breeding season like this? My apartment has central air, so I have total control over the air temps in the room. Why do I not hear breeders talking about this, or see babies for sale at all times of the year? Is it really that difficult to adjust the breeding season?

2) Once they have copulated a few times, is there any reason to continue the temp drops, or is it ok to seperate them and resume normal temps?
It is my understanding that the temp drops stimulate the males to produce viable sperm, and that after being bred, the heat going back to normal triggers the ovulation/fertilization process. Is that correct? And if it is, would resuming the normal temps after seeing copulation trigger an earlier ovulation/fertilization than letting the breeding season run it's course?

Any answers would be appreciated, but please don't tell me to buy the Ball Python Manual, or type something into Google. I have done both, and have not found answers to my questions. :)

Thanks!

[mykee]

You can breed your balls any time of the year. Just tell them when by cycling. Your second question; as far as I know, you are really only cooling to GET them to breed. Once they breed, I would assume that you can return their heat to normal. I've heard from some very sucessful breeders who cycle for anywhere from 8 weeks to 6 months. If it works for them, it'll work for you too.

[RPlank]

That was what I was thinking, but hadn't heard anyone else saying it. Thanks!

[Stockwell]

Regius will copulate just by blowing on them.
In the pioneer years, It took me 5 years of hundreds of copulations before I had any ovulations. Sure, females must have viable sperm in them at the right time, but they must have mature follicles, and they must ovulate. Copulations alone don't result in this and there is little reason to rejoice in simply seeing Regius hooked up. It's the first step, but doesn't mean you'll get eggs.
Copulations have no direct impact on whether you get eggs. In fact I'd say most copulations, don't result in eggs.
Females must be of adquate weight, and they must be cycled to produce eggs.
In my case(1980's), mine produced eggs after I provided artifical monsoons via a rain tank, over a two months period during winter.
That was when there was no such thing as CB Regius.
Captive produced animals reproduce with less work, but females still must be triggered into ovulation. Somtimes this simply means several weeks of night time dips, with an increase in food consumption. Sometimes an increase in humidity can trigger it... Doing both, is often useful

[Corey Woods]

Everything that Roy said was true. Getting Ball pythons to breed now adays is extremely easy.

I would just like that add that sometimes people lose site on why they cool their snakes in the first place. Cooling allows the males to develop sperm as well as triggering females to start producing ova. When the females start producing ova they start to allow the males to breed them. I believe in some females that constant stimulation from the male (courting, spurring and breeding) entices the female to continue in her ova production. It is detrimental to the female as well as the survival of the species to produce eggs that are no good (slugs). So, if a female feels that it's not worth killing herself to reproduce she will stop ova producting and reabsorb them to stay alive.

If you warm up the animals too early then the constantly high temperatures kill off viable sperm. It also causes the female to develop the ova too quickly and at varying rates of speed. So, some ova will be big enough and some will be to small. Most often then not warming up the animals too quickly results in a high degree of slugs.

It is true that some people do not "cool" their ball pythons. However, one must consider where these people are located. Most of the people that claim to not "cool" their animals live in the southern states were it is relatively warm year round (Florida, Texas, Georgia....etc). However, even though it does stay warm in the day it is not uncommon for the nights to get anywhere from 50-75F. If one is not heating their house at night to 90F they will experience a natural cooling to a room temperature anywhere from 60-70F. Is this not the defination of cooling and ideal for Ball pythons? Even with heat tape in the enclosure "on" most ball pythons know when to cycle themselves and constantly stay on the cool side of the enclosure resulting in them cooling themselves even if their owners don't want them cooled.

Everyone has their own way of cooling snakes. Who is to say who is right and who is wrong. All I can say is that if you have a proven way of doing it why mess with it.

Corey
PS You maybe able to change a snakes cooling cycle. This can be done if a snake is born into a different cycle. If they are long term captives expect upto 5 years to switch them over. Once a snake gets set into their breeding cycle it'll take a long time to change them over. Even if you get snakes to breed in September most will ovulate in March............with the ones that started breeding in January.

[jfmoore]

Hi Randy –

As someone who advocates allowing yourself the freedom to look at problems from all different angles, may I now give you some contrary advice on breeding ball pythons for the first time?

Don’t get all original your first time out.

Yes, I see the business advantage of getting your snakes to produce eggs against the normal supply. But you might end up with nothing for your efforts. No, that wouldn’t be such a disaster. But why not follow one of the tried and true North American models described, find out what works best for your set-up, have the fun of getting some eggs, incubating them and having the thrill of seeing those first heads pop out (that thrill never lessens, I think), mess with getting some recalcitrant feeders going, pork those females back up, and then…….Then you can riff against the usual because you’ll have that first hand knowledge of how everything is supposed to work.

Getting ball pythons to “breed” is about as easy as getting corn snakes to breed – put one of each sex together and watch the action commence. Just about any time of the year. But as has been noted, with ball pythons copulation does not equal successful reproduction. For that matter, all those pics you see posted starting around this time of year of tails together does not necessarily equal intromission, either, but that’s another topic of discussion.

Okay. I know this wasn’t what you asked. And it probably wasn’t appreciated, either. I’m not familiar with your background, so maybe you already have a ton of experience with other pythons. If so, never mind!

-Joan

[Stockwell]

Well what a pleasant surprise!
Hello Joan..fancy meeting you here...
My Regius days are over!Been there done that! With exceptional breeders like Mr. Woods, they don't need me around these parts much
think I'll slink back to my Erycines...
See ya :)

[Corey Woods]

Roy,

We can always use you over here! You pioneered Ball python breeding back when everyone thought it was impossible.

Corey

[Stockwell]

You hold the torch high Corey...
Keep up the good work!!!!

[jfmoore]

Originally posted by jfmoore

As someone who advocates allowing yourself the freedom to look at problems from all different angles, may I now give you some contrary advice on breeding ball pythons for the first time?



Oops. On re-reading that, I think I left the wrong impression. So, just to make sure - I DID NOT MEAN contrary to what Roy and Corey had explained. They sounded right on the money to me. I meant contrary to what I usually advocate. Okay? I don’t want to be dissin’ the gods of Canadian herpetoculture on a Canadian message board. At least not unintentionally, anyway!

Hi Roy! So, it’s “Uncle” Roy here, huh? Not Grandpa? Re Erycines: I wish I could get those Indian sand boas to breed as reliably as Kenyans.

Hi Cory – re ova reabsorption: Do you think it’s possible for mature ova (late vitellogenesis) to be reabsorbed by ball pythons?

-Joan

[Corey Woods]

Joan,

Yes, it is possible to have ova at all stages of development to be reabsorbed. It gets frustrating when you palpate a snake and find 6-8 mature ova that are about the size of a loonie and then a couple weeks later the snake is empty!

Corey