morph prices

[pitviper10]

i was just wondering why ball pyhton morphs are so expencive. I dont have all the money in the world, so getting something a little "uniqe" would be way out of my league. dose anyone else share the same opinion on the subject?

[fogertyfan]

I would think the rarity issuse comes into play here. Only a certain # of these snakes will carry on the specific gene that makes it unique. So i can see the price prob...to me though, the snakes dont do any special tricks, or talk or anythin so just a regular ball pyhton may look boring comparitvly, but will act the same way

[greenman1867]

That and it takes years to get a female Ball up to breeding size, and then you have to worry about a breeding not taking, clutches going bad, and genetics odds possibly not working in your favour. All with a small clutch (4-8ish).

Combine that with a reasonably high demand and there ya have it. Big bucks :)

[ffollett]

On top of what Shawn said. Think about it this way.
Going on a price list from one of the big guys.
An albino boa is $1000-1200 USD depending on if its male or female.
An albino ball is $2500-3000 USD depending on if its male or female.
An albino Burm is $200 USD no matter what.

Now look at clutch size.
Boas have between 20-50 babies a season
Balls have 4-12 eggs in a season
Burms can have 80+ eggs in a season

That is another factor when thinking about price. Also it sometimes takes mixing a couple different morphs to produce on kind of ball. So now you need a few thousand to several thousand dollars in snakes, not including waiting for them to mature and feeding them until that point. Breeding them, raising up those babies and then adding another morph to the mix, repeat.
With all that work wouldn't you want a lot for them? Especially if you are the only one that produces that snake?

[Dirty]

One way to look at it is as an investment. If you spend a thousand bucks on a snake, you could make many times the money you spent if you plan on breeding, even if the price goes down a little bit (if you know what you're doing).