papuan olive pythons

[Elfmaze]

I'm looking for a captive bred papuan. or a wc, ch, python in good health without scars or the likes. i want to have a pair for display and private collection only so i want them to be good lookin snakes, lol. but if anyone knows of someone breeding them please let me know

http://www.eastbayvivarium.com/virtual/snakes/papuan/popf01-2.jpg

[Invictus]

I'm working with 2.2 Papuans that should be ready to breed maybe next year, or the year after. To my knowledge, I'm the only one in Canada working with breedable pairs.

[Elfmaze]

THat might be a good time frame to work with for me because it will give me time to get out of school and get settled somewhere before picking up the new snakes. But i've seen two papuans for sale so far and both have been mean and in rough condtion from the world. probably wild caught. but let me know how the project is going and i'd like to try learning more about there husbandry before picking up a set. but for now i call dibs on a male.

I just looked at you're site, beautiful papuans. my sister has a female and its the same way about being very defensive of its terraria. or any terraria it happens to occupy at the time. We basically just let cena(my older sisters papuan) come out of the cage on her own so noone gets struck reaching in to get her. but once out, i love the nature and intelegence of these snakes. my ball pythons will squirm around and try to go places but cena you can tell is thinking about stuff and trying to figure out better ways to escape

[Invictus]

Mine are all perfectly tractable as well, but you do want to hook them out of the cage. Unfortuantely, so little is known about the husbandry of these animals, but here are my observations so far - VERY high heat, VERY high humidity. Their scales dry out incredibly fast, and if you allow them to soak all the time (which they WILL), they get blisters. Though this isn't a huge deal, they come off with a shed, it's pretty annoying for them.

Their intelligence is just beyond amazing. It's nice to see more people showing interest in this incredible species. Right now my bigger female is over 9 feet, probably closer to 10, but hasn't put on her adult girth yet. I hope she gets to be one of the rare 14'+ specimens. That size combined with her incredible personality would just be gold.

[Invictus]

Crappy pic, but here's me holding my big female:

http://www.invictusexotics.com/images/ken_lilith.jpg

[RDJ]

awesome! always good to see papuan pics!

Elfmaze, cool papuan. is that a pic of yours/sister's papuan?

Ken, finally a pic of one of your females! She looks good. How are the others coming along?


I look forward to the day I own one of those gems.


Ryan

[Invictus]

Hey Ryan, all of the rest of my Papuans are doing great. Though they were all aggressive when I got them, they are all calming down nicely, and are by FAR my favorite snakes. Lilith (pictured above) will be with me at the TARAS show. I had a problem with her at the Red Deer show, she had been soaking excessively and had blisters, but as predicted, she shed them right off, and is looking fantastic now.

Something I wanted to mention Elfmaze (and others reading this thread), calling them Papuan Olive Pythons is actually a misnomer. They are in no way related to Liasis Olivaceous, so the correct common name is simply Papuan python. It's easy to see why the confusion and name-crossing came in, added to which, Apodora Papuanas was originally thought to be a Liasis ssp.

[RDJ]

good stuff man! I'll definetly be there to see her in person if I make it.

thanks,

Ryan

[Elfmaze]

but both apodora papuana and liasus papuanus i've seen. who started the whole liasus thing anyway? the correct scientific name is apodora correct?

[Invictus]

Yes, Apodora is correct. When they were first discovered, they were lumped in with Liasis, but it was discovered later than Papuans are very much their own genus.