Starting my RP collection

[jackdcurz]

Hey Guys,

1st off i am new to the forum, so a little about me, names Jack D'cruz, i live in Kent and always been an animal fan. Always wanted snakes but never been allowed, but hopefully its going to change soon so thought i would do a bit of research. I also have a good mate who is going to help and mentor me, he's mainly into boas, but has had rp's in the past.

I want to start a Royal python collection, with a view to breed. I like RP's and like the size they grow to, and also their placid nature. I thought i would start off reasonably cheaply and get 1.2 100% het albinos. Was just wondering about pricing and availability, whats the price difference between 08 and 09 animals?

Thanks in advance
Jack

[mattsdragons]

you want 1.1 yellow bellys, and royals are such great snakes, i already want loads, very well tempered, realtivly small but may i recomend you start with something different as roayls can be filcky feeders?

[jackdcurz]

why do u recomend YB's, i'm guessing its because the potential for Ivory's? I'm sure the feeding well be fine, i have plenty of help from experianced snake keepers

[Malc]

Jack,

I've only just come across this forum myself, although I've been keeping snakes since 1986. The thing I can't grasp is that nowadays Royals are the "in thing" and seems that everyone is starting off keeping royals as a first snake. Back in the early 1990's I servers on the committee of one of the large independent societies and we would never recommend Royals as being an ideal first snake, instead recommending corns or king snakes as the ideal breed to start with. Mind you that was 15 years ago and it may be that a lot of the issues with royals have been ironed out. When I say issues, it was due to the fact that at the time most hatchings were difficult to get settled and start feeding, and were more demanding with regards to their environment.

Can't really advise on price, again things have changed. 15 years ago a pyebald royal would set you back between £2K and £8K depending on its bloodline ! - these days it seems the variety that we used to have in corns has now migrated into royals and the prices have fallen dramatically !

The fact you are researching the subject and have a mentor is a positive move.

[rachel132002]

Everyone's doing royals now which is a good thing for the new buyer, morphs are easier than ever to get and cheaper than ever.

For a starting point i really wouldn't bother with hets, you need 2-3years to grow the female on and even then you may not get a visual animal back.

Find yourself some nice adult females and a nice co-dom male

Spider, YB, Pastel, Pinstripe for example or if you can push the boat out a Bumblebee.

Feed him up so he's good to breed, have a good read up on breeding and go for your life if all goes to plan you'll have visual morphs within the year and with a bee for example which is spider x pastel you can get 25% normal, 25% pastel, 25% spider and 25% bee and the odds can go anyway so for example this year i did bee x normal and got 3 eggs which contained 2 bees and 1 spider worth a total of approx £2k.

Whatever you do though if you get a co-dom morph KEEP at least 1 if not all females hatched especially if pastel is the mrohp as they become invaluable to any breeding programme.

Rachel

[jackdcurz]

Thanks Rachel, good advice, i'm liking that idea. Gonna try and get my hands on some nice norm females then, 08's i think, and then look into a co-dom male. Will prolly go for a pastel as they seem to be in everything so will be a good asset, tho i do like spiders and pins! The word pastel is thrown around a lot, pastel jungle is the actual "pastel" right, which is lots of yellow? But pastel is also used in Cinnamon pastel and others, but thats just a cinnamon isnt it? All these royal names are confusing lol!

Thanks
Jack

[vazzza]

Hi Jack

Welcome to the forum. I'm recently getting into the royal game, already have 3 normals (1 hatchling unknown, 1 male and 1 female ready to breed next year) and am picking up 1.1 HET albinos ready to breed next year as well. As Rachel said, not the best route to go down, but i'm limited on funds so seems logical.

You seem to know quite a bit already, so all i'm going to say is the person i am picking up my HET albino's from on Saturday has a female ready to breed in a year or 2 (I can find more details if you like), all i know is she eats like a dustbin and is going to be a big girl, so might be a good place to start.

[rachel132002]

Originally Posted by jackdcurz

Thanks Rachel, good advice, i'm liking that idea. Gonna try and get my hands on some nice norm females then, 08's i think, and then look into a co-dom male. Will prolly go for a pastel as they seem to be in everything so will be a good asset, tho i do like spiders and pins! The word pastel is thrown around a lot, pastel jungle is the actual "pastel" right, which is lots of yellow? But pastel is also used in Cinnamon pastel and others, but thats just a cinnamon isnt it? All these royal names are confusing lol!

Thanks
Jack

Get the biggest girls you can ideally 1200g+ if you can get 1 or 2 or better still 3 of them and a pastel male, again bigger the better then you have a good chance of seeing babies by 2010 if you get your bum in gear.

Honestly, pastel males are useless once you've used them once so if you get a pastel you may want to sell that after you've got pastels but keep back female pastels (i can't stress that enough) but if you buy a bee say then he'll always be of use being double co-dom but it's more about budget i guess.

Rachel

[ScottyGurn]

welcome to the forum

may i just say that your name sounds great for a pattern line.

I could just imagine saying in the future "thats a Jack D'cruz royal that" haha

or maybe jus D'cruz for short? haha

[jackdcurz]

lol yeah well the surname is portugese, not that any of my family are from there, but somewhere along the line they must have been!

I'm going too look for some nice big normal females, seems the price for a older one is bout £100-150 a piece. If anyone knows any for sale not too far away from Kent, i'm intrested in 2-3! I think a bee is going to be bit out of my price range.

Why are Pastel males useless after one breed, and females so valuable?

Thanks
Jack