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Discussion: Should a snakes value determine how much info the breeder/seller gives?

E.Crassus

E.Crassus

Note, its only a hobby
Well i was thinking about this tonight and thought it a good topic.
I will refrain from voicing my opinion first so as to let other people voice theres.
Basically were looking at genetic history here and what breeder the snake comes from not base elements such as feeding and sex.
get posting.
 
I'm not quite sure what you are asking. Are you asking if the value of the snake should be determined by genetics and who is breeding it? The title of the thread makes me think that it's a question of how much info a breeder should provide to the buyer to justify the cost. Are you saying that if a breeder wants "X" amount of dollars for a snake are they obligated to provide genetics, family tree and breeder info if it's other than themselves? As far as the buyer, are you saying that if a breeder is selling a valuable animal they should question the buyer to find out if they are qualified to own one? Clarify a little if you will.
 
I try to give all the information I have on any snake I sell, but being a small operation this is easily done. I can't imagine the big breeders who have a huge amounts of babies every year would have time to make up family trees for everything. Hopefully in the future we can all just go to ACR and look up the information. It would be pretty ridiculous to expect someone selling surplus lots of poss het normals to put that much time into detailing each individual's genetic background.
 
I agree with Jen, smaller breeders and hobby breeders would have an easier time providing a more detailed background/history of an animal being sold. I don't think the amount of info provided should be based upon the asking price for the snakes though. I personally would like to have all the info I can for my records, regardless if I spend $20 or $200+ on a single snake.

I of course, wouldn't expect the breeder to bend over backwards to dig up info on one snake out of hundreds or thousands though. It can't hurt to ask, and we do, but we understand how much effort and work it takes to track all of that info for huge colonies.

That's just us though.

Jenn
 
I happen to think that if you're going to take on a business selling animals of such variation like Cornsnakes that keeping track of the hets, and possible hets should be required. Granted to most of us who keep them just as pets, it doesnt really matter, but if I were to want to find out, I'd really hope that the seller/breeder would at least know that much about his "product".

But I dont think that the amount of information given should determine the price of the snake at ALL. You'd be paying for the amount of genetic information rather than the genetics. It just doesnt seem justifiable, or worth it.
 
To me, it seems that if a breeder is charging a high amount of money for a snake(multiple hundreds), there *should* be a reason for it. That reason is almost always genetic history, in terms of definite hets. and phenotypes. As far as possible hets goes, I can't see charging extra for them, nor can I justify paying extra for them. In my mind, it only makes sense to provide as much proven info as possible when charging high dollars for a snake.

For example, as a beginning breeder, hets are very important to my purchase decisions. However, possible hets are a "luck of the draw" situation. If I want to breed Amber Motley Diffused(or whatever the trade name would be ;)), I would certainly pay more for an Amber het motley het diffused than an amber. I would expect to pay more for such a combination of definite hets, as well. If the breeder can't list them, I can't be expected to pay for them.

On the flip side of that coin, I think it would be beyond greedy for a breeder to expect someone to pay more money for an amber poss. het motley and diffused. IMO, that should simply be sold at the going amber rate. I don't think it is fair nor justifiable to charge for possible hets., but it would be nice if that info could be provided.

While it would be impossible to list every single possible het a snake may possess(what about the possible hets from the breeding stock?), a breeder that keeps good records *should* be able to supply a reasonable amount of information. Afterall...you, as a breeder, *should* know who the parents are for each clutch you produce, which leads to a reasonable conclusion of being able to know what definite and possible hets each clutch-mate contains, based solely on the parentage.

But my tune may change when I'm dealing with 1,000+ babies every spring...I don't know from that standpoint...
 
I provide the important information on all the snakes that I produce...genetics, including known and possible hets, feeding and shed records, sex, hatch date, ACR papers. But as to whether the parents or grandparents are SerpenCo or Kathy Love stock, no...unless it is specifically requested. If it happens to be a snake that I didn't produce myself, I would indicate the breeder in the listed information. And price has nothing to do with the information provided by me as I treat the sale of my snakes equally, no matter if it's an expensive designer morph or a normal.
 
Here's what I would expect from solely a buyers prospective: If I'm getting a multiple hundred dollar snake, I would demand a certain amount of information on it. For me (and many others), that is a large investment. I would want to know any hets, possible hets, ACR info on parents (and the snake, if it's registered), hatch date, feeding information, any relevant medical information. Honestly, if a breeder could not provide me with this information, there's a high probability that I would go somewhere else for that morph.

While I would really *want* all of that information for a less expensive snake, I wouldn't renegotiate or terminate the purchase if it couldn't be provided. Granted, if the seller knew absolutely nothing, that might a problem. Simply put, spending less money is less of a risk.

The point I'd really like to stress, though, is that no matter the cost of the snake, I still *want* as much information as possible. Even if you're a bigger breeder, buyers will definitely appreciate a printed copy of the snakes records. I think most breeders keep some sort of feeding records, either electronically or paper, and in my personal opinion, providing as much info as possible just spreads around the good will. :)
 
Here's what I would expect from solely a buyers prospective: If I'm getting a multiple hundred dollar snake, I would demand a certain amount of information on it. For me (and many others), that is a large investment. I would want to know any hets, possible hets, ACR info on parents (and the snake, if it's registered), hatch date, feeding information, any relevant medical information. Honestly, if a breeder could not provide me with this information, there's a high probability that I would go somewhere else for that morph.
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It sounds like you only want ACR registered animals.. While the ACR is nice for providing back ground information on registered animals, it is how ever not a complete solution or the end all to end all.. What happens if someone is working on a project they want to keep secret about. Are they supposed to register their animals with the listed hets so everyone can see what cutting edge morph they are working on??

I will provide a buyer with as much information as I can about the animal they have purchased from me. Likely, if some one is to get in my face and demand things I would have no possible way of knowing, etc I am going to reserve my right of dealing with a nasty buyer and refuse service. When your buying animals, the big thing is to remember to buy from a highly reputable dealer..

So the snakes value be determined by given genetic information? Depends on who and what you are.. If you want a pet, your not going to give a rats behind about the hets, but if you are breeding, your going to be concerned with the hets.. Your question was and is wide open for a wide interpitation and a broad spectrum of people reading this.. :sidestep:

Regards.. Tim of T and J
 
2 cents worth from a novice

IMHO most owners first experience is with wild caught snakes or pet shops. For me first corns came from pet shops, where I have yet to see one list sex or hets. Usually they have fancy colors like "cotton candy" or as simple as "black corn" or "red corn", the last two being in a reptile store. The only snake I have gottten with papers and background is from Jen Pagram (my Yoda on snake info) .
Although I consider myself a novice I have had my male amel for four years. been on this forum a little over a year. I have learned so much, but requiring breeders and sellers on large scale to provide info seems like pulling teeth. When I asked if "red corn" meant bloodred or what I was told "red corn". Personally I would love all the info and maybe when I can afford to buy form big breeders like Rich Z, Joe Pierce... I will get it until Yoda helps me and messaging other gurus. again my humble opinion, susan
 
I agree with Susan. I will give as much info as possible with every snake that I produce. I give out ACR papers, pics of parents if requested, shed and feeding records. But I also understand how bigger breeders may have a harder time with it. I only have about 10 clutches this year. Imagine 1,000 +, I don't think I could do it then.

I have, on occasion, purchased very expensive morphs from breeders where no info whatsoever was given other than the phenotype. I got some of them slightly cheaper because of that fact. But others, I viewed it as my one chance to get that morph. In those instances it has to be a purchase from a VERY reputable breeder.

My biggest problem with these purchases is the fact that when I go to sell the offspring of those animals I purchased I do not have any info to give on them. The first year you may not have figured out all the genetics of the parents yet. Because I am a small breeder I cannot afford to keep all the first and second season offspring as holdbacks until the genetics have all been proven. So now what is there for me to do? Do I sell them as what I believe them to be according to the original breeder? Do I sell them cheaper because I truthfully have not proven that breeder to be correct or not? Do I not sell them at all because I have no info on the parents and their hets are not proven?

Here is where the situation without info becomes hairy. This is the reason why I will no longer purchase a snake without the history record from any other breeder unless they are a mainstream stock (Serpenco).
 
Arcanefate mentioned..

Here is where the situation without info becomes hairy. This is the reason why I will no longer purchase a snake without the history record from any other breeder unless they are a mainstream stock (Serpenco).
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Thats nice, but I guarentee you, there are times when the big breeders don't know what is in thier mixes too.. I have gotten suprises in a clutch that way, although not unexpected. The following quote sums it up..

But I also understand how bigger breeders may have a harder time with it. I only have about 10 clutches this year. Imagine 1,000 +, I don't think I could do it then.
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I can't expect every breeder to write down info pertainant to hets and possible hets, nor can I see them wanting to use the ACR. Time consuming, when they should be feeding, cleaning cages, feeding the mice/rats.. Definantly Kathy gets Kudo's for being able to find time in her operations to actually enter her animals in the ACR's data banks...

My biggest problem with these purchases is the fact that when I go to sell the offspring of those animals I purchased I do not have any info to give on them.
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But you do have information on them, the limited amount you received on the first breeding.. Give them what you have, pass on what you recieved from the original breeder/seller.. :shrugs: Problem is you will have people doubting what you have said, but if you have dealt with people fairly and honestly, your integrity should not be in harms way.. I totally agree that it comes down to who you buy from, no matter the size of their operations, whether or not they have ACR registered animals or not.. :cheers:

Regards... Tim of T and J
 
Some breeders (including Rich at Serpenco) breed multiple males to the same female in a season. In many of these cases, the hets may not be known for certain, say nothing about possible hets. Try calculating possible het percentages for a clutch with three fathers. :shrugs:
 
susang said:
The only snake I have gottten with papers and background is from Jen Pagram (my Yoda on snake info) .
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lol... there is no try, there is only do or not do... :crazy02:

The ACR cost would be astronomical for someone w/ lot of snakes to register every single one anyway. I pre register clutches, give the stickers to the buyers, and register any holdbacks, but I think I have registered fewer than 15 snakes. I can't imagine someone like Rich with 100's of breeders would want to spend the $10 to register each breeder 'from unregistered stock' and that's understandable. Sure it's great to get a snake with 'papers', but that is really not a big factor for me when I am deciding what to buy.
 
I don't mind purchasing a snake from "unregistered stock", but my preference is for the breeder to at least have somewhere written what the parent's genetics were. Then if you breed to something you know will create all Normals you have an idea of what's in the mix.

As far as buying a snake from a main stream with hets., if I buy from someone like Rich, it's not about the hets. that bothers me. At that point I am mostly buying the phenotype, not the genotype because I know getting exact parentage from some main stream breeders can be difficult due to the sheer numbers. It's when I buy from a person with unknown reputation and they tell you this is an Ultramel het. Stripe and you breed it to an Amel Stripe and get all Normals. Well, obviously then there is something amiss because that shouldn't happen. (This has happened :shrugs: )

The point I was attempting to make, was that if I want an snake that costs a pretty penny because I want to reproduce it, then I NEED the records to know what I am working with. Otherwise, how can I turn around and sell the offspring when I myself am not 100% positive.

But you do have information on them, the limited amount you received on the first breeding.. Give them what you have, pass on what you recieved from the original breeder/seller.. Problem is you will have people doubting what you have said, but if you have dealt with people fairly and honestly, your integrity should not be in harms way..
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Not necessarily an option. If I can only afford one snake of an extreme price or they only have one gender available. Then obviously I will have to pair it with another morph. And in those circumstances, you will not have all the information you need to know about genetic history by the first or even second generation. Then if you do sell some of the offspring and they end up being hets. for what you think are an expensive morph, you have to sell that snake at a cheap price just to make sure you aren't accidentally cheating someone out. It always bothers me in those situations because I don't want to sell an an animal I am not positive about.
 
thanks for the comments guys, all very interesting
My opinion (and one I hope to uphold when I have babies to sell) is that if the snake is worth £10 or £1000 the amount of info given to the buyer should not vary.
Ive had cases myself when buying an expensive snake the seller will give info like its coming from a bottomless pit yet when I went to the same place to buy a cheaper snake the info given was far less.
This I think isnt appropriate. As a small breeder I want to know what hets my snake has, im very dubious of people saying the snake has very valuable hets unless I see parentage and grand parentage.
Time will tell if my persistance to know what exactly my snakes have in them pays off, most probably next season.
Obviously I understand what big breeders would have to go through to do this but I feel there is no excuse for smaller breeders not providing detailed genetic history.
 
tyflier said:
As far as possible hets goes, I can't see charging extra for them, nor can I justify paying extra for them. .
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I think you would change your tune if it was something uncommon. For example, I bet there are people who will buy my Charcoals pos het motley for a little more than a regular Charcoal due to that 50% chance of having the motley gene. I think the same holds true for lava pos het motleys, ultramel pos het lavender and a whole bunch of rarer morphs. Granted, an amel pos het snow is probably not going to fetch more than a standard amel but when the genes are important and not too common I think pos hets are going to get a higher premium price. (Hey, look at the ball python market...lots of the recessive stuff almost entirely deals around pos hets. Pos het female pieds are a heck of a lot more than a normal ball python.)

As far as info....I do what I can when I can. I do, however, have almost all of my stock registered with the ACR so if people ask I can provide that information and they can see exactly what hets and pos hets might be there....or at least that are known to be there. There is always the possibility that a stray gene is in mix and just hasn't been tested yet.

All that being said, if I'm bulking out 10 or 20 lots I'm not going to take the time to list hets, pos hets or even parents. And sometimes I don't WANT you to KNOW the parents. Sometimes I have too many hets in a project but I really don't want you to be able to compete on that project with me down the road. For example, what if I have a clutch of het lava anery stripe and it is very male high. Most people won't pay a premium for a normal LONE male het lava anery stripe (a pair, yes, but lone male...no). However, the right person who picks this snake up for $20 and I tell them the genetics might take advantage. Lets say they breed it to an anery stripe. Now a fourth of the clutch is anery stripes pos het lava. Breed those together and match up the right animals and you've hit a gold mine of ice stripes for $20 initial investment. It is a big gold mine and can be worth the shot and that is why I sell lone male project snakes for a nice price. You can hit the project from a different direction and do fairly well. Sure, I'm not charging an arm and a leg for the lone male...but I ain't wholesaling it with a label either! ;)
 
This is a very interesting topic.
Considering I shall soon be getting as much info as possible from a breeder it is good to know (or scary haha) how the breeders feel about giving out all the info.
Kinda makes me hope I get a small breeder so I can get as much info as possible. Sure I'm never gonna breed my snake and it's only gonna be a pet but I'll love to know hets, and if they can if possible any possible hets. Just so I can know all their is to know about the baby :D
 
MohrSnakes said:
I think you would change your tune if it was something uncommon. For example, I bet there are people who will buy my Charcoals pos het motley for a little more than a regular Charcoal due to that 50% chance of having the motley gene. I think the same holds true for lava pos het motleys, ultramel pos het lavender and a whole bunch of rarer morphs. Granted, an amel pos het snow is probably not going to fetch more than a standard amel but when the genes are important and not too common I think pos hets are going to get a higher premium price. (Hey, look at the ball python market...lots of the recessive stuff almost entirely deals around pos hets. Pos het female pieds are a heck of a lot more than a normal ball python.)

As far as info....I do what I can when I can. I do, however, have almost all of my stock registered with the ACR so if people ask I can provide that information and they can see exactly what hets and pos hets might be there....or at least that are known to be there. There is always the possibility that a stray gene is in mix and just hasn't been tested yet.

All that being said, if I'm bulking out 10 or 20 lots I'm not going to take the time to list hets, pos hets or even parents. And sometimes I don't WANT you to KNOW the parents. Sometimes I have too many hets in a project but I really don't want you to be able to compete on that project with me down the road. For example, what if I have a clutch of het lava anery stripe and it is very male high. Most people won't pay a premium for a normal LONE male het lava anery stripe (a pair, yes, but lone male...no). However, the right person who picks this snake up for $20 and I tell them the genetics might take advantage. Lets say they breed it to an anery stripe. Now a fourth of the clutch is anery stripes pos het lava. Breed those together and match up the right animals and you've hit a gold mine of ice stripes for $20 initial investment. It is a big gold mine and can be worth the shot and that is why I sell lone male project snakes for a nice price. You can hit the project from a different direction and do fairly well. Sure, I'm not charging an arm and a leg for the lone male...but I ain't wholesaling it with a label either! ;)
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I completely understand what you're saying. And if you can do that, and still have satisfied customers, so be it.

For MY money, I wouldn't pay extra for "possible hets". It's not financially responsible for me to do so. I would rather pay the more premium price for definite hets, than pay a slightly higher price for possible price. It is a personal decision that each buyer/seller must decide for themselves.

For my money...if it isn't definite het, it is "normal"(or just the phenotype). I would kick myself in the pants for years to come if I "invested" in a possible het. pair, and they turned out to be NOT het. for the genes I was looking for. I'm a VERY small breeder, with VERY specific goals. I can't afford to take chances like that with my investments. For me and my money, I would rather invest a bit more money at the outset for the definite hets, than risk LOSING the entire investment, because the hets. simply are not there...and I paid for them.

But as I said, I see nothing wrong with charging extra if your customers are willing to pay for it. I guess I stated it a little harshly earlier when I called it "beyond greedy", and I apologize if that offended you...it wasn't my intention. If you can do it, and still maintain a satisfied customer base, more power to you. For me, I wouldn't pay for poss. hets., and I can't rationalize charging more for poss. hets. But that is ONLY my decision as a business man. Each to their own...
 
I will not comment further on the subject of possible hets. other than to say this.

Way back before the Stripe phase was booming in some morphs I paid $75 for a female Butter possible het. Stripe and $125 for a group of 1.2 two year old Amels het. Lavender possible het. Stripe.

Now, you may say that the added amount is not worth spending, but look at the amount I paid. Not much more than the morphs without the possible hets. And what if ANY of them had proven to be actual hets? I was more than willing to take that gamble for a few extra dollars. (And I won't mention what the outcome of my investment was ;) )
 
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