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Getting out of snakes...

I think a lot of people are feeling this way right now, and it's totally reasonable. I'm a pet owner, not a breeder, though I do intend to breed a bit in a few years. But no more than I can stand to keep if I can't find homes for them! So obviously this waits until I live in something bigger than a one-bedroom apartment.

If you've had snakes for so long, I can't imagine you really being happy getting rid of ALL of them. But there's no shame or harm in cutting down your collection to whatever number gives you genuine pleasure. I currently own exactly one snake I intend, one day, to breed. The others I keep only because they make me happy. It seems like a good place to be, to me.

SUCKS about the woma, though. Those guys are so pretty!
 
There's a few I will definitely hang on to... certainly the pair that were my first and have been with me 10 years. I don't know if I'll breed them again but I think they deserve a foreverhome with me.

All in all, at least half my adults could go and I wouldn't really miss them. They're cool and all, but yeah. I'm still not ready to let go of any of the juvies I got / kept last year XD ... baby steps to quitting.

The womas are really cute and it's hilarious to watch them waggle their tails when they're excited, but I'll just stick with my one girl I've had for two years for the forseeable future. This male is really pretty but I'll be much better off not having to worry about him.

(the good news is so far I've not found any mites on my other snakes, including the one snake that went to the same show I got the woma from)
 
I am not being critical but I do not understand the compulsion to breed snakes of any kind. I know it is probably interesting but I can see how it would get out of hand really fast. And I guess some people will get rich doing it but the market is saturated. I also worry about the welfare of all these animals. Like it or not snakes are still not an every person's pet. A lot of snakes are bought for a child on a whim and end up being neglected. There are too many dogs, cats, gerbils, hamsters (well you get the idea) of all kinds and not enough vetting of the owners to ensure that the animals will not be neglected.

Also remember that the best of hobbies over done quickly become a pain in the ass and you no longer will want to do it. I like to say that even the photographers for Playboy probably have grown to hate shooting pictures and therefore their jobs.

Dont feel guilty, sell the snakes you don't want to keep you will probably be relieved when you have lifted yourself of the burden.
 
charlie1 said:
I am not being critical but I do not understand the compulsion to breed snakes of any kind. I know it is probably interesting but I can see how it would get out of hand really fast. And I guess some people will get rich doing it but the market is saturated. I also worry about the welfare of all these animals. Like it or not snakes are still not an every person's pet. A lot of snakes are bought for a child on a whim and end up being neglected.
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I don't know if it is a compulsion or not. I have a plan. I don't really care if I make money or not, I just want to see if I can reach my target through careful combinations of genes. No one else is doing it in the corn snake world as far as I can tell. I am prepared to sell excess hatchlings at a minimum price to avoid feeding them off to my kingsnakes, because I know that I will end up with excess. To avoid producing too many unwanted snakes, I plan to be working for no more than 1:16 odds, rather than mating snakes that are het for all of the target genes & aiming for a 1:1024 or something, but I know I will end up with multihet normals etc that will get sold on.

But I am prepared to stop breeding if keeping herps stops being fun & starts being stress. I am really bad at rehoming animals I have already made a commitment to, so once they move in, they are likely to be here until they die of old age, but I am prepared for the idea that if I am stressed it's time to allow natural contraction to occur.

I guess since I don't even need to break even, just not to be over worked, I am in a great position, huh?
 
charlie1 said:
I am not being critical but I do not understand the compulsion to breed snakes of any kind. I know it is probably interesting but I can see how it would get out of hand really fast. And I guess some people will get rich doing it but the market is saturated. I also worry about the welfare of all these animals. Like it or not snakes are still not an every person's pet. A lot of snakes are bought for a child on a whim and end up being neglected. There are too many dogs, cats, gerbils, hamsters (well you get the idea) of all kinds and not enough vetting of the owners to ensure that the animals will not be neglected.

Also remember that the best of hobbies over done quickly become a pain in the ass and you no longer will want to do it. I like to say that even the photographers for Playboy probably have grown to hate shooting pictures and therefore their jobs.

Dont feel guilty, sell the snakes you don't want to keep you will probably be relieved when you have lifted yourself of the burden.
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I know what you mean, but I think it has it's place... it's pretty fun to see the whole lifecycle of the snake and it's only recently I've noticed the market seems really saturated. I think there's always a place for conscientious breeders, otherwise all pets would come from mills / backyard breeders / wild caught :p
Eh I'm babbling, I don't really feel guilty it's just hard to give up on a hobby, yaknow? (and even if I have a few as pets that's not really what I'd consider a "hobby")
 
Well, you could cut down to just animals you love to handle, and breed one clutch a year of something beautiful, just to keep your hand in. That's no more than, what, 40 babies if she doubles and gives you 2 big clutches? That way you are still a hobbyist breeder, just at a smaller level, say, 10-15 adults and 1 planned breeding a year.
 
I agree wit alot of ppl here but in sticking to my guns...i mite sell some of my corns that arent real projects...but i will for sure keep at least 2 pairs at all times, plus i think the best way to not over whelm ur self is to pic a project and stick to it and let the corns not related or needed for ur goal go and just keep it small, when i got back into herps i decided i would just get 1 pair of every snake i really liked and pick a pair and breed that pair, then next year a diff pair, Thats why i have 1 pair of spotteds, childrens, bp, brbs, milks, kings. Like next year my only breading plan is to breed some jungles, wit my cali king and my creamcicle. thats it o and my leos. So if u keep it under control like that and know ur limits and u should b ok and be able to get over this hump.
 
You know, not to hijack the thread, but I have a question. Is the market saturated on the east coast only? Because here, at the two Petcos, the nearby Petsmart, and at Pet Supermarket, corns are selling like hot cakes. That might have to do with the fact that there's no breeders in NV and not many in Cali, but still! Other herps are selling well too (except the adult tokays one Petco imported that are nasty buggers xDD).

There's also another thing; are breeders breeding special morphs or common normals, amels, aneries, and snows? Because those are what are selling well, and I'm pretty certain it isn't spontaneous buyers. Petco and Pet Supermarket seem to be having trouble keeping with the demand. Could also be because kids are in school now and want a reptile to show to their teachers/classmates/burn-for-science-project, but I dunno.
 
The market was saturated a couple of years ago... Thanks to some handy work of certain individuals they seemed to be proud to under cut the heck out of every one.. I don't give a crap though, I know they are in it for the money.. They will certainly come crashing back to earth soon enough with a grip of high end stuff that is worth peanuts.. Anyone remeber me saying I would love to see the market crash through the floor? I don't think its hit the floor yet.. What has discouraged me, is that me and the Wifes hard work seems to not be important enough to hold a price.. Regardless, if you want quality your going to see people like my self hang around for quite a few years, but if you want someones "snake farm" rejects, well best get them now before they disappaear..
 
My suspicion is that in a few years there will be a few big operations and lots of very small hobbyists who produce a few clutches a year and the market will be back in a sensible balance. I really pity people who are getting into BPs or BCI morphs because they are going to drive off a cliff sometime soon and that will be sad indeed.
 
My suspicion is that in a few years there will be a few big operations and lots of very small hobbyists who produce a few clutches a year and the market will be back in a sensible balance.
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I wish I could agree.. I think we have a lot of back yard breeders out there that are just trying to make their money as fast as they can without any care to the market place.. Its happening with rodents in my area.. To many people breeding..
 
TandJ said:
I think we have a lot of back yard breeders out there that are just trying to make their money as fast as they can without any care to the market place.
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I'm quite new to the hobby and to breeding, so I have little basis upon which to agree or disagree with this statement. But I am curious to know what makes you say this? Who are these breeders you speak of? And what do you mean by "care for the market place?" Should there be some sort of regulation in your opinion? Or do you think the market will naturally balance itself out eventually?
 
I'm quite new to the hobby and to breeding, so I have little basis upon which to agree or disagree with this statement. But I am curious to know what makes you say this? Who are these breeders you speak of? And what do you mean by "care for the market place?" Should there be some sort of regulation in your opinion? Or do you think the market will naturally balance itself out eventually?
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1.. Why do i say this? Because it is more than obvious to me.. I refuse to let myself be trapped in the box of unreality..

2.. If you pay attention, your going to notice flash in the pans.. Fly by nighters, ones that pop in hoping to make that really quick buck...

3.. What do I mean care for the market place? Watch the trends and listien to what some people talk quite frankly about.. Notice there was a few people and the OP of this thread that are definantly down sizing and getting out.. Wonder why?

4... The market place will balence out once the prices have finished being a dumping ground, means a lot of the get quick rich folk will disappear.. Seen it happen in Cichlids, BP's to some extent, and for sure Red Tails.. Mass produce and your going to find your market will dry up.. I could have bred for sunkissed granites this year, never did it, and they are fairly uncommon.. Not worth my time to get kicked in the sack by everyone producing more.. What will work? Responsible breeding, qaulity before qauntity..
 
My take on the situation is this. To go cold turkey on the hobby is something that will be regretted. I talk from experience here. About 11 years ago I was forced to get rid of all my animals, this was due to moving to another Province
in my Country. I was moving from a Province where no permits to keep snakes are required to one where you need a Permit for every snake you keep.

I actually became depressed over the fact that my beloved snakes were gone. Needless to say, as soon as I moved back into the original Province, I bought snakes left, right and center.

My advice is this, sure, cut down on the number of snakes you keep, but don't get rid of all of them.

I breed snakes every season but not for profit. I sell babies for next to nothing and have even given a lot away for free (Corns of course). I am quite happy to entertain my hobby and love for snakes with no financial gain if needs be.

I wish you the best of luck in making a very difficult decision, but just wish to add, follow your heart.
 
I'm quite new to the hobby and to breeding, so I have little basis upon which to agree or disagree with this statement. But I am curious to know what makes you say this? Who are these breeders you speak of?
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The is what my local reptile shop has told me. In previous years they've purchased tens of thousands of pounds worth of Corns from a range of sources and sold them on to other shops around the country.

This year, they've found that they cannot compete on price with other suppliers. The prices of Corns are so low, that it isn't worth buying them in. They're selling very slowly and actually cost more in food in the shop, than they'll eventually sell for.

My contact at the shop put this down to the twin factors of a) the economy and fewer people buying pets, b) the market being flooded by rock-bottom price Corns from home breeders who've thought it might be fun to hatch a couple of clutches (because it's easy) but didn't think about what to do with the hatchlings once they'd bred them. These hatchlings are being offloaded direct to the public for £2-£5 just to get them out of the house - even morphs like Caramel Mots and Butter Mots.

Not only has this effectively destroyed the commercial market for Corns, it has reduced them to the status of "throwaway" pets. So cheap, that it doesn't matter if they die because you can easily get Little Johnny a new one. Or you can just dump it if he gets bored with it and incur next to no financial loss.

Over-supplied, under-priced Corns are bad for the trade (which let's face it, most of us need to survive so that we have sources of food and equipment, never mind those members of this board trying to make a living), bad for us and above all, bad for the Corns.
 
I've got to agree here. Over the past few years I went from one clutch, to 3, to 5 and so on. This year I produced about 150 hatchlings, ranging the gamut from normals, amels, snows, etc up to tesseras and sunkissed tesseras. I enjoyed the planning and projects and the "what-ifs". I vended my first few reptile shows....and enjoyed seeing children who were interested in the "pink ones" or the "silver ones" and enjoyed talking to them about what to expect from their new pet etc.

On the flip side, it really became a chore to take care of sooooo many hatchlings. Packing them up for shows, feeding, watering, dealing with the non-feeders, etc. Luckily I have a pretty good network of outlets I am able to wholesale babies to, but even still it has become more of a chore than a hobby. Working full time and then coming home to feed different batches of snakes each night, cleaning cages etc....can just become too overwhelming.

Bottom line, if you aren't enjoying it, then it's not for you. I seriously re-thought the business side of things this year, and won't be producing clutches that people aren't interested in having. I don't have room to keep everything I produce, nor the time to care for 100+ babies. I plan on concentrating on a few "pet projects" that I wouldn't mind keeping all the offspring from, and if people are interested enough to purchase them, that's fine too.
 
TandJ said:
I wish I could agree.. I think we have a lot of back yard breeders out there that are just trying to make their money as fast as they can without any care to the market place.. Its happening with rodents in my area.. To many people breeding..
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I agree this is what we have NOW. But I don't think most of those BYBs will survive. They are in it to make $$ and when they can't they will bail out. That will leave places like BHB & SMR that are big enough to be profitable and hobbyist breeders who are in it for fun.
 
I agree this is what we have NOW. But I don't think most of those BYBs will survive. They are in it to make $$ and when they can't they will bail out. That will leave places like BHB & SMR that are big enough to be profitable and hobbyist breeders who are in it for fun.
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They are the guppies of the snake world.. *lol* The truely hard core hobbiest will be around, then the others will just fade away, as the value slides into the toliet.. I have said over the last few years this has gone or is going to soon enough.. What do I know though, I am just some crazied lunatic that goes against the grain..

Regards.. Tim of T and J
 
wstphal said:
I really pity people who are getting into BPs or BCI morphs because they are going to drive off a cliff sometime soon and that will be sad indeed.
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Sometime soon??? They are in mid-air like that scene in Inception....the ocean is just a bump below.
 
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