I have been depressed a lot lately. Within good reason - I've been ripped from my old home, shoved in to a trailer park, and I've been dealing with adjusting, stress, a new job, missing the animals that couldn't come with me, and living in relative isolation far from my friends. Of course with all of this, I've been focusing a lot on my snakes to keep me happy. That's exactly what they do to repay me for what I have to do for them... they make me smile even when I'm really down, and they help when nobody else will.

Now that it's hatching season, I've found myself going around selectivly picking babies, trying to get in contact with the owners... this is a mentality I didn't think I would pick up so quickly. I used to be focused on species. Then I went to focused on nice looking individuals within a species. With bloods I have already developed a sense for the strange but good (since some strange things turn out awful in the end) and I've got several projects I want to raise and persue. To some people this sounds like a waste of money. To me this sounds like therapy, fun, and future profit all rolled in to one. I've already selected a few nice ones that I'm trying to aquire.

Project Short-Tails

Males
A beautiful male stripe borneo:
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The only non-blood project I'm interested in other then ghost borneos and pure black black bloods, I found this one by chance and he's a well established yearling. He will be the only borneo for awhile.

A strangely patterned male:
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He probably will not turn out very red, he's likely to brown out or go burnt orange. But his pattern is very unusual and with selective breeding could be passed to increasingly high red offspring.

Some excellent Striped Bloods:
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The amount of pure, clean red and the high intensity in a young specimen makes this one a good choice. Currently unknown genders, so I will assume they are male.

[link]
It's not a full stripe, but it's a THIN stripe. A lot of full stripe reds are wide striped, I want to produce thin striped reds for more red to show. I love the triple stripes but they are currently too expensive for me...

Elvis
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I have raised this blood python personally myself. He is my baby, my boy, my favorite, my best limbless friend. His temperament is ideal (I will not breed aggressive bloods) and I hope it is passed down to his children. He is also getting to be a bright cherry pinkish red fading to orange along his sides, and I am confident now that this will continue, so he should be nice looking once he is mature.

With this I am likely to end up male heavy, so I am trying to find females only. Unfortuanetly females are almost always more expensive and are less advertised. I already have one female being payed for.

females
Amelia
[link]
Amelia is a female red blood normal. She has some nice and neat broken striping, and looking at her parents, is gauranteed to become the BRIGHTEST red you have ever seen. She will be an EXCELLENT snake and will probably be the mother of many hold backs to keep her intensityin future projects!

A couple females I am perusing
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These two are twins from the same egg with very thin stripes. They would be great for a thin, or even pinstripe project. Their parents are also very nice, bright and rich reds. Unfortuanetly the breeder is no longer selling single females, so I would have to buy a male with them in a trio, making it much more expensive and once again uping my male count... however one he has is very nice: [link] I really want those twins, but with the male... idk. And seperated.. they would not make a quick moving project.

[link]
A very pretty, relatively standard female from great looking parents. She could be used to mold any male started project out of.

[link]
A nicely striped, brightly colored girl. Unfortuanetly she is pretty expensive for a normal not carrying any genes, and since I would need a high volume, it might be too much invested in one snake.

[link]
She's pretty expensive too... but golly she's pretty, and one of her parents is a red head. Still possibly too much of an investment..

I am in contact with other breeders with cheaper and nice females, but I currently have no photos to link to from them, they're contained in emails.


Keep in mind a male blood can ideally breed with two females each season. That means you want your male to female ration to be 1:2. Currently I have 2:1, possibly 4:1 and a lonely breit male. I'm looking at picking up at least three more females...maybe as many as 7 more. Each of those snakes will be eating a medium or large rat each week. Each one will need a proper cage... which means I'll have to build more rack systems as they grow.

This is an expensive hobby and I work a part time job at PetSmart. It might seem unaffordable, but I don't spend my money on anything else. I don't have too many other hobbies and those other hobbies, for the most part, are free. I am happy to spend every penny of my fun money on my snakes and more snakes. Plus, let me enlighten you to this: snakes are my way out.

Think about it. I can not afford college. I will NEVER afford college. I can only get grants for being poor as shit to study stuff I don't want to study. Right now I have a job I enjoy doing. I also have expendable money, not much, but still expendable. So I buy snakes. Snakes that have babies for me in a few years. Those babies sell for as much as their parents. The money from the babies get re-invested in to better snakes. This is how a collection grows and this is how breeders come to do what they do: their snakes earn money enough for more snakes, reinvestment eventually pays off. I have nothing to do with my life but breed snakes ad make it to work on time. You guys know I'd love to be a snake breeder.. and oh man would I love to do it as a living, but this is how that starts.

Lots of people think I'm "wasting money" on my snakes, but it's what I enjoy doing. Just like you're wasting money when you buy treats for your dog or go to the movies. Sure, they're less expensive.. but they add up over time, and they don't pay themselves off. This is just a different kind of hobby.

Not to mention this will allow me to start doing public talks with snakes for educational reasons. If I have a big enough collection, I can safely start breeding rats, and if I'm breeding my own food I can afford larger snakes.

tl;dr YEEHAW SNAKE SEX AND MONEY