The first problem that needs to be addressed is the importation of ball pythons. This needs to stop before you will ever see larger amounts of normal captive bred animals being produced. This is just a number game. Nobody, and I mean nobody is going to be able to breed, raise and sell captive bred normals for the same price as imported babies.
On the flip side of this, there are numerous amounts of captive bred normals also being produced as a bi-product of co-dominant breedings, ie. pastels, spiders, mojaves and etc. There are breeders all over this country who have these snakes available. The catch here again is still going to be price. I personally think that $50.00 for a captive bred animal is a great price. I wouldn't hesitate to spend that on a cb. I see some of the larger breeders selling normal captive bred hatchlings for $100.00 and they sell them out! Normal ball python have and always will have a very important role in the propagation of the high end morphs.
In reality, the community here on Kingsnake is a very small percentage of the herp community. This small percentage that you see here happens to be more involved with high end morphs. Nonetheless, breeding, housing, heating and feeding are all things ball python owners and conniseurs contend with. Whether it be normal, morph, import or cb, the information found here is invaluable and applies to all of them across the board, making Kingsnake an invaluable tool to ALL persons interested in herps.
Another viewpoint is this; True a vast vast majority of herpers will not fork out the large dollar amounts that morphs are commanding. Though this is a waiting game, eventually many of these morphs are going to be produced in even larger amounts as the price drops and more and more people will start breeding them. The prices will be dropping to a point where the "average" pet owner/herper can afford them. Then you will really see a fever hit the herp world!!!! Not any one breeder will ever be able to keep up with the demand for morphs when the prices do reach that point.
At this point the captive bred normals will also be in abundance and I personally hope it will force the importation market out of business as the damage they are creating on the wild populations is devastating (not to mention the devastation of the numerous animals that die in the process). Of course this will not be happening on a grand scale for quite some time. We do already see this with pastels. Pastels are starting to reach the price range of "average" pet owners.
Wow, I just really went out to left field on this post. Sorry for my ramblings. At any rate, there are many sources for captive bred normal ball pythons, one just needs to look a bit and do thier homework. Once we see the end of importing tens of thousands of animals from Africe, we will see more captive bred normals. Until then, most breeders will not devote their monies, time and efforts to lose money, hence the price of morphs.
Yes, normals need love too, but remember there are way, way, way more normals in the ball python market than morphs. Normals are beautiful and so are the morphs, they ALL grace our lives with their beauty and timelessness!
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Steve Garrett
info@serpentireali.com
www.serpentireali.com

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