I can remember about 15 years ago an unnamed fellow first was breeding HYPO coastals(then considered albinos).$600 seemed too high for me at the time so I waited for the price to drop over the years.It never did.The price remained consistently high and they hold their price even til today because of 3 reasons.
1) Breeders would conspire to hold the high price--to a point of RELEASING het babies rather than lowering the price.BAD IDEA.
2) Coastals are notoriously difficult to start-which some breeders are working on.More babies die than make it though.
3)MOST IMPORTANTLY--these markets were artificial.You had to sell the snake,unlike today with the internet pics,they didnt sell themselves.With most breeders the art of the sale is lost to apathy or even refusal to TEACH,nuture and develop relationships beyond the sale.You should be encourging the newbies rather than keeping up with the BP Jones's.If you make good relationships you make much more than a sale.
But as these very real markets plunge the prices I suggest that the hondo has more of a chance to go by the way of the burmese python market without proper management.Like the corn snake,at some point the purists will step in.With the blowout of morphs the surest increase in this or any market will always be in high quality NORMAL phenotypes.
The uniqueness of tricolors is over.But why not encourage more people with cheaper snakes than fewer people with more expensive ones? Jeff

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