I purchased what I thought was a female hypo boa at the 2003 NARBC show in Tinley Park, IL from a vendor in the smaller section of the show.

I've raised the animal to adulthood with no abnormalities, great feeder, great shape. I fed the animal to ready it for breeding this winter, it fed great and is currently about 7 feet long and in great shape.

In early November I saw it cruising the cage, trying to escape, a sign of hunger I thought. Rather unusual behavior for this animal. I tried to feed it, it refused, thus I thought, it was ready to begin the cool down cycle with several weeks for it to deficate and empty out it's last meal.

Two days later I noticed that it had excaped its enclosure and put a nice scrape on it's head from scraping the side of the enclose in trying to escape. I taped up any rough surfaces and began the cool down cycle.

It's now been cooling (heat pad on during the day, off at night 75 degree temps) The animals continues to cruise the enclosure, my other boas are rather sedate but this one is frequently on the move trying to escape.

I began to think, is this the behavior of a male instead of the female I thought I bought? I looked at it's tail (pic attached) and instead of a stout thin tail like my other mature female being cooled, it has a full, gradually tapering tail after the cloaca like a male. It's on the slender side compared to my 8 foot female boat.

Questions:
1) Is this behaviour typical of some males?
2) Based on the pic, does it look like a male?

Sorry but I don't have probes and my girlfriend refuses to help if I had them.

Thanks for your help.

Merry Christmas

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• Experienced Breeder Question - AGERARD, Sat Dec 24 12:10:45 2005
• RE: Experienced Breeder Question - whitneywee, Sat Dec 24 14:25:24 2005
• Judgeing by the picture... - ChrisGilbert, Sat Dec 24 15:16:27 2005