Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hey frank, i wanted to know your take on "horny" males "raping" females(snakes)? if this occurs to a female that has not ovulated/cycled to breed(can it)& what if anything will happen? does it happen in the wild? i know i have some males that will breed a broomstick at this time of year!, also if a breeding occurs before ovulation in the female(can it?) & is there a time limit on how long the female can retain viable sperm to fertilize her eggs? ive had females double clutch w/o having been re-introduced w/the male and lay good eggs(sperm retention?),also in your experience is it possible for them to retain sperm or lay viable eggs a whole season or 2 or more without concurrent breedings?thanks,,,,,,,,thomas davis

That was the most amount of questions in a small paragraph, that I have ever seen. That is some efficent ? asking.

The problem with kingsnake is, without doubling the page and going back and forth. You can look at the post and write your responce.

So I have already forgot most of your questions. Or at least they have blended together.

Something about rape. Hmmmmmmmm A female must be "ready" in order to make viable eggs. You can call it what you will, receptive, whatever. If she is cycled/ready/receptive, she will be hmmmmmmm receptive. Get that? Althought this is not all together true. In my experience, a female is very choosy about which male she will breed early in the receptive period. But towards the end, she will cop a doorknob.

Normally there is a short window of oppertunity for a male to successfully copulate. My guess is about two weeks. But because keepers do not allow choices of suitable temps. This may or maynot be consistant, or anything like nature. Where they do have temperature choices.

In my experience females do not hold viable sperm from one clutch, to even as short as a second clutch. Muchless over winter.

The reason I say this is simple. I bred females to other species(crossing) I would breed a single female to a different species each time she cycled, without fail, the offspring expressed the traits of the current breeder. As I mentioned, this includes, several clutches per season, year after year.

Now for the punchline. I too have had kingsnakes produce viable eggs from times they did not copulate with a male. In these times, the offspring only resembled the female and none of the males she had ever bred in their lifes.

This is the advantage of raising hatchlings and keeping track of their reproductive history. I knew and seen offspring of all their breedings. Then when there was no copulation, and the offspring only resembled the female, that was evidence that something was amiss.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA yes I tried to publish that in the mid-seventies, but CAN YOU IMAGINE, what my peers(peer reviewed) thought of it. First they could not get over the idea of crossing so many species, they went bonkers over that. Remember, by their difinition at the time, different species meant they physically could not interbreed.

Muchless the mention of pathnogenic reproduction. Which has now been proven to occur in many species of snakes including kingsnakes. At the time, no sir, that does not happen with any snake.

About raping in the wild, I don't seen that. I see, what happens if a male is allowed to live with a female. That is, they attend the female thru out late fall, thru winter and up until the female cycles, they then copulate. Some species then dispurse, others do not.

I have seen many types of kings where the pairs stay together year around. Even more shocking, I have found many pairs of babies. That is, finding two individual neonates together, and having them be opposite sexes. I have seen that too many times for it to be an accident. So yes, my understanding may be different then most peoples, due to the experiences I have had.

Again, male snakes normally attend females, they do not rape them. In nature, the female would shed that male, crawl into a tight crevice or hole and not allow him to stay anywhere near. Remember in captivity, the female has no choice. Where is she going to go? Why don't you offer a tight hole or crevice and see what the females do. Yes, they know exactly what to do.

So with the knowledge that behaviorally females "know" how to avoid a randy male, then it must occur in nature.

AS you may know, I breed monitors. Male monitors are sorta like male tortosies, they will breed anything remotely similar to a female, naw, it does not have to be similar. The females also have very effiecent behaviors to get rid of the randy boys. The females simply dash into a crack and leave the male mating the edge of the crack. The males don't seem to mind.

The problem with many on this forum is, they do not provide the tools that allow the snakes to perform their normal everyday behaviors, then wonder why they don't see them.

For instance, in order to view these, male shedding behaviors, you first must have a cage large enough to equip with the proper hiding areas, and second, you must be able to easily view them. Which effectively eliminates most here from seeing any of this. Cheers

thanks for the responce frank,i have learned alot since youve been posting here, when your thirsty there is nothing like going right to the well, i to have found several kings in pairs in the wild and have some(w/c & c/b)ive had for 5 years that are mates & live together year around in captivity quite happily, it definately is all about the choices, it is interesting that you say males have about a 2week window for breeding, in my experiences i usally have males show alot of interest in the spring and fall and it seems they last longer than 2weeks,could that be from the scent of ovulating females at different stages that keeps them going?so to speak , with optimal conditions can a male be ready year around? theres always talk about "the window" of time for females id like to here about "a window" on males, also i did a cross of l.g.holbrooki(F)Xl.g.yumensis(M), and of course the babies looked just like l.g.splendida, but the female speck doubled without reintro to the male yuma and damned if the second clutch didnt look just like the first with lots of yuma traits sockhead,black belly,etc. so im pretty sure on that breeding sperm was retained, however the following year the speck was bred to another speck and ALL babies looked pure speck with no yuma influence which goes along with what your saying about parent ssp. and influence, im definately interested in parthagenesis(SP?) in females, have you raised up lone females that produced viable eggs? im ALL ears,,,,thanks,,,,,,,,thomas davis

About raising up virgin females, hmmmmmmmmm. I think I kept females only to bred to males. That is, I always had intent to breed this to that and that to this. So to not breed a female to a certain pattern or color male is totally against my makeup.

Besides, that is something for acadamic to do(if they could only do it) hahahahahahahahahaha Cheers