Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I see the occasional post here from owners of this beautiful species. This week I visited our local zoo, which has a fine pair, and was again struck by how impressive they are. However, I rarely see any in the classifieds. For the spilotes enthusiasts: Is this because of limited captive breeding? And how do husbandry requirements differ from most other snakes? Finally, anyone have some available?

from what i have found on the net there are about 3 breeding pairs in the states and a few random gravid females every year but there are alot of people that can help us out with the tigers, some of the most underated snakes in my opinion.

sorry i mean of spilotes, i have only heard of one breeder of spilotes pullatus

There are five breeders I know personaly. There are quite a few breeding snakes out there but not to many are being released to the public at this time. The breeders are working on establishing them and tracking locality. Projects are Mexican Spilotes, High yellow, Banded, Speckled and so on. There is a couple that live in Kentucky that sell offspring a few times a year. Don Bordner now has the largest collection I know of in the US and he also has a nice variety of locality spescific animals. This male is from Honduras and now lives at Don's.

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"Life without risk is to merely exist."

thats what i'm talking about, i can't wait another two months...

here's some old pics of my high yellow breeding pair, the female is shown on the cage door. the male is an 03 from dean alessandrini & is simply enormous. as display snakes, this species is unparalled! they are big, beautiful, super alert & very active. the only drawback [other than their appeites] is that their feces tend to be watery which requires fairly constant maintainence esp. in an aboreal setup.

I agree that they are as impressive as they come. Whoever gets a good breeding program going is likely to have more business than they can ever handle.

There's alot of us that breed stuff that are't frequent visitors of these forums. I've been breeding Spilotes for almost 6 years now and am onto F3 offspring that I thought would go this Spring but nothing yet.

I had the misfortune of introducing a new breeder male a few years back that died shortly after quarantine and the rest of my adults died w/in 3 weeks! What was worst is my foundation breeders were 11' at 9 years old and were tame as kittens! I've held back the last three years' hatchlings and should be back in the classifieds w/subsequent production.

Like my Goynosomas, all offspring I've produced for sale were/are spoken for before they even hatch. If only the Goynos were as problem free as the Spilotes!

Bill

sorry to hear about that bill. here's hoping your f3's will go!

Yeah, it was a crushing loss! Spilotes can spoil you w/their hardiness. Thankfully it didn't spread to the rest of the collection. I didn't have any postmortem lab work done but I think it was coccidiosis.

Bill
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The Menagerie:
3.8 Emerald Tree Boas
2.4 Spilotes Pullatus
1.3 Chondros
2.4 Red Tailed Green Rats - Maylasian Origin
2.2 Scrub Pythons (Kofiau, Moluccan)
1.1 "Sunburst" Indian Sand Boas (Adults retain juvie coloration)
Veileds, Jacksons, and Panther Chams