Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a large 7' female boa. Back in October 2006 I place a young male with her. No interest. In January 2007 I place a different male in with her. He courted her like crazy. By the end of January he showed no further interest. I took the male out in mid February and just figured the female was long enough but not real big. She was born in 2004. So I figured I would try again next year. The months went buy. She got irritable and hefty.
As of 4 weeks ago I started feeding her weekly. Then today she delivered 11 slugs and 3 premies. She has not been with a male since February. Any ideas on how this happened? I am really upset with losing the babies because they were super nice. Another two weeks and the babies would be fine. The mother does not appear to have lost much weight and has been eating weekly. Do you think I could breed her this fall?

Thanks,
Dan

It sounds to me like you forced her into parturition by the extremely excessive and totally unnecessary feeding towards the end of her gravidity.

You shouldn't feed pregnant boas towards the end of their gravidity...no less than 4 weeks prior...because you might risk early delivery which would give you premies.

I feed my pregnant boas every 2nd or 3rd week for the first 70 days post POS...and they are fed very very small meals.

As for the slugs, she most likely wasn't sexually mature when you bred her at being 2.5 yeares old...although it's been done many times...but you'll see many more slugs this way. You'll have many more successful litters in the future when you allow the females to reach full sexual maturity befrore you try.

Better luck next time.

Kevin

-----------------
www.bciexotics.com

That I know. If I knew she was pregnant I never would have fed her. I just don't understand how she could have babies 7 months after being with the male. She does not look like she has lost a pound. How soon would I be able to try and breed her again?

Dan

A boa can retain sperm for a long time after they last copulate. And not ovulate for many months after last copulation. A boa is not gravid until they ovulate and once they do ovulate will give birth in a certain amount of time. Many people have been fooled into thinking their boas have very long gestation periods (see post a few threads down) when in fact they were just retaining sperm and ovulating later than many.