Reptile & Amphibian Forums

this is another hold back from my possible harleqin litter (had two males with the mother so I can't prove lineage unless I can prove him as a super hypo - in which case he would then also be proven as a harlequin)..

I believe this one is a male, but this was my first litter so I'm not certain - and haven't tried probing - I'm guessing sex by just feeling the underside of the tail and looking at spurs.. this one has small spurs but enough to think he might be a male and I can usually feel the lumps when I roll my thumb under his tail. I haven't tried to "pop" them yet either. I did see the video on Youtube by Ralp Davis where he gives an excellent demo of popping male ball pythons. Would any of you Boa Experts out there want to produce a short video of popping boas??? or could you tell me if balls and boas are similar with regard to "popping" them..?

Congrats on all the litters and best of luck with all the breedings yet to go! I've had two litters so far this year - both were mostly slugs - but I have one more to go (Salmon Aby X Normal Aby from Mike at Basically Boas).. (fingers crossed!!!!).

thanks for looking,
Patrick

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Too hard to explain, you can call me from the number on my website and I can explain it, much easier than popping!

Chris

No need to ever pop Boas. Thumb roll for babies, adults you can usually do it by sight. Mature males develop keeled scales around their spurs.
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Gilbert Boas
The Boa List!

thanks for the advise.

I have been doing the thumb roll.. I thought I described that clear enough in my post but maybe not.
what threw me was that a few I thought were females ended up having bumps in the tail when I tried the thumb roll again after they were a few months old.. so none of my males turned out to be females, but a few of the females ended up being males - I think.. for my holdbacks, I'm relying on their behavior once I place them with mature boas at a future breeding time.

I sold about half the offspring from this litter and have not heard from anyone that I mis-sexed any.. I guess no news is good news.? hopefully....

thanks again,
Patrick