Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i love playing the local lottery. so where im going with this is, i have seen a lot of ads for "unsearched" captive hatched imports. and to me thats kind of like playing the lottery. has anyone lucked out by doing this? i know the odds are stacked but is it worth the chance? also if i do decide to do this, and nothing pans out i know i can sell the animals to local pet stores for a profit! i guess thats a bonus. your opinions and input are appreciated. thanks

chris

I lucked out last year. Bought one bag of 10 and got this male in it. I got a 4.6 ratio.
This year I am getting more.

very cool, thanks for the reply. im pretty sure im going to do it. hell, i would be totally stoked to get a ringer. especially a female! but something interesting at all will be cool with me. take care.....

chris

Unsearched ?? , well I have got the garneted whining LOTO #s for your local LOTO for only 1$ a chance David

Truth is generally the best vindication against slander
Abraham Lincoln.

In Africa they pull the babies out of the egg and they get sorted into morphs, fancies, normals. The importers buy bags of normals or fancies - the lotto is for bags of normals (fancy bags can be had at a considerably higher $$$ amount you just have to ask) on occasion you'll get an interesting fancy - but the likelihood of getting anything other than a nice normal is very much dependent on how good the sorter in Africa was at spotting the oddities that day. Last year I ended up with a male heavy lot and a severely kinked baby I had to put down. You win some you loose some.

But it's fun to take a gamble - remember when they arrive - hydrate, hydrate, hydrate!!!!
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Tosha
JET Pythons

Very true.
The oddballs are in the fancies.
Cost more but you don't get run of the mill normals.
Some pretty nice looking animals pop up.

who did you get yours from?

I'm not sure Chris.. I wounder whos putting these babys in bags per ten.. They sure are not coming over like that.. Your best bet would to know a big breeder and be there when they arrive in a big crate,before the small bags. I hope this helps.

Van
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Forever Trust in what we are,and nothing else Matters

They are packed 10 to a bag and there are 20-30 bags per crate when they are shipped from Africa.

Do the imports come full of parasites? just wondering
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Adrian De Leon
Hissenia Reptiles

Not this early in the season if you wait to long then you can have parasite problems. This is my third year getting them. I love getting them even if they are normals.

well i talked to the distributor last night. now im trying to be a trusting person here. i was told the animals are captive hatched and never touch african soil, never drink african water and that the only way he knew of them having a tick is if there was a pin tick left on an egg after the female laid them. i was told to make sure they get plenty of water when they arrive and if i had any serious concerns get a vet to check fecal samples. he also said he dosent get graded bags (normals, fancies, morphs etc. etc.) anymore because the quality done in that manner didnt really seem to be there for him. i know im not going to open the bag and find the next big thing in ball pythons in there. obviously im not trying to make a ton of money here. im easy to please for the most part and thought this might be an interesting way to maybe get a cool looking snake. id bet dollars to doughnuts that nothing "crazy" will be in the bag. i was mainly just curious if any one else had done it and were they pleased with their bag.

where do u find ads for these,or go about getting in touch with somebody about these

i found the add in the classifieds.

chris

just wondering...

BP's are notoriously hard to start... seems like snatching them out of an egg, shipping them 1/2 way around the world... then being caged.... seems like it would stress them a wee- bit.....

how many die from this as well?

Beth
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The rescue site: www.freewebs.com/okreptilerescue

If you set them up properly, you should have no problem. I hatched a baby myself last year that would not eat and eventually has to be put down. Set up right and they will eat, best advice is set them up and leave them be till they shed.

We have bought 500-1200 a year for the last 4 years, and have had great luck with them.
As long as they are not given water in Africa before being shipped and you soak them here for rehydration, they do just as good as c.b.

Out of 1200 last year we have about 20 that didn't feed, that needed to be worked with.

The biggest thing is to get them when they are first brought in , and have not sat in crowded bins at wholesales waiting to be shipped. We house all our individually and have had great luck with them.

If they died as often as people think, then there would not be such a big market for them. Most of time time when people loose big numbers of them it is from not being set up and taken care of properly.
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J&J REPTILES
www.jnjreptiles.com
sales@jnjreptiles.com
(207)479-6658

a lot of them do die but when there is only a 7-14 day live guaranty they don’t report them ether out of shame that they had a snake die on them and a lot of these are first timers or are farley new to the hobby and don’t now how to plead there case . I had a guy tell me he got a bag and tree died in the first week and he called the guy he got them from and was told it was his fault because the temps were off by 4-5 degr.s And the fax’s are they were within the excepted parameters . But he didn’t have the experience to argue his case and was taken advantage of . And if you imported a large # of bags of Balls you don’t wont to loose money to dead louse so it dose happen ,a lot more often than it should . David

Truth is generally the best vindication against slander
Abraham Lincoln.

Have you ever bought large number of them?
You are talking about 1 guy.
Overall they all do well, but as we said if you get them when they have sat around in overcrowded conditions, in dirty cages then yes they will die, c.b would too.
When properly set up and if bought "fresh" from a reliable source they do very well. The biggest losses come from people who buy 50 and set them up 10 to a blanket box, and do not have the experience to deal with them. If you get them from a quality supplier, and set them up by themselves they do great. We keep ours in 6qt shoe boxes on newspaper or cypress mulch with a water dish and a disposable hide spot ( 16oz solo party cup split in 2) in a heated snake room with a temp of 85-87* and they do great!

We set up and started 850 last year, (the other 350 went out unstarted), and they all fed on the 1st or 2nd feeding attempt, and they all did great, all the customers that got them were very happy with them.

My advise is : If you dont know what you are doing dont buy 100 of them.
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J&J REPTILES
www.jnjreptiles.com
sales@jnjreptiles.com
(207)479-6658

Yes I have and they were from a importer and they were all hand picked by him and there were 2 dead in the bags he sent and they had already been hydrated by them when they came to his place were they had all been dumped out and separated into groups and rebagged and then select bags sent to select .Of coerce he replaced them . But not every one new the bags had been gone threw , that is one of my points you have no way of knowing if they have been gone threw . And he later told me eh had 8% dead louse that year . But yes if you know what your doing you can role them if they don’t eat . But a lot of people don’t . David

"I would rather be precisely wrong than approximately right"
Marion "Doc" Ford

im not sure of how many make it from these shipments. but i would definately have a colony of live soft furred rats ready to go! good luck!!!

chris

Just my opinion but I would not start them on asf, only in a extreme case. they usually start fine on hoppers with no problems.

good point. its probably best to try to start them on more efficient food supplies first (domestic mice/rats) and wait to use the soft furreds as a last resort!

chris

Definatly if you start them with asf they are hard to switch back. Best of luck with the babies when you get them.

They feed on domestic rodent just like a c.b animal does.
The biggest misconception with c.h is people treat them like wild caught animals when in reality they are closer to c.b
They have not been out in the bush feeding on Native rodents. They hatch and within 2 or 3 days of hatching they are in the us. It happens so fast that it doesn't have that big an effect on them. Set them up by themselves after you give them a good long soak in clean fresh water and they are good to go.

ASF : Everyone says how good they are, I get a lot of odd w.c specials, and morphs, and set up a bunch of asf rats and not a single w.c ball will look at them. Out of 50 or so w.c we bought this year have all but 5 or 6 have taken domestic rats and mice but will not take soft furs. Maybe its just us, but I dont think they are that great.
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J&J REPTILES
www.jnjreptiles.com
sales@jnjreptiles.com
(207)479-6658

I bought 1200 c.h last year, all unopened crates, 8 animals per bag, ( new rule by the airline), and we got some black backs, reduced patterns, etc. Nothing really nice other than a vanilla type animal. The babies are picked heavily in Africa, and the specials are all sold as specials. We are not doing any normals this year ( well maybe 200 or so for retail) but are just going to buy 500 specials when they start coming in. The lottery bags are fun, but your not going to get anything spectacular. Lots of nice healthy normals, black backs, and jungles.
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J&J REPTILES
www.jnjreptiles.com
sales@jnjreptiles.com
(207)479-6658

Since you're not likely to get anything REALLY interesting from these imports, why not support U.S. breeders and buy true CB balls in this country?
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

I agree completely. It goes back to the old thread of managing our own resources. Help sustain or even better "rebuild" the market here in the U.S.
Foot Hill Reptiles

I forgot to add. Last year at our local reptile expo I purchased 2 "fancy" normals for about $25 each. That is the best price I have found "although I don't look to hard" and in some sense what I got were just 2 normals but on that same note some details about them are way off in left field so who knows, maybe when they breed I will be the next millionaire but regardless until that time comes I sure am having fun watching them turn into monsters "shed problems and all" I think your odds on this would more than likely be the same if not worse than the lotto. I tried the loto a few times and never won a penny, thats why I stick with snakes, they are more profitable LOL.
Foot Hill Reptiles