Reptile & Amphibian Forums

last year i bred my het pied male to my het pied female. 5 eggs. 1 male pied and 1.3 poss het pieds. this year i attempted to breed them again. they refused to breed. i tried at least 6 times with no copulation. in june the female laid 8 eggs. 5 were slugs. of the 3 remaining eggs 2 were infertile and one was fertile. i am 100% sure that no breeding took place this year. i assume that it was a case of sperm retention from last year. perhaps that was the reason she refused to breed this year. any thoughts on this?
oh, an a pic of the hatchling from the fertile egg. Rin

love that snake.....CONGRATS!

you are in the "luck" group of 08' There seems to be some crazy stuff going on. The axanthic pied, go read the story.......then I saw an albino from a poss het male to a supposedly "normal" female, then a mojave x normal that threw a paradox lucy......the fellow below who had got the pied male and gravid het girl in on a trade and now you! one egg, from NO breeding (that you are aware of) and you happen to get a 90% high white pied. anyways, you all suck! just kidding of course.......nice snakes, congrats to everyone.
-----
Jon F

I say it was sperm retention Ive had Burms do this. When I was getting out of Burms many years ago. I sold my male Albino and kepted the Females,Two of them layed eggs almost a year after. Over half the clutch was fertile with no male around,goes to show.

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

there has been numerouse cases of sperm retention in female ball pythons--PROBABLY alot more than people think, especially when switching males.

Wow - what a beauty!!