Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was checking out a few of my yearlings such as this '07 La Pine and this '07 Presidio Co. affinis/sayi intergrade (a naturally ocurring intergrade)and the size difference is as interesting as the color variety we see within the Pituophis genus. Both have been feed at about the same frequency, but off course the La Pines start out so much larger.

Scott John Reptiles

That's interesting. I have found, with my somewhat limited experience with Pituophis, that males seem to grow faster than females. Has anyone else seen this or is that just the way my particular specimens are maturing.

Matt Kauffman

I found that when you record everything- number of meals, mass of each prey item, length and mass of the snakes, etc.,- that in a cb group there is not much difference between males and females, but there can be big differences in individuals.

just an observation!

daveb
-----
in the light, you will find the road...

That's what I thought. Thanks for the info. I guess I'll just have to get some more Pit's to enjoy.

Matt Kauffman

Scott,

I did a year long growth study on a group of cb Louisiana pines back in '06-'07. I would be curious how big your yearling(s) got?

And in the end they will probably be close to the same size...

daveb
-----
in the light, you will find the road...

My La Pines are around 3 ft, they are big enough to take large adult mice or weaned rats, and yes that is a good point, both of these snakes will reach about the same size as adults even though they start out with a drastic difference in sizes. BTW the below pic was taken several months ago, this guy is much larger now.

i noticed the same observation with my bulls, my female white-sided is 104 grams and a female snow that i have is 308 grams. they are kept in the same rack (same temp and feeding rutine). two bull snake, that i just got rid of where around 300 grams as well.

its kinda frustrating since she is not growing near as fast as the others. she escaped for 1 month and when i found her to was amazing how much bigger the other bulls where then her.

Hey Scott
Not sure if those are the L.A'S that you got from me or not(thay look like my little tigers), but either way they look great. I find that in the first year they grow larger in girth than even length. I had quite a few more L.A babies this year and already they are bigger than all my 08 Bulls.

Andy

Hi Andy,
Yes, these are the ones from you and they are doing great...they are such beasts.

Scott John Reptiles