(Edited for KS.) High orange 04 Hog Island male bred to an 03 Cay Caulker female. Litter born 6-23-08 103-104 days POS. 8 live 2 slugs. Approx 16”-17” in length. 35-40g before feeding.
I had pondered for a while the idea of crossing my two smallest tamest boas, but it wasn’t really the plan until my aggressive female hog tried to eat Crictor, the male hog, good thing I was watching. I didn’t have a mate yet for Maybelline the Cay Caulker, so I decided what the heck, another locality guy joins the dark side. Ov swell.
Both parents are so tame I wasn’t even sure they’d breed, but the male bred so vigorously he went off feed and was stressed enough to be my first boa to get sick. So I think only two slugs is pretty good considering he got sick before they were done breeding. His symptoms looked a bit like IBD at first, but he responded well to antibiotics and after a full recovery I even housed him with my pet BP to prove for sure he wasn’t carrying it. 100% guaranteed. ;^)
Couple weeks before birth.
It was a clean, dry birth, and small babies hidden under the paper so I wasn’t even exactly sure which day they dropped.
This was the first one I saw when I looked, he’s a keeper, figures he’s the last not to take ft.
I didn’t plan to make a long term project of it until a couple came out with aberrancies, now I suppose I’ll have to see if the stripe proves out. The other aberrant has a pin stripe, arabesque-ish appearance, but it has a crooked tail, so I gave it to a friend who won’t breed it. Here it is as a newborn.
The rest are about what you would expect, sort of mixed up colors, some pink bellies and freckles on nice miniature pet boas. A couple of them are still going through their hissy phase, otherwise perfect little examples of hybrid vigor. High ratio of males, might only have one girl.
I’ll be printing up birth certificates explaining exactly what they are, and that they should never be bred back with either parent locality. At least they don’t look like either parent. They have shed twice now, not squirmy when handled any more, and already doubled in weight. They’re a hit with the kids at the Napa Reptile Club.
I was tight lipped for a couple months because I didn’t want to stir up trouble with the peanut gallery. I didn’t follow up after I asked for help with the sick male, and grumpy gravid female, so a belated apology and thank you for your help.
Thanks also for the responses to my first post, the handful that I saw at least… (and sorry for the disappearing reappearing post.) I understand the negative responses, many crosses leave me shaking my head, this one made sense to me as a pet boa project. I mean really, why are color and pattern the only criteria breeders use for new projects, not size, temperament, or healthy gene pool?
I really appreciate the positive responses, I bet there would have been more but they’re scared. :^)
Most of my projects will still be purebred, but I do have a couple other morph crosses in the works as well.
