Reptile & Amphibian Forums

just took the last pic of them before i put them away for the winter, this season will the second season that i am trying to breed these two, last season the male was too young and had no intrest in her, 22 infertile eggs for his lack of intrest, i hope this year he will breed her as he is much larger this year, wish me luck.
Greg c

Your male looks very thin to me. Is he off food? I like to have my snakes holding a bit more weight before cooling them down.

Phil

he is on the thin side but i think he looks much worse in the pic because he is next to the big 6ft female, Phil do i even have to cool the male down for him to breed? because i thought i could be feeding him while the female is cooled down and he would get larger and gain more weight by not cooling him down.
Greg c

My experience has been yes, the males need to be cooled down for successful reproduction. This is a very important aspect of these snakes natural biology and without it they will most likely not produce offspring.

Beautiful pair of snakes btw.

Phil

Thanks Phil, i was feeding the male 1 jumbo mouse 2 x a week, he is at that stage when they just start to get thicker or gain weight and start to look like an adult, he is an early 07 so he will be 3 in the spring, i don't know his exact length but i think he is a little over 4 ft long the female is about 6.5 feet long so she makes him look small in the pic.
Greg c

This is my opinion and others may disagree, but my Pits never see a mouse - ever. I start hatchlings on rat pinks and progress to crawlers/ pups/ smalls and and on towards medium adults. I have often read on this board in particular all the advice on raising Pits slow and cringed. These are large robust animals with a high metabolism. Quite simply, they need food to prosper. I sometimes get e-mails from some of my maintenance diet friends here telling me how their snakes did not survive the winter or failed to reproduce.

My snakes breed every year and do not die over winter. I have big hulking animals that are prime specimens. My advice to you is up grade the meal size on your animals and you will see positive results.

Phil

I agree with starting them on rats. I've heard of many pines that when started on mice, never would change from them. I know a poor soul who once picked up a huge order of chicks, as they were discounted. His pits loved them so much, he struggled afterwards with getting some of them back on rodents. Some went fast but others liked the chicks far longer than his supply lasted.

That is rough! I once acquired a big bullsnake years ago that was raised on mice and I never was able to get it to switch to rats. I really liked that snake but had to part with it do to this feeding idiosyncrasy. So much easier to just start them off on rats to begin with.

Phil

Although I do not necessarily disagree with feeding them strictly rats, and I have heard before about what you are describing, I have never experienced a pit not wanting to eat rats. I have raised pits on both mice and rats, more on mice due to food size issues, until the snakes get full adult size, and actually have had just a few take mice for years, then seem to only want rats and then the occassional mouse. Never though have I had some only want rats, but I do know it can happen. A good friend of mine who breeds pits never has had that happen either, but like I said, I do know it can. Shows that they can be stubborn!! LOL!

I know one guy whose adult graybanded king didn't want anything but small fuzzies....so he has to feed him a big pile of them! LOL!

Heck, my biggest pits got to be enormous from retired breeder mice. At this time, my biggest pits though do get both or either rats and retired breeder mice.
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Genesis 1:1

No doubt there are exceptions to every rule and many individual Pits can go back and forth on either mice or rats every other week and not miss a beat. On the other hand I have seen more than my share of mousers to know that this is a road I would just as soon avoid. It is a very real situation that exists with some individual Pits. IMO, I see no reason to even take that chance. Start them on rats and keep them there and it never becomes an issue. Feeding a large adult Pit on hand fulls of mice at each feeding can get rather expensive when compared to feeding it one appropriate sized rat. Just my thoughts.

Phil

Phil...What happen to the gallery page on your pituophis.org site? I sthere any plans to put it back?

Dan

Dan,

Unfortunately that was something that I put a lot of personal time into only to be let down by a friend who assured me he would handle it. The galleries were lost in a server switch and not backed up by my computer "friend". That was only the start. I could have added at least 100 more locale images due to my networking with other field guys - but it was not to be.

Sorry, Phil

Ouch. What a lose. Disheartening. As you know, I'm always looking for pics. Unfortunately, aside from you and a few others, it has been pretty weak lately.

Man they are pretty! Good luck next season

Dan Eby

Thanks Dan.
Greg c