I will try to make a very long story very short. Many people have puchased het this or that ball pythons from me in the past and I am always happy to hear them proved out as you know no matter how good people feel about buying a het from somebody they trust, they will feel that much better when a pied or albino or a whatever pops out of an egg. Kind of a feeling of relief right? I have been there believe me.
So the reason I post this is simple, I bought a small collection from a friend. Just a couple small racks of snakes. In this collection there were three proven het albino females that all had produced albino babies before and one "het albino" that my friend purchased from a big name guy in this business at a big herp show years ago. This female was bred only to the same albino male that fathered the other albino clutches and three years in a row she has produced not one albino, total of 18 hatched eggs. I bred her with the same male albino and another male albino this season. She has just laid 6 eggs.
I forgot to mention, his collection is small enough that there is no chance the animal was ever mixed or confused with something else. It is the same animal.
What I want your honest answer on is: With 24 eggs on the ground, all from albino x "het" there is almost non existent odds that her clutches have just been misses and that she is in fact not at all a het albino. What do you guys think should be said and/or done about this when the animal was purchased at a high price back when they had value and if the 6 eggs come out normal (hets) and no albinos at that point does anyone really think that it is unfair to accuse somebody of selling a normal as het with that big a test group and regardless of wether it was accidental or intentional what about all that lost income from that purchase? 4 years of selling albino babies at $1000-400 each as the market moved and the cost of raising and keeping the female all these years?
I would really like to hear opinions. We broach this subject sometimes but what really should be done? How is the best way to really deal with this problem and what do you think is fair for being out so much money?
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Evan Stahl Reptiles
www.evanstahl.com


