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I use to keep and breed kingsnakes, started in the early 60's. My favorite species were Calkings, but I bred all sorts of species, from zonatas, to pyros, to all the montane kings
(mexicana).

I have not kept any captive produced colubrid snakes, for a decade or so.

My question is, what happened to them? They shrunk, both the babies and adults. I seem to remember, baby calkings to be of decent size. In fact, all the babies were.

Recently, I have been getting some kings, some as gifts and some were purchased. I recently purchased a nice calking, that was around 7 inches long. Also, I was givin a tarahumara king that was even smaller.

I know I've been away for awhile, but, I seem to remember them to consistantly be in the 12 to 14 inch range as hatchlings. Of course, I did hatch a dwarf every once in a while.

Also, most but not all by any means, adults I see are very small. Any thoughts would be welcome. F

The pic is a small calking I recently purchased. Compare the snake to aspen shavings.

I'm bound to get in trouble over this ...but my own opinion is that it is a combination of;inbreeding, double clutching and pumping snakes to make them breed earlier. All these can lead to inferior babies in succesive generations. When they stop being a hobby and start being a crop....Quality can suffer. The old saying is correct; "Quality takes time and Patience".
Frank

I don't think that would be it, because you just discribed what I did.

I have always found the individuals that grew the fastest, bred the best and for the longest. I believe if an individual fails for a mechanicial reason, then you should look at the support system and not the animals.

We had no problem with double clutching females breeding for over 15 years. Even after that, they continued to breed, but produced fewer clutches and less eggs. But then, that could have been my fault.

Never had a problem with inbreeding either, as I experimented with direct brother/sister crosses for many generations. Again without a problem.

I do understand, that anything can happen and it sooner or later is bound to. It just did not occur for me. F

It depends on the genetics of the parent snakes and who you get them from. I have some 2003 babie california kingsnakes that I had reserved for at the daytona show and some of them are about 12- 16 inches long.

>> My question is, what happened to them? They shrunk, both the babies and adults. I seem to remember, baby calkings to be of decent size. In fact, all the babies were.

Interesting question. And some interesting opinions in the thread. Just for objectivity's sake, it would be interesting for you to get a precise, actual measurement of the king that's impressed you as being so small, as well as any other hatchlings you've gotten. Tembmer how quickly hatchlings can grow, too, so a september or october hatch may be considerably smaller than those that hatched in june or july and have been feeding.

Another factor is the phenomenon (i don't know the name for it) of exaggerated memories. A couple examples:

1) as a kid, i owned one gopher snake, one red rat, and one chain king. I've been to the daytona show for years and years, to the mid-atlantic show, to the ETHS show, the tampa show, etc., and i've never found a single specimen of any of those species that matches the one I had as a kid. Fact? Probably not, probably exaggerated memory. But it's a strong feeling. The early animals obviouisly made a deep impression on me. (btw, i take back part of that statement: Lee Abbott DOES have one red rat that exceeds the childhood specimen I remember).
2) my ex-wife for years told how she had broken her leg sledding, as a child, down a big hill and running into a telephone pole at the bottom. We visited the site as adults, and the "big hill" was just taller than I. So to a gradeschool kid, that seven or ten foot (albeit steep) hill left a bigger-than-real impression, especially when compounded by the trauma of a broken leg.

Are you remembering the hatchlings from 15 years ago realistically, or with exaggerated memories? I dunno, but it's a possibility. Sometimes, after my first clutch hondos have been around for a couple or three months, I'm surprised at how small the 2nd clutch babies are, because I've gotten used to the growing babies. And then, the next summer, the first clutch babies suprise me with how small they are, because by then even the pyros from the previous year are bigger.

There was a semi-related thread here or on the milksnake forum, earlier this year, and several people told anecdotal accounts of exceptionally large kings (or milks?). I remember asking people to provide some documentation, since a number of the anecdotes references snakes that were still alive. A few people responded, but i was struck equally by the reports that were NOT followed up with any substantiating photos. But yeah, there were a few remarkable animals--a five foot pyro, for example?

Good question you raise.

peace
terry

Probably from a breeding of small or young (18 month) adults or could just be the runts of the clutch. I have also had several eggs that contained twins. Twins also start out small and so do small eggs that have partial yokes.
In my experience if they are runts and started small they sometimes make haste from a ravenous appetite and catch up and pass the normal sized babies in growth.
Good luck with them!
Peanut Butter brooksi twins:

.

I think some of it has to do with folks breeding for color and not size as well as breeding young but I also feel a lot of it is embelished memory as Terry puts it. An example of this I see often in my other pet interest would be numerous folks telling about their 8 inch Redknee Tarantulas they had as kids when the species simply does not get that large. Most folks don't measure their animals with a ruler and no matter how good a guess is made without a measure it is still a guess. Time also has a way of growing sizes out of proportion in the human mind.

Phil

But that usually applies to remembering something larger or bigger then life. But 12 to 14 inches in not large or bigger then life, is it?????

Also, that does not explain hatchling calkings being 7 or 8 or nine inches. I just measured this individual and its 228mm, to be exact. I have had it three weeks and its eaten 14 pinkies and shed once. It was also at least two months old when I got it. At least that when the nice fella that sold it to me, said he had what i was looking for.

For bluerosy, yes I understand dwarfs and twins, in fact a friend had four large eggs from one female pyro and said they have to be twins. The funny part was, they were. I also, hatch many sets of twins, but not in one clutch.

I go to lots of shows and see lots of colubrids. I do see large pines, a few large gophers(some really nice deppi jani)(which i have seen tons of in nature) But lots of very small adult calkings, montane kings(especially true here) and GBK's, I will admit to seeing a few larger adults of these.

I have to admit, I have seen lots of all these species in nature, so I do have some idea how large they can be. I will also admit to pioneering many of the kingsnake morphs that are here now. In this case, i did pioneer the morph I showed the pic of. Only we did not call them Banana kings. A banana king, was a wild morph, found in the vista drainage, north of San Diego. They were a very yellow king with darker yellow bands. Hence, banana. Thanks for the effort. F

That's why I mentioned trouble....Everybody has a different opinion.
Frank

To not agree is not trouble, its simply a difference of opinion or experience. It really means nothing more then that. F

Semmantics are just that...Trouble is wasting your time giving an opinion on a subject that no one agrees on...Def:see HYBRID
Frank

>>I think some of it has to do with folks breeding for color and not size as well as breeding young but I also feel a lot of it is embelished memory as Terry puts it. An example of this I see often in my other pet interest would be numerous folks telling about their 8 inch Redknee Tarantulas they had as kids when the species simply does not get that large. Most folks don't measure their animals with a ruler and no matter how good a guess is made without a measure it is still a guess. Time also has a way of growing sizes out of proportion in the human mind.
>>
>>Phil

My own experiences are the two clutches I had hatch out this year, three out of four of the parent snakes were 18 months old at the time of breeding.

Cal Kings:

Both parent snakes were 18 months old, but quite large, had 8 eggs. One of those eggs was HUGE, I was convinced it was a twin. It wasn't. It was a hatchling that was about 15 inches long (nope, didn't measure it, but the egg-box was 12 inches on the long side, six inches on the short side, and it stretched out in a way so that we were certain it was at least 14 inches with some curvature still, leading to the 15 inch estimate.) The others were all roughly the same length as the one side of the egg box... around 12 inches.

Blotched (Appalachicola) Kings

The female was 18 months, the male older. The female had 8 eggs and one slug. The babies that hatched out were all in the 10 - 11 inch range. They hatched 9 days early after an AC failure in our house sort of jump started them.

228 mm.... isn't that close to 9 inches? I have doubts that the hatchling could be 2 months old. Even my most reluctant 2-month old feeder is closer to 15 inches in length (blotched king hatchlings) Growing like weeds!
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~Sasheena

Hi Frank, I'm surprised that no one mentioned this- with "artificial" incubation techniques being refined over the years, it's possible to safely increase temps therefore shortening the time (number of days) to hatch. It's traditional thinking that lower temps/longer hatch time equals larger neonates, and vice versa. People may be "quickening" the process with higer than average temps to get the offspring sooner, but resulting in smaller hatchlings. Now, by my own experience this isn't always the case. By coincidence, my example happens to be some "higher white" Cal Kings that have consistantly produced smaller hatchlings from good sized adults with normal incubation times (60 days.) In the "old" days of more natural incubation (boxes in the top of the closet, etc) hatch times usually were longer (70 days or so) so fuller development was the norm. All this may not have a thing to do with it, but it's another thought to add to the list. I've kind of noticed the same thing as you, but didn't really think much
about it, so thanks for making the brain work a little.

Eimon