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I need some help. What entails a breeding loan besides I give my male/female to breed with your male/females? Who keeps them while copulation is occuring? Is there a "fair" deal on babies, or just 50/50? Any help will be very helpful!
Thanks,
Greg
Link

This year is my first year, with a breeding loan. I have a fat female and a pal has a suitable male. The deal between us is first of all split the eggs evenly, 8 pop out, 4 a piece. After incubation, we make sure all are fertile. Say 1 out of 8 is infertile, it's now 3 eggs a piece and we sell the extra, split the money between that egg. Once they have hatched and are sexed, we'll split them female/male evenly also. If it turns out uneven again, I guess we'll work something out also.

I guess you just have to trust somebody enough to do it. I have his snake at my place, since september, and all the food has been on me thus far.

Hope that helps a little.

Joel

>>I need some help. What entails a breeding loan besides I give my male/female to breed with your male/females? Who keeps them while copulation is occuring? Is there a "fair" deal on babies, or just 50/50? Any help will be very helpful!
>>Thanks,
>>Greg
>>Link
-----
- Joel Smith

"If you're not part of the solution, you're still part of the problem"

I don't think there is a "standard" agreement for breeding loans since they aren't done all that often. Many seem to be wary of them and I have seen at least one post of a breeding loan gone bad.

However, ever the optimist, I've been trying them for a while and will try several more this year. Unfortunately neither of the two females I borrowed in past years was quite big enough to produce so I haven't yet followed all the way through to splitting up eggs.

If the snakes are of similar value a near even split seems appropriate. However, I consider breeder females to be intrinsically high value so a big normal might be about the same value as a male het or possible het for an expensive morph. Often I would think the person with the more valuable snake might want to host the breeding and especially after putting in that extra work that person might get first pick. If you then rotate picking one at a time and agree to this order ahead of time you shouldn't run into problems on what to do with any extra babies, extra females, or unusual/morph babies.

Concerns that need to be considered include what to do if something happens to a loaned snake and how to be sure you aren't spreading diseases or parasites through breeding loans.

Joels417 has my het for albino male ball. He has a very thick female. I feel she is wild caught because of the price he paid for it. But she is parasite free and one of the biggest pigs you will find.I am a little nervous because of the time and money spent on him. We are both learning this year so all of it is in gods hands.

Joel let me know how much you feed him and i will even up with you. I feel if she lays eggs you would need the rats then, to get her weight up.
Are we going about the sepration of the babies correctly. I feel what ever hatches should be sexed and divided between us. What is left should be sold and the money split.

>>I don't think there is a "standard" agreement for breeding loans since they aren't done all that often. Many seem to be wary of them and I have seen at least one post of a breeding loan gone bad.
>>
>>However, ever the optimist, I've been trying them for a while and will try several more this year. Unfortunately neither of the two females I borrowed in past years was quite big enough to produce so I haven't yet followed all the way through to splitting up eggs.
>>
>>If the snakes are of similar value a near even split seems appropriate. However, I consider breeder females to be intrinsically high value so a big normal might be about the same value as a male het or possible het for an expensive morph. Often I would think the person with the more valuable snake might want to host the breeding and especially after putting in that extra work that person might get first pick. If you then rotate picking one at a time and agree to this order ahead of time you shouldn't run into problems on what to do with any extra babies, extra females, or unusual/morph babies.
>>
>>Concerns that need to be considered include what to do if something happens to a loaned snake and how to be sure you aren't spreading diseases or parasites through breeding loans.
-----
Thomas Jones
aligatorhunter@earthlink.net
(252) 757-3879

My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, I Sure Do Miss HIM!!!

Good luck! I bet it will work out fine for ya'll.

I'm thinking a het albino male and a big normal female are probably a pretty even match now days (at least if she is one that will really breed).

Now if the male was a visible morph then it would be lopsided and maybe some other agreement would be in order. But then again how much does it really "cost" the male to breed one more female?

If for example you had a nice male and where breeding it to as many females as you had available and someone you trust has a big guaranteed clean female ready to go and says "lets put them together a couple days a week for the next three weeks". In the perfect world where there would be no risk or haste to trying this (I know, not the case) you might hit the timing right and get half of an extra bunch of eggs for a few days of your male's time. It would be fun to be in a position (and have a valuable enough male) to try something like that and see how thin a male can be spread and what sort of results you would get.

Randy,
You're doing the thing I was thinking of!!
Het male to norm female.
Keep the first litter breed back, and find out who is who!!
Good Luck,
Greg
Link

In my original post I said we would also divide by sex. We also agreed in the original event that it would be 50/50. The way normal females are selling now a days, especially large ones, like my baby, I think it is even. I have seen 100% Het Albino breedables for 150 shipped. If you dont think this is fair, let me know, we need to work something out. Take Care man,

Joel

>>Joels417 has my het for albino male ball. He has a very thick female. I feel she is wild caught because of the price he paid for it. But she is parasite free and one of the biggest pigs you will find.I am a little nervous because of the time and money spent on him. We are both learning this year so all of it is in gods hands.
>>
>> Joel let me know how much you feed him and i will even up with you. I feel if she lays eggs you would need the rats then, to get her weight up.
>> Are we going about the sepration of the babies correctly. I feel what ever hatches should be sexed and divided between us. What is left should be sold and the money split.
>>
>>
>>>>I don't think there is a "standard" agreement for breeding loans since they aren't done all that often. Many seem to be wary of them and I have seen at least one post of a breeding loan gone bad.
>>>>
>>>>However, ever the optimist, I've been trying them for a while and will try several more this year. Unfortunately neither of the two females I borrowed in past years was quite big enough to produce so I haven't yet followed all the way through to splitting up eggs.
>>>>
>>>>If the snakes are of similar value a near even split seems appropriate. However, I consider breeder females to be intrinsically high value so a big normal might be about the same value as a male het or possible het for an expensive morph. Often I would think the person with the more valuable snake might want to host the breeding and especially after putting in that extra work that person might get first pick. If you then rotate picking one at a time and agree to this order ahead of time you shouldn't run into problems on what to do with any extra babies, extra females, or unusual/morph babies.
>>>>
>>>>Concerns that need to be considered include what to do if something happens to a loaned snake and how to be sure you aren't spreading diseases or parasites through breeding loans.
>>-----
>>Thomas Jones
>>aligatorhunter@earthlink.net
>>252) 757-3879
>>
>> My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, I Sure Do Miss HIM!!!
-----
- Joel Smith

"If you're not part of the solution, you're still part of the problem"

I agree normal females are getting higher! I was saying that when she lays i will give you the same number of rats you fed my male. To help you get the weight back on her. I am not trying to get more babies we agreed 50/50. And i am sticking to that. I just want to see some eggs hatch. I would be happy. But i guess i would still be considered the Professional Slug producer. LOL

>>In my original post I said we would also divide by sex. We also agreed in the original event that it would be 50/50. The way normal females are selling now a days, especially large ones, like my baby, I think it is even. I have seen 100% Het Albino breedables for 150 shipped. If you dont think this is fair, let me know, we need to work something out. Take Care man,
>>
>>Joel
>>
>>
>>>>Joels417 has my het for albino male ball. He has a very thick female. I feel she is wild caught because of the price he paid for it. But she is parasite free and one of the biggest pigs you will find.I am a little nervous because of the time and money spent on him. We are both learning this year so all of it is in gods hands.
>>>>
>>>> Joel let me know how much you feed him and i will even up with you. I feel if she lays eggs you would need the rats then, to get her weight up.
>>>> Are we going about the sepration of the babies correctly. I feel what ever hatches should be sexed and divided between us. What is left should be sold and the money split.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>>I don't think there is a "standard" agreement for breeding loans since they aren't done all that often. Many seem to be wary of them and I have seen at least one post of a breeding loan gone bad.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>However, ever the optimist, I've been trying them for a while and will try several more this year. Unfortunately neither of the two females I borrowed in past years was quite big enough to produce so I haven't yet followed all the way through to splitting up eggs.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>If the snakes are of similar value a near even split seems appropriate. However, I consider breeder females to be intrinsically high value so a big normal might be about the same value as a male het or possible het for an expensive morph. Often I would think the person with the more valuable snake might want to host the breeding and especially after putting in that extra work that person might get first pick. If you then rotate picking one at a time and agree to this order ahead of time you shouldn't run into problems on what to do with any extra babies, extra females, or unusual/morph babies.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Concerns that need to be considered include what to do if something happens to a loaned snake and how to be sure you aren't spreading diseases or parasites through breeding loans.
>>>>-----
>>>>Thomas Jones
>>>>aligatorhunter@earthlink.net
>>>>252) 757-3879
>>>>
>>>> My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, I Sure Do Miss HIM!!!
>>-----
>>- Joel Smith
>>
>>"If you're not part of the solution, you're still part of the problem"
-----
Thomas Jones
aligatorhunter@earthlink.net
(252) 757-3879

My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend, I Sure Do Miss HIM!!!

Trust, it's a big word that carries alot of weight.

As far as what is fair in dividing the babies is concerned, it depends on the prices of the breeders, if you ask me.

Say for instance, you want to breed your albino to someone's normal. If an adult albino, at that time, costs $5000 and a normal costs $200 then 25 babies should go to the person that owns the albino for every 1 that goes to the person with the normal.--the same ratio as the price of the parents 25:1 (these prices/ratios should be considered at the time the babies are to be divided in my opinion as prices can fluctuate considerably from the time of breeding loan until babies are produced).

If you are breeding normals to normals, there are 2 ways to consider it. Generally 1/2 the babies plus 1 is a good formula. The person who is taking care of them should get an extra one if there is an odd number of babies. You can also consider food costs and such and include that as part of the equation (you supply 1/2 the food and they supply 1/2), but basically, it's a contract so just do what you think is fair, and if you think it isn't fair, suggest to the person that you are dealing with that you reverse rolls and see if they are happy with that deal instead. If they don't like that deal, then it probably wasn't fair to begin with. Another way to consider it is to keep track of everything. This can be a real pain, but if you do it that way, very little is left to interpretation. Keep track of food costs, heating costs, etc. Then sell all the babies and subtract the costs from that money and divide by 2. Kind of messy.

And most importantly, write the deal down and list every possible outcome you can think of in the contract and how it will be handled! That includes no breeding, one of the breeders dying, a loss due to fire, theft, etc.--and make sure both parties sign and date it and have copies. You could even sign the contract in front of a notary public if it is high end animals or you don't trust the person.--You also need to consider the sex of the babies as certain morphs are far more valuable as females (or males). I wouldn't want to get 2 male pastels and the other person get 3 female pastels! You could even ask for collateral to make sure you get your breeder snake/babies back at the end of the contract.

Rodney

Work out the details with your FRIEND in a way that seems fair to both of you. In my case, my friend has a het pied and I have a male pastel. Last year she bred two of my girls to her het pied and I bred two of hers to my pastel. We had agreed ahead that the one with the male (for each clutch) should get the first pick, and we'd just take turns. So, she ended up with 2.0 pastels, I ended up with .2; She ended up with 2.3 PH pieds, I ended up with 2.2. That seemed fair to both of us. We both got something we would not have had otherwise, but still got the first pick of the snakes sired by our own (expensive) males.

That worked GREAT!!!
Greg
Link

WOW!!!! 25 babies from a Ball Python, that would really be some record#!! LOL I know exactly where you're coming from, very good examples!
Greg
Link

That was funny.

I was actually saying that because of a post I saw earlier on this forum where someone was going to breed his normal to someone else's albino and then they would split the babies. What a terrible deal that was for the guy with the albino! I couldn't believe anyone would do that, but it was probably just a bogus post.

The guy with the normal gets some hets. which individually are worth way more than his normal and the guy with the albino also gets some hets. that are worth way less than his albino.

kind of like crossing a yugo with a lamborghini and both owners get a mustang in return! (yeah, I like cars...but not yugos!) Seems there is a car analgy for everything if you love cars.

That guy with the albino ball needs to go to business school or something!

Rodney

I'm assuming you are talking about someone sending a normal female to be bred to an albino male.

Rather than thinking of it from the envious perspective of "hey, this guy with a normal got half a clutch of albino hets for almost nothing" I think of it from the perspective of "the guy with the albino got an extra half clutch of hets he wouldn't have gotten otherwise". I'm not saying it would always make sense because of the risk and bother factors but it could work out for both especially if the albino owner is for some reason short on females. Sure the guy with the albino could have bought more normal females but maybe at the last minute he is thinking his boy could take on a few more females. Maybe he only puts that pair together a few times. As long as the person with the normal agrees to the reduced chance of getting anything against the chance of getting het albinos it MIGHT work out. I've got to assume that just one good breeding at just the right time could be sufficient even though you usually wouldn't want to risk it with your own females that you have a lot invested in.

from a purely business perspective, if two people invest in a business venture and one puts in $100,000 and the other puts in $5,000, it is pretty foolish to split the profits equally--even if the person with the $100,000 investment would be making some extra money he wouldn't have otherwise. True, they both may gain on the deal, but the gains should be distributed in proportion to the amount invested.

But, then again, there is a fool born every minute. And if you can find one and he doesn't mind being taken advantage of, more power to you.

Rodney

How about this:

You buy a $100,000 building but there is a back room you aren't using. If you rent it out for $5,000 do you feel taken advantage of if your renter uses it for a business that makes a higher rate of return than what you use the rest of the building for?

Not a perfect analogy by any means since you didn’t sell the other guy the normal female and your businesses compete with each other.

Just a different philosophical outlook. Maybe some day I'll have some nice snakes and get to put it to the test.

I've only done breeding loans 3 times before. Once I got nothing because no breeding took place. That was the good one. Twice I got dead snakes back in plastic bags. Obviously you have to trust the person that you are doing the loan with, otherwise you wouldn't even consider it, right? So just think of all the things that could possibly go wrong, Discuss a way to work it with the other party, and put it in print.

What happens if one of the animals dies? Who will owe what to whom?

What happens if one of the animals gets sick? Who pays the vet bill?

What if one of the animals is abducted by aliens? Who calls NASA?

Ok that's kind of silly but you get the picture, think of anything at all that could possibly go wrong, discuss a workable solution to the problem with your friend, and get it all in print with each person getting a copy.

Good luck.

Mark

What do you think caused the two to die?

I can see how that would be hard to take. I know there is a chance they could die if I keep my prized females here and I trust that the guy I'm sending them to will take as good of care of them as I would. If one dies it probably would have died here (undiagnosed problem etc.) but if both die of course I would question why (husbandry, disease, malicious intent).

One of them died egg bound. I actually did get her back alive, the guy I loaned her to didn't want to take her to the vet so he gave her back to me so I could take her in but it was too late by then. She died before I could get her in. The other one died because The guy I loaned her to found a mite in his collection (not on her) and didn't want to send her back to me with mites. So he threw a no-pest strip in her cage (this was right after she laid eggs), she was gone within two days. He was nice enough to give me half of the hatchlings though, (all of the ones he gave me were males).

Mark

>>What do you think caused the two to die?
>>
>>I can see how that would be hard to take. I know there is a chance they could die if I keep my prized females here and I trust that the guy I'm sending them to will take as good of care of them as I would. If one dies it probably would have died here (undiagnosed problem etc.) but if both die of course I would question why (husbandry, disease, malicious intent).

Different View That is a scary story. Sorry for your loss. Very unfortunate also. That is only the third egg bound ball python I've heard of and the only one that didn't recover. Apparently they don't egg bind very often compared to say corn snakes.

Also a good warning about the pest strips. So did he put an entire stripe in and leave it in continuously? In the past I've used small pieces in ventilated containers and cycled them through for short periods without problem but a good warning to heed. I had heard that they could be dangerous. You used to hear to pull the water while treating but recently was told it didn't mater. Do you know if he pulled it? I only treat for a few hours at a time anyway so pull the water to be safe and don't figure it maters to be without water for that long. Maybe two days without water right after laying would be as bad as two days with a pest strip.

Sucks about the split too. Is this guy still in the hobby? Even if the sex ratio was left open ended it sounds like he didn’t even try to make it right. Do you know if there where any females in the clutch?

Randy, sorry for the confusion on this. Neither of the snakes that I was talking about were ball pythons. They were other snakes that I had sent out on breeding loan not ball pythons but the mechanics of any loan would be the same no matter what the species. I guess I should have made that clear.

On the dead one with the no pest strip, that was a female snow corn, she laid 14 eggs before she died and I got 7 of the hatchlings. I asked the guy I did the loan with why I got all males, he told me that he hadn't even sexed them and just gave me 7 random snakes. Pretty strange odds if you ask me. When I asked him if I could swap for any that he kept. He told me that he had already sold them. As far as how much of the no-pest strip he used, he just told me that he had put a no-pest strip in her cage, I've always assumed that it was a whole strip, but I can't really say for sure. In any case, it was apparent that thats what killed her. This was about 7 or 8 years ago, I think the guy is now out of the hobby, at least I don't think he's a breeder anymore. Oh well, live and learn I guess.

The egg bound one was a female albino sonoran gopher. They also don't egg bind very often, she was a beautiful animal that I had bought as an adult snake that had been kept as a pet and was an 11 year old virgin. I don't know if that was a contributing factor or not. I just wish I had gotten her back sooner. Again, 20/20 hindsight. Sometimes bad things happen, and that was my point. Make sure you plan for every contingency and get it in writing. The fewer 'grey' areas there are, the better chance you have of reducing the hard feelings in case something goes wrong.

Mark

>>Different View That is a scary story. Sorry for your loss. Very unfortunate also. That is only the third egg bound ball python I've heard of and the only one that didn't recover. Apparently they don't egg bind very often compared to say corn snakes.
>>
>>Also a good warning about the pest strips. So did he put an entire stripe in and leave it in continuously? In the past I've used small pieces in ventilated containers and cycled them through for short periods without problem but a good warning to heed. I had heard that they could be dangerous. You used to hear to pull the water while treating but recently was told it didn't mater. Do you know if he pulled it? I only treat for a few hours at a time anyway so pull the water to be safe and don't figure it maters to be without water for that long. Maybe two days without water right after laying would be as bad as two days with a pest strip.
>>
>>Sucks about the split too. Is this guy still in the hobby? Even if the sex ratio was left open ended it sounds like he didn’t even try to make it right. Do you know if there where any females in the clutch?