Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Sorry for the delay, but Eunectes4 asked me earlier about sexing ball pythons by the spurs. While most boas and some adult pythons can be sexed reasonably well by the spurs, I feel that many pythons prove to be difficult to accurately sex by this technique. After confirming the sex by probing, I have seen adult female pythons with unusually large spurs that could be mistaken for males. Conversely, I have seen adult male pythons with very small spurs that could easily be mistaken for females. I had an adult male Burmese python back in the 80’s that had only one spur and was completely lacking one on the other side; and a friend of mine had an adult male reticulated python that had no spurs at all. Although these were not typical cases, I would be very careful trying to spur sex most python species, especially the smaller ones. Your best bet would be to confirm the sex of a python by probing. I would expect an adult female ball to probe 3-4 subcaudals and an adult male 8-10. Good luck,

Kelly

I don't remeber asking about spur sexing ball pythons, but I could have been curious about structure since thats what caught me on the anacondas I was not aware of. Thats why I was surprised since I have seen many ball pythons probe differently than spur size would indicate. My friend says she can just get an eye for them and I am impressed because I still call my opinion on external features a guess (she breeds a bunch of them though). I have a female with large spurs. The snake I was refering too probed in between though (roughly 5) so I need to do it again later and carefully mark both sides. Now when you said that, I can usually only find one spur on the anaconda and it looks like the one I can find can go in and out(out if I get the right angle on her). I think I do just come across tricky snakes though. I think after scott micheals probing I am pretty confident since I do not trust my own spur sexing since I have only been doing it since you told me how ; )...thanks for the response though.

You are correct, python spur size differences between the sexes are not near as consistant as is seen with most boas. Additionally, you will not see the degree of structural differences either, especially in the smaller python species. The actual structual shape of the spur itself is totally different between male and female anaconda and boa constrictors. However, unless an anaconda is at least 5 feet, you will most likely need magnification to see them well.

Kelly