Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was wondering, what is the minimum cool-off period for Eastern kings (for successful breeding)? As far as I know it's around 8 weeks (personal experience). Has anyone else had success with a 6 week or even 4 week cool-off with males and/or females?
Just trying to get more educated . . .Thanks for your opinions, thoughts.

Zee

I am an expert on everything, but know so little and have so much to learn! - Carsten Zoldy -

Sometimes the photo period is enough for some species.

I have taken small females and fed them up until april (to bring them up to breeding size)and then put them down for two weeks and they produced fertile eggs.

I knew the Ververkas back in calif used to brumate some of their colubrids by putting them into an ice box in the middle of July. Worked for them and they produced very late animals.

Wow! That IS short! How about your males? Two weeks???
THANKS for the info!

Zee

2 weeks! Someone told me to put them down for 4 weeks, I was going to say that but that Ive never had that recommendation again and I dont think he was actually a breeder so it may be trivial, but apparantly it can be done!

One thing I was thinking of trying is a shortened year. I might try to put them down for a month and have them awake for 8 months, put them down early every year. This will produce 4 clutches every 3 years, which may be good for species that dont double to produce more offspring. Has that been done? Thoughts?

Never heard of that one, but would be interested if someone HAS done it!

Zee

Well, Im going to try it. Im also going to brumate 1/4 of my snakes at the same time, when they wake up, its time for another 1/4 to brumate. This way, I have less animals to care for all year, produce offspring all year long and about the same amount, and I wont need as many mice and then wont have an overabundance of mice when the entire collection would be hibernating.

Makes sense to me....