• Responding to email notices you receive.
    **************************************************
    In short, DON'T! Email notices are to ONLY alert you of a reply to your private message or your ad on this site. Replying to the email just wastes your time as it goes NOWHERE, and probably pisses off the person you thought you replied to when they think you just ignored them. So instead of complaining to me about your messages not being replied to from this site via email, please READ that email notice that plainly states what you need to do in order to reply to who you are trying to converse with.

  • IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ!! About the Google Adsense ads being displayed

    =====================
    Posted 08/15/2025
    =====================


    Yeah, I know. They are a pain in the butt. But they pay the bills to keep my server running. Just a fact of life, I am afraid.

    Want to get rid of them? Simple. Just become a Contributor level member or above and they will be gone. -> Please click HERE."

    Is that too much for me to ask of you to keep this site running? Well, sorry about that. I too wish I could get everything for free. But alas.....

    =====================
    Addendum: 01/10/2026
    =====================


    Google Adsense ad revenue for December, 2025 was just $30 over the cost of the lease for the server running this site. So, in effect, the money providing the incentive for me to continue running this site is coming SOLELY from the paid memberships and sponsorships here. Which honestly ain't much....

Blazing Blizzards for $250 - Morph Pricing drops

M

Milwaukee Reptiles

Gecko Addict
Joined
Jun 15, 2004
Messages
830
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
41
Location
Milwaukee, WI
I was just browsing around today and noticed that Prehistoric Pets has Blazing Blizzard babies available for $250. That's a hell of a discount from the $2000 that they were less than a year ago.

The only reason I bring it up is to demonstrate how quickly market prices can drop on new morphs... I'm happy I didn't drop a grand on one last year.

This reduction leads me to a question: Are all the morphs going to drop like this? If so, when? Obviously some morphs will remain expensive (Line-bred stuff mostly I would assume), but what does the future hold for pricing of various morphs?

Personally, I'd like to think that this reduction is specific to that morph, but as a customer, am I going to spend $200 on a nice RW Albino when I could get a blazing for $50 more? I guess I just wonder what things like this do to the general pricing of the other morphs.
 
They've been advertising them for a couple weeks now, but I don't know anyone who has bought one. They say they're incubated for male, so the boy will likely not be terribly useful for breeding, except to give you a head start on a project if you don't already have any double hets.

I've been over to PP a couple times and asked each time about the blazing blizzards, but have yet to see them in person. Each time I ask, I'm told they're in the back and either they don't have the key, or I don't want them to bother asking if they're for sale, because I'm not going to buy one. I'm sure you can find other threads on the conditions in their store, but their leopard gecko enclosures (and some others) don't really impress me. They've got a ton of stuff, and many cool animals, but since I'm a gecko guy, I'm super critical about husbandry and the condition of animals. I'm sure some of their BBs are in good shape, as they keep them in the back and probably in racks, but I just haven't seen them.
 
I knew this on would drop really quickly (though not as quickly as it apparently has)...the thing with linked traits (as blizzard and the albino morphs seem to be) is that once you get a double recessive...its a heck of a lot easier to reproduce with hets out of them! Linking prevents traits from being combined...but once they are combined it also makes it hard to UNcombine them. Basically if you breed two double hets out of actual blazing blizzards to each other...you will have a GREATER than 1:16 chance of getting blazing blizzard offspring out of them. The albino and blizzard alleles will sort of "stick together" so that normal recombination doesnt' occur. I don't think that the prices of other morphs will be affected the same way.
 
That's really interesting, Christina. I had never heard that. So, if you bought one of these and created double hets, they'd be more likely to make BBs together than the double hets we have now, not from BBs?
 
Figures. Every time I think I have a firm grasp on genetics someone throws in another twist. Kind of like the rules in English (i before e, ect), every rule has exceptions.

Is there any evidence of Blizzard and Albino genes being linked? I'm curious to see if anyone has actual data on the hatch ratios.
 
lol...it's just another wierd rule to learn! Linkage throws everything out of whack! I have no idea if anyone has actually done anything to really test if there is linkage...but the fact that the blazing blizzards seemed so hard to produce originally suggests that there is linkage. Either that or the blizzard/albino genetic combination is usually fatal...another possible reason for the major price drop could be that PP found something wrong with the bb's and want to unload them before anyone else figures it out...but my guess would be that linkage has something to do with it.
 
the morph prices always go down on co dominant traits (very quickly) and recessive traits (quickly but not as quick as dominant ones)... it's not just the blazing blizzard but its with them all... the only ones whom seem to retain any value are the line bred ones ir a recessive trait (say albino) that has been line bred for pattern or color variances
 
Hi, I'm from Europe (amsterdam/holland) and went to a big Reptile fair in Hamm Germany yesterday. But the prices of Blazing Blizzards are still very high here... Ray Hine sells them for 500 euro (675 dollar)
 
StinaUIUC said:
Well...assuming that the genes are linked...then yes
Click to expand...
I am linked to no one! LOL

At the NARBC show PP had the blazings for $1000 so out of curiousity I went to their store and was just horrified at the geckos they had. I agree with Rob that they have a big selection but it seemed as if the leo's weren't even fed! The most leos we saw were in the party rooms and there were about 30 of them out of 50 that I wouldn't even consider purchasing, and one dead one! I don't even look at their site anymore.
 
Robin, I agree with what you said 100%..... It is just too easy to produce recessive and co-dom morphs..... Now with the linebred or selective bred morphs, it is a bit harder to get the desired look..... How many times have you bred a SHTCTB to a SHTCTB and got babies with head and body spots??? It happens often enough..... If you breed a blazing blizzard to a blazing blizzard you will get all blazing blizzard babies but if you breed 2 SHTCTBs together you will not always get SHTCTB babies....
This is why selectivly bred animals hold their value and recessive and co-doms do not.....
 
Everyone here is talking about how quickly the prices drop on recessive and codom traits, but that has no relevence to this discussion.

There was no competition for Prehistoric Pets to justify a significant drop in prices.

Unless the few people who were coming close to being able to offer Tremper Blazing Blizzards has declared they were going to sell at bargain prices, what reason did PP have for asking 17% of what they were asking just a few months ago?
 
E2MacPets said:
what reason did PP have for asking 17% of what they were asking just a few months ago?
Click to expand...
Probably to move slow selling stock quick as possible, so that they could beat everyone else thats attempting it this year... From the looks of it there will be several strains of Blazings this year. So if they undersell themselves and make thier money fast, they have nothing to worry about at the end of the year. Thanks to them average people would expect to see BB's at or around the same price PP charges for them, forcing everyone else to lower their prices to match or beat it.
 
Exactly... they've taken advantage of their position in the market by cashing in and ruining the market right when competition is ready to start entering the market.

However, I would expect that breeders who provide a superior quality of animal will still be able to charge over what PP asks. Let's face it, just because I can buy a hypo tang at PetCo for 19.99 doesn't mean I'm going to.... the same principle applies.
 
E2MacPets said:
Exactly... they've taken advantage of their position in the market by cashing in and ruining the market right when competition is ready to start entering the market.
Click to expand...

Isnt that what buisiness is about???? PP did it faster and better than everyone else..... Why not take advantage.... I say it is a wake up call for some greedy breeders...... Everyone getting into the blazing blizzard project expected to make $1500 to $2000 an animal...... Now they cant...... Too bad...... Alot of people working on BBs just kept holding back what they bred and wanted to produce a ton of BBs before they started selling them so they can make a ton of quick money..... Any business or project with in it can be a gamble...... I guess the people that went for the BBs crapped out...... Oh well...... There is no way people producing BBs will be able to get more than $250 now..... Well atleast the Tremper BBs anyway....... The market will be flooded with them now...... In another year they will be 100 bucks less...... All I have to say is, "good for the greedy breeders that thought they were going to make a killing".... This is a good learning experiance..... Never bank on something that is as unstable as the leo market.....LOL.....

I am sorry but I just do not feel bad for the "other people" that were working on blazing blizzards..... That is just the name of the game.......
 
Altho...i would definatly buy from a very well known breeder who has very nice livestock and easy pay 500-700 on a BB even tho PP has them for 250.

The only one i see greedy is the people going out and snatching up BBs for 250, they turn out to be low quality but they breed them anyways and try to make money just because they got a cut.

Personally i'd much rather support the people trying to improve the leopard gecko genetics, than someone just making a buck. And the breeders DO get the charge more, because they know that their animal easily out weights the competition.

Not saying PP's leos aren't nice, but from the two comments made earlier, i can only assume...
 
Everyone getting into the blazing blizzard project expected to make $1500 to $2000 an animal......
Click to expand...

Wrong, wrong wrong.

All I have to say is, "good for the greedy breeders that thought they were going to make a killing".... This is a good learning experiance..... Never bank on something that is as unstable as the leo market
Click to expand...

Gregg, some breeders actually look at projects such as the blazing blizzard project as a challenge, not a way to "make a killing". I felt I needed to point that out. Your posts confuse me sometimes. Alot of times they seem angry and (for lack of a better term) hate filled. Oh well, whatever dude. You've been working with leopard geckos for how long now, 1 year? 1 1/2 years? Let me ask you, why do you work with leos? I think you would be surprised to know that some of us "big breeders" work with them for the same reasons you do. We just do it on a larger scale, baby! :cool:

Yes PP is selling their hatchling blazings for $250. BFD. I wasn't surprised at all to see that. It's a little dissapointing, not for me personally, but for those who just months before had spent big bucks on them. PP did the whole thing with the blazings all wrong from the beginning. First of all they used a photoshopped picture of a blizzard and made the eyes red, and marketed this as a blazing blizzard. This was before they even hatched a single one! Then, they priced their double hets at outrageously high prices. I can't understand why anyone would have been foolish enough to pay $2000 a pair when they could make their own double hets for a lot less but, ok, those that bought them weren't thinking clearly I guess. Blah, I could go on and on about it but I will spare you LOL.

I've seen it happen over and over again, with all the recessive trait morphs. We spent a lot of money on het blizzards the first year they were available. At that time blizzards were $1000 each I believe. By mid season the next year they were like $300-350. But we didn't buy the het blizzards just to make money. We bought them so that we would be among the first to have blizzards and thus be able to create different morphs with them. It's definitely more of a status thing than a money thing, for me at least. :bolt01:
 
Back
Top