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Breeding black tailed cribos

C

Crested12

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hey ive recently aquired an adult pair of these guys and i was wondering if anyone could shed some light on the subject of breeding. or point me to some good caresheets on them.

to what temps should i cool them to? and for how long?
is it necessary to brumate them separately?
reccomended egg incubation temps?
anything else you can think of would be greatly appreciated
thanks
_Ben Hoksch
 
Drymarchon can't tolerate extreme drops in temperature like most colubrids do during brumation.
I don't really brumate my melanurus. I shorten their photoperiod and I will lower temps somewhat. (low 70's during the day, high 60's at night) but I still give them a basking spot to help digestion because they will continue to eat all winter. I offer them smaller meals when the temps are cooler.
My Drys are breeding now and I expect eggs around March to April. I incubated by melanurus eggs at 78 degrees this year and they took approximately 90 days to hatch.
Good luck
 
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I do not have any black tails at the moment. But from what I understand they are much the same as my couperi. What I have been told is that all Drymarchon are kept and bred pretty much the same. Give them a thermal gradient from the low 70s to the low 80s at the other end of the cage. Offer several hide options throughout that range. There should be a basking spot wich goes up to the upper 80s. DO NOT BRUMATE! You can cycle them a bit by dropping the temps to the upper 60s at night, and shorten the time that the basking spot is on to around 4-6 hours a day. And cut the photo period to 12 on, 12 off. And mist the cage daily. Basicly I would try to mimic nature in their native range. Then keep them that way for about a month during breeding. After that, build them back up to probably 14 hour days with the 70 to 80 degree temps day AND night, and the basking spot all day. Remember, Drymarchon do not like to be hot! They don't like it cold either! They must be able to choose! It's o.k. to cool them a bit for breeding, but do not attempt to brumate them. They are sub-tropical to tropical snakes from Central America.

Again, I have not kept black tails yet, but that is pretty close to how I would do it. You can read more about it in this forum under the threads about breeding. Again pretty much the same rules apply to all the subs. If you are then in doubt, e-mail old herper, and Dean Alessandrini. They are both very knowledgeable, and very helpful. Hope I have helped.
T.
 
Hi people... well as I was saying elsewhere in this thread...I get 100% good eggs and near 95% hatch rate with my 1.1 cribos with next to no special environmental cycling year in year out, compared to my 2.2 indigos which breed every year and with careful calculation of my intended strategy that year, still no good eggs (3 yrs running) so believe me, it's entirely different with blacktails than indigos..if only the indigos followed the cribo pattern!!
 
Well anyone know what breeding size is for these snakes. I know my male is good he is 7 ft. or around there. But I want to acquire a female and wonder on the size that she will need to be. and yes I know this thread is old........
 
This Thread Is Old!

So old, in fact, that I can see the flaws in my own {old} advice! Just goes to show that there is a learning curve with drys.

Black tails are probably the easiest drys to produce. You shouldn't need to do anything fancy. Start introducing them {after feeding well} late summer through mid winter. Simple as that. The day length in Central America does not change but a few minutes, the temp. is the same way. But the rainy season begins then so you can spray them, and their cages with water daily if you want, but I have never heard it to be nessecary.

As far as size,... males no matter, as long as they are old enough. My [unicolor] male fertilized his first female at age 2!,... believe it or not. Females should be as far over 6 ft. as possible, or even 7ft. Bigger is always better. Makes for easier egg laying, and reduces the possibility of egg binding. Which can be fatal. And females should probably be at least 4 years old, unless you have a 7 ft. monster female who is only 2 or 3 years old, then it's a judgement call. Good luck, keep us posted.
T.
 
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