Buying power...

[Robert Walker]

Ok, This has been a question I have had for a while, real glad Fauna lets us poll people. I am trying to get a real sense of what price range of ball python people plan their breeding strategies around.

Option 1: Buy low: ($1000 under): ex. single morph babies cheap to create their own 2 gene balls. "I'm not buying more expensive ones, I will make my own" thought process.

Option 2: Buy low-mid: ($1001-3500): ex. skip option one and start with double morphs to create 1,2,3 & 4 gene balls.

Option 3: Buy mid: ($3501-7000): Bypass older gene morph singles some doubles. Shot for newer genes and newer combos.

Option 4: Mid-High: ($7001-15,000): 3 & 4 gene rarer animals only made in last 2 years or so.

Option 5: High: ($15,001-25,000): Soul sucker type animals, female bananas, etc.

Option 6: Real High End: (25,001-$65,000): Male banana combos, 6 gene animals, etc.


This poll will lead to my true "REAL QUESTION", which I will post once some results are in and I can phrase my real question based on those results.

I realize my ranges may not be how others view things but I had to break things down some how, so I did my best. I'm sure this is a question many of us (if not all of us) have asked ourselves before.

THANK YOU in advance!! - Robert

 

[deobra2869]

I guess it would depend on what your main future plans are.

Doing it as a hobby for fun and creating your own masterpiece for your collection (which I would spend more money buying higher end stuff if I had that option in my finances LOL)

OR

If you are wanting to be in the business of selling such as a retail store and doing it for the money not for the hobby (buying the lower end single or double codom morphs or single ress. genes) because a high grade pastel or spider etc. is more likely to sell versus something more higher end such as a pastel clown or even a higher end animal such as a banana

I dont know how much sense this makes? But hopefully it makes some sense LOL

 

[RJK890]

We should be able to check all that apply.

Going by your price line, I purchase Low females and Low-Mid males.

 

[Robert Walker]

You're right, If I knew how to edit the poll for "multiple options", I would update it... sorry

 

[reptilebaby]

I buy what I can afford and what I can pay for rather quickly. I wish I could buy some nicer morphs but I tend to go for het snakes, that I can eventually make cool snakes from.

 

[reptilebaby]

unless I see a morph that I feel I can afford.

 

[hhmoore]

You're right, If I knew how to edit the poll for "multiple options", I would update it... sorry

That is an option when you create the poll...from what I can see, there is no way to change it after the fact.

 

[R. Eventide]

I said low to mid. I've never paid more than $1k for a snake, but I do plan on buying a Clown in the next year or two, and they're in the $1.5k range. This is because I'm mostly going for double-recessive morphs, which are way out of my price range (plus, I think it's more fun to make a double-recessive myself).

 

[Robert Walker]

Thanks everyone for helping out so far. Perhaps we can get some more people to take the poll to get an even better feel for how things work. Thanks Harald for letting me know that I can stop looking to alter the poll since it can be done, I appreciate it. Again, once the poll closes then I will ask the under lying real question. Thanks again everyone!

 

[morph evolution]

robert in my opinion,if your looking to start with a collection buy some single or double codom males breed them to norm females and keep back all female morphs..you can build your colony easy that way..it does not take a ton of money to start a great breeding colony.it will grow quicker than you think in time.

 

[MrBig]

I would have to say low, not that I wouldn't buy higher, I just haven't yet. I want a BEL, it's one of the reasons I started to breed, but I don't want to buy one. I've been real tempted but it will mean that much more when I actually produce it. I could also easily buy a bumblebee, but it's one that my son wants to create, so I gave him a male spider and a female pastel to work with. Then he will get what he wants through some hard work and have a greater sense of accomplishment. We're in this more for the love of reptiles then to make a ton of money. If I was in it for the money I would be purchasing fewer and higher end animals.

 

[Robert Walker]

Mike - you have hit part of my question right on the head...

Even if people had the money, would people be more inclined to to breed for combo animals themselves for the reasons you have listed OR to buy that animal.

If you had $3500 right now which would people buy:

Mystic Potion baby

or

Mystic $1100 & Mojave $400 babies to make their own and sit on the $2000 savings.

Money 100% aside, are we a community of Do-it-yourself(ers) or buy it instead(ers)?

 

[hhmoore]

As a general rule, I like to make my own combinations...that way I have some say what goes into them. There are a few combos in my collection that I purchased, however. I purchased lemon blasts because I wanted them, and I wanted to use them to make other combinations....but I don't particularly like pinstripes, so I didn't choose to make my own (producing a few babies I don't like is necessary byproduct of the process of getting other snakes I do like...the difference is I don't have to look at them longterm, like I would if I was keeping a breeder pin). Yellow bellies are a similar thing - I like some of them, but the process of finding a female that I liked proved to be a daunting process...so I acquired an ivory. I wasn't wholly untrue to my picky nature, though - how many other people look at pics of the parents when shopping for an ivory, lol?
You mentioned mystic potions - that is another combination that creates a bit of an issue for me - I like mystic potions, want a mystic potion...but am too damn cheap to buy a mystic potion. There are two problems with the idea of making my own: 1) it would mean having a breeder mystic (not a big fan of mystics), and 2) it would put me in the position of having babies I can't identify with 100% certainty. I've seen too many breeders - more experienced than myself - being unsure if a baby is a mystic or a mojave. I've tabled that project for the time being.
I'm not "in it to win it", and I have a hard time with the concept of paying thousands of dollars for a single snake - especially in the current climate. Factor in that I'm just not willing to breed in quantity in order to ensure a quick return on an investment, and I'm destined to be years behind on the production of any given morph.
Did somebody say super stripe? I want one. I've got the female ivory, so I started shopping for a male specter....and found myself confronted with the same issue I mentioned regarding the mystic - I'm not particularly impressed with the look of most of the specters I've seen. (Luckily, with the plan being to breed it to an ivory, I wouldn't have to worry about identifying specter babies...because I have no faith in my ability to do so.) I began toying with the idea of purchasing a male super stripe; but struggled with the idea of dumping that kind of money on a baby snake. The subject got raised again in chat; and, after some more thought, I decided to do it...probably at least in part because everything crapped out on me this year, lol. On the plus side, by starting with an ivory and a super stripe, I won't have much need to hold back babies; so I can actually sell them...and, if both are able to breed by late next season, I'll have a decent chance of recouping my "investment" in one breeding - even with where I expect prices to be by the time I have babies on the ground.

 

[Cp3_Pythons]

As a general rule, I like to make my own combinations...that way I have some say what goes into them.

I agree with this line... I like to go for quality and starting with my/your own Combo's ( Buying single gene animals to produce double gene animals ) when you start with the single gene animals you know what the parent's look like and should be ale to give you an idea of what the offspring will look like ( Not always true however ) Yes I'll pick up a few higher priced animals into the 1k mark maybe a little over... Maybe But I'd only for certain animals of a certain sex.

 

[Robert Walker]

BINGO!

Harald - You have brought up the underlying "real question" to the purpose of the poll. (BTW - good luck on your super stripe project, they look awesome)

The purpose is to help me decide whether to be "in-it to win-it" or simply remain a casual observer hobbyist??

Option A: Hobbyist/Tiny Breeder
I buy cheaper ball pythons, raise them up, breed them, raise babies up, breed them...so on and so on. By the time I make anything "super cool", the prices for said animal has dropped and dropped. Yes, I end up with a super cool looking balls, but no real financial reward for all my efforts. I could instead go buy a rainbow boa which looks super cool and have a great pet for $100.

Option B: Full Blown In-it to Win-it
I take out a loan for $70k-$100k. I buy cutting edge ball pythons (make someone else's day), buy up collections, etc. Set up a website, find out expo dates, make You-Tube videos, the whole enchilada!

If Option B ends in the result of producing $10,15, 25 - 30k animals, who cares...if there is no market for it (per current poll results) Does Option B leave me 100k in debt and a bunch of "super cool" expensive snakes that I can't sell anyways?????

Thanks guys and gals...hopefully this has been helpful to others, as it has for me!

 

[rabernet]

I agree with this line... I like to go for quality and starting with my/your own Combo's ( Buying single gene animals to produce double gene animals ) when you start with the single gene animals you know what the parent's look like and should be ale to give you an idea of what the offspring will look like ( Not always true however ) Yes I'll pick up a few higher priced animals into the 1k mark maybe a little over... Maybe But I'd only for certain animals of a certain sex.

I'm the same way - I'm super picky about my animals, and when I'm breeding, I'm really breeding for my number one customer - ME.

It's the primary reason that I haven't purchased a bumblebee, for example. Even with pastels, I want to produce only the best that I can. I'm a huge fan of selective breeding. So, unless I can see the quality of the pastel that contributed to that bee, I'm not interested. Yes, you can somewhat predict how nice the pastel was, by how nice the bee is, but I'd rather make one myself.

Also, producing my first clown this season was far more rewarding then laying down the cash for one. I've always liked "some assembly required" in all things. It's an awesome sense of accomplishment to put in years of work raising those babies and then seeing fruits of your labor.

I'll never be the first to produce something new (unless something weird pops up in the normal girls I've not yet put into projects), but I am happy with the quality of animals I've been producing for myself.

 

[Diego Velarde]

I voted under 1K cause I'm broke
Most of my collection was based on single gene morphs and I couldnt be any happier with the results on my first two breeding seasons. Making my first double co-doms and my first hets was really fun.

I'm currently in the process of replacing my single gene animals with double or triple gene combos (the only way to stay small... hold backs are a pain in the butt, I'm holding back 9 animals from this season and thats more than I wanted to) and hoping to produce a few triples and maybe even some quads next season... and thats were all the fun is

I spent about 6500 on new snakes this year. Yes I could've got me a nice powerful male with that money but instead I got me 5 badass snakes that will make amazing offspring in the coming years.

-Harald, forget the male SS, get a Specter Fire for that ivory girl.

 

[snakesRkewl]

Money 100% aside, are we a community of Do-it-yourself(ers) or buy it instead(ers)?

I've done both and the real joy comes from making your own as Robin said.
There is just something special about raising up your own babies and then producing offspring from those babies

 

[R. Eventide]

From what everyone else said and how I feel, I don't really think that there are only two options. There's a whole spectrum available when breeding.

Robin said she loved producing her first Clown from hets, which was more rewarding than just buying one. A friend in Phoenix just produced her first Lavender Albino from hets because Lavs are simply too expensive. I won't do either because I'm trying to minimize the number of snakes I need to do the projects I want (I have a lot of hobbies and like having time for all of them, not to mention my day job), so I buy straight-up visual recessives. I can easily see someone going straight for a super-expensive morph (Black Axanthic, Tri-Stripe, etc.) and focusing on those, like the guys at lavenderalbino.com.

I think your two options can go more than two ways. You could do Option A with a lot of high-quality, low-cost snakes and end up with an Option B-like output. It's more difficult and will take longer to get a return on your investment, but it's still an option. And as mentioned above, you could do Option B with only a handful of morphs. There are lots of different ways to take this.

And be aware that there is a market for those five-figure morphs. Any polls here will be biased toward hobbyist breeders and/or people who wouldn't spend more than a couple thousand on a snake. The people willing and able to buy five-figure morphs have their own fora! It may still take a little while before these people will trust you enough to buy $10k+ snakes, but they will if you consistently produce outstanding morphs and are willing to work with them.

I hope that made some sort of sense. I just got up not too long ago. Heh.

EDIT (again): I'm assuming all other important issues--space, time, do you want this to be a full-time job eventually, etc.--have already been taken care of. Those are big things that need to be taken into consideration as well.

 

[dustinNMpythons]

I did a combination of what everyone else has said so far. I would never just drop 100K on a bunch of high end snakes and here's my reasoning on that. The collection I've created has taken me 4 years of fairly rapid but VERY selective buying and some of the time I've purchased hets because they are a little more price friendly some of the time I buy visuals to get the better odds. The thing about it is if you drag it out over time you will be able to see something and say WOW thats the best one of that morph I've seen I'm buying it and then keep doing that until you reach your goals. For me I buy het females and visual/combo recessive males to breed to the het females, it's the best price strategy. I've bought all single dom/co-dom females and have almost one of every one of them at breeder size now to build my base of breeders. So now all I have to do is create replacements for them through the hold back method. I only have probably one normal because to me you won't add genes so there's no point in having them when they won't increase the value of your collection by giving you more genes so save the space for morphs. Another reason for buying higher end morphs is you want to get to your end goal faster. For example I want to create a super black caramel glow so I'm getting ghosts het caramel to get my caramel glow faster even though I would get a glow male if I could find one but the ghosts het caramel are faster than double hets. but on the other hand I am also working towards being the first at a axanthic pastel super stripe and I worked that project from ground up bred a yellowbelly to a axanthic and will be breeding a pastel axanthic to a specter that I purchased recently. well actually I traded for the specter so that brings up another topic not touched on yet. If your going to produce high end stuff don't hesitate to take trades or even trades plus cash. It also works the other way trade your stuff and put up some cash for the high end stuff. I got a breeder size leopard male this year for 1.1 black bees and some cash, come to think of it I have a lot of high end stuff but I'm 100% certain I've never paid over $2000 for a single morph and actually I can't really recall paying more than $1500. So basically it all depends on what your goals are and if there are people out there who are big money spenders on ball pythons so don't think your *NOT* going to sell ball pythons just because they're higher end, otherwise I don't think these big breeders would be in business lol look at some of their prices but like Krystal said it takes a good reputation or they won't buy from you. Typically though the middle range has more sells as long as its not a morph that's been so burned out by people overbreeding to normals. My biggest downfall is when I think of a new combo that I think would be cool I want it NOW! Its safe to say I'm addicted! LOL hope this helped a little, sorry if I rambled but at least you guys got to hear about some of my near future projects haha!