I have been offered a couple babies to choose from within my price range... all hatchings though... either a female yellowbelly, male black pastel, or male spotnose and there was another but a bit pricey a male pastel yellowbelly. What do you guys think to raise and put into a future breeding program possibly?
Stock up on females. It is always easier to find a quick male stud or pic up a breeder male in a shorter window than it is to find a female even remotely close to breeding size.. not to mention females hold their value longer. You already have that killer multi gene male; start picking up females to plug him into because he'll be able to handle several. Females take at LEAST 2 years to reach sexual maturity while males can attain breeding weight at half that size. Ideally you want to buy your females....and wait a year to pick up males because you can pick up males at a lower price with the following season and then both will be ready to breed at approximately the same time. The male pastel yellowbelly would be completely pointless to consider because you have a Super Pastel Yellowbelly Spider male already.. assuring that ANY baby will at the very least carry a pastel gene no matter what you pair him with. The black pastel is also thoroughly pointless because you have a male black pastel already (now, if that was a black pastel female, things may be different because you could pair the two to shoot for the super). If you get the female yellowbelly, you can potentially produce ivories... Bumblebellies are also a nice possibility coming from that male killerbee yellowbelly you have already as the yelloybelly gene tends to really bring out the colors of morphs in my opinion. But I revolve my projects around that powerhouse male and pick up females to produce things you want out of that combo. I'm personally a fan a Queen Bees, so another option may be a lesser or butter gene female if you can get ahold of one, but the choices are completely personal opinion. Just to put a personal twist on this: I first bought a male bumblebee and a few female double codoms several years ago to start a breeding project. The females increased in value as they aged, the male decreased substantially. By the time they were sold, I lost $250 on the original price of the male, and the price of the females increased as they reached breeding size. Females are the ideal investment... I was feeding the male for an entire year while he was already producing plugs waiting on the females to attain breeding weight.
That's true I do have one adult female normal ready to breed and my friend will loan me 2 or 3 more breedable females come this October. So getting the baby yellowbelly would be for that particular project 2 years later. And is 70 dollars a good price on a 2012 yellowbelly hatchling?
Its all personal preference; I tend to prefer to have a female with at least one gene rather than a pile of normals. Here is just a quick example of what the difference a single gene can make: Your Powerhouse male with Normal female: [excluding the epic gene] 1/4 Pastel 1/4 Bumblebee 1/4 Pastel Yellowbelly 1/4 Bumblebelly (bumblebee yellowbelly) If you replace the female normal with a simple female pastel: 1/8 Pastel 1/8 Super Pastel 1/8 Bumblebee 1/8 Killerbee 1/8 Pastel Yellowbelly 1/8 Super Pastel Yellowbelly 1/8 Bumbelbelly 1/8 Killer Bee Yellow Belly As you can see, you can produce offspring that are not only more attractive, but are valued at substantially more. You get more bang for your buck and use less space and resources if you put the money for 3 normal females into a single gene female or two. Kind of a "quality" vs. quantity dilemma for lack of a better word. But yes, $70 is a very good price for a female yellowbelly.
That makes sense :0 I was told by my friend to get a great co.dom male and few normal females to start with 0.o
I wouldn't start with a few females... get your feet wet and start with a female or two so you can get an idea of how the breeding process works and become familiar with the market. Babies can sometimes be harder to sell than anticipated, and if for some reason you have crazy sized clutches from several females 20 baby snakes can be a lot to handle and a lot to manage for selling, time, and cost purposes...especially if you end up with low-end morphs. That male you have is insane... a true genetic powerhouse. If you can get a single gene females paired with him you run into some great morph possibility which will not only be more rewarding...but you will make more return on investment, have an easier time selling the offpsring, and will not have to fill so much rack space or have to feed and clean up after so many babies. You don't want to get in over your head too early, best to start slow ; )
