Breeding Ball Pythons; ARP Livestream

[@tullysoutregiusroyals]

Insightful, educational and vastly entertaining….lingering dangerously close to podcast territory here gents. I have seemingly ignored the state of the market I’m quietly here feeding and cleaning. I have sold nothing for 3 months now and thats absolutely fine because i only had 5 clutches last year. I can quietly sit here and enjoy my snakes without the worry of cost, sales and the time i don’t have. I can enjoy what they teach me and if i sell a few snakes then great its just a welcome contribution to feeding costs but this is my hobby not job and i still love it 9years in!

[@Bildgesmythe]

Well said.

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

Hi Joe. You have always been an inspiration to my channel and for the hobby we share. I think your approach is exactly what Arawin was talking about. This is why we do it. There is a caveat though. Even at only 5 clutches a year, that's 30/40 hatchlings. Let's say I'm right and this isn't a cycle but a new normal situation. Within 3 years you'll have 120 extra snakes that have become a burden you cannot sustain and ruins the enjoyment of the hobby. This message is to everybody who has more than say 10 snakes in their collections, but are still "hobby breeders". This would include me! Don't breed yourself into a hole. Stop breeding if you have to. I have. Not only should we be prepared to hold back everything, we should also be prepared to stop breeding altogether until it becomes prudent to do so again. Furthering your own projects is a big chunk of the enjoyment of breeding Ball Pythons, but not when the burden of feeding and cleaning becomes unsustainable. No enjoyment in that.

[@tullysoutregiusroyals]

@@RobertBarracloughRoyalBallsagreed, i have already decided hold off. Firstly this gives my snakes another season or two to recover and build up some extra reserves and even will allow my younger, up and coming females time to fully mature into egg laying machines before i start paring again and that adds another wave of excitement. Admittedly, I do have a female due to lay in the next few weeks but this came from a paring i did way before i decided to stop paring back in October, is a paring I’m excited to see the results of and, i have the time and space to hold on to all hatchlings if needs be. chances are, Ill have one or two hold backs in that clutch anyway.

[@Bildgesmythe]

Great points. Markets do cycle in every item. I think of the history of tulips where a single bulb went for a fortune. The market crashed but tulips are still here.

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

The market does cycle, but it also evolves. I think parts of the market will bounce back eventually, but I also see parts of the market that have evolved into a new norm as I discussed above. The Ball Python Market isn't dead and will still be around for years to come, but just like Tulip Farming, if breeders do not evolve with the industry, they will go out of business. Even small time hobby breeders will find themselves breeding themselves into unsustainability.

[@lorgagssertao4036]

Hello! It's great to hear from Arawin! Lot's of people are requesting his presence on Hold Back Rack podcast! Many kids with Royals wish his presence on HBR, pleeeeease think of the children!! ;P

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

I have talked to him on this and I think he can be persuaded. The main issue is the time difference and HBR podcast goes out about 7am on Sunday morning for us. The timing could not be more inconvenient for UK/SE Asia for us to appear and for our local viewers to watch it live. There will be no kids from the UK or SE Asia watching at that time, that's for sure! When I did the 3 horsemen episode I set my alarm early and the rest of the family were still in bed. Let's see if we can't organise something.

[@holdbackrackpodcast]

@@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls We can definitely push it back in time on this side. It would still have to be in the morning local time but we could probably still get some US viewers if we started at 9 or 10 EST.

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

@@holdbackrackpodcast hi Jessica. He'll do it! I'll talk to him and get back with a date/time.

[@holdbackrackpodcast]

Thank you. Whenever its convenient we can figure it out!@@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls

[@sammythai99]

Sorry I missed the live stream

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

Hi Samantha. You can watch it at leisure here! I recorded it all. I'll do a follow up myself with some strategies that should help. Maybe a live Q and A.

[@JH-zb2zy]

At 43:38 to 44:00 of the time line in the video….what snake or what morph was going to be cheaper? I’m not sure if I caught it in the audio. Thanks!

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

Hi mate. The question was about Axanthic, which is a recessive gene like Clown or Lavender or Pied, requiring the homozygous form to produce a visual. Recessives have traditionally held their value more than Incomplete Dominant morphs, but in today's market, everything is dropping in price. That will include VPI Axanthics. Price drops will be across the board except for the snakes which are cutting edge project snakes that are still both very difficult to get hold of and hard to make. ARP has just made VPI Axanthic Clowns, the double recessive. Axanthic is still a gene in demand, especially in Malaysia. So you might expect a lesser discount on VPI Axanthic than on other recessives from ARP.

[@Bildgesmythe]

A normal costs as much to feed as a high end snake. So, I think your idea of being very selective in pairing is a great idea.

[@RobertBarracloughRoyalBalls]

Hi mate. Absolutely correct. A $20 snake requires the exact same care and food as a $20,000 snake. In SE Asia, the pet trade scoops up normal and low end snakes almost as quick as they are produced so the pet trade, at least here, is a viable market, but profit margins are none existent. The snakes cost more to feed than they can ever hope to recover from sales. The high end snakes also still sell to other breeders, but take much longer to move. This is tolerable however because profit margins are much higher. You don't need to sell many before you recover costs for the whole year. Which is good because we don't sell very many. The bulk of production is what used to be the mid range market. These are recessives and multi incomplete dominant morphs that used to sell well and at reasonable prices. This is the market that has taken the biggest hit and these snakes are now selling at ridiculously low prices. They are produced in numbers far too large for a breeder to keep them all and these snakes are now costing more to feed than they are worth in sales so they end up being cheap. If we are honest, this is the bulk of what we produce and its the bulk of what used to sell and provide cash flow to any business. Prices are now so low that this is simply not sustainable and unfortunately, this segment of the market I believe is not coming back. Prices for these snakes will remain low and this is the reality or new norm for any breeder. This will require some rethinking and a different approach than over the last 20 years. This range of what are now low end snakes now extends into the realms of double recessives, which are hard to make but don't sell any better than anything else. Lightening Pieds (Axanthic Pieds), Dreamsicles (Lavender Albino), Clown Pieds, Albino Clowns are all both cheap and not in any great demand. Triple and Quad recessives and hets with the latest and greatest genes are the morphs that still sell for top dollar and very few of those are available. The difficulty of making them self regulates the numbers available and demand is therefore still high. So I'm afraid I don't see this particular change (what used to be the mid range - the bread and butter of most breeders) as a cycle which will recover. I see this change as permanent. It's a new norm and isn't coming back. If breeders don't recognise this soon enough and keep breeding these mid range snakes waiting for a rebound, they'll simply end up with shelves full of unsellable hatchlings that are a burden to look after and a financial drain. I'm going to do a follow on video about things the average hobby breeder can do to help themselves reset for this new norm.