Reptile breeding for a future?

[Gary D.]

Most professional or semi-pro breeders will also tell you that they spend copious amounts of time doing nothing more than cleaning cages. Vacations and weekend trips are out because of chores, an animal's worth becomes measured by how much you spend in aquisition of said animal, feeding and heating costs and offspring produced. Majority of your sales are to pet shops, who may already have a working relationship with another breeder, and not wish to deal with you. All in all, I'm way happier as electrician with a reptile hobby, producing a couple of litters of boas a year than trying to scrape out a living as a breeder.

GD

[Nicky]

thx everyone. Boaddict, for the vet school thing what kind of courses are the expecting you to take i'm only in grade nine but i'm taking all acedemic next year since acdemic this year and I plan to kepp doing science through grade 11 and 12 because you can stop and grade 10 or 11. Like is chemestry and biology and math the major things they'll be looking for? Do you think 80s are good enough my average is about 82 i guess theres still room to improve though.

[Chair]

Hey Nicky

To become a herpitologist you do not need to got to med shool. You would need to take biology in University, at Guelph you could take Wildlife Boilogy, it's focused on nature. You would have to study mammals, birds, insects and plants as well as herps. There are no Universities in Canada that have a herpitology program.

Josh

[Nicky]

thanks Josh, a while back I read about a good one in Denver i think but i'm probably gonna stick to becoming a vet but thats deffently an alternative as long as its something to do with helping animals i'm fine.

[marisa]

If you are considering breeding even corns, two enclosures just won't cut it! lol.

For one both parents should be housed seperatly. During breeding you place them together and copulation usually takes place right away, but housing together year round is NOT the best idea.

Anyways, aside from the parents enclosures you'll need small (deli cups or rubbermaids) to house each hatchling in until you can sell them. Let me tell you, it could take months and I have only breed corns once. I ended up selling most off to pet stores and definitly was no where NEAR making a dime. hahaha that's a joke. But anyways you have to plan for babies that you cannot get rid of, corns grow fast and each will need an enclosure plus heat.

The biggest factor I think if you want to breed your corns is get pinkies. TONS of pinkies. Your female may lay 8 eggs, then again she may be like mine and give you 33 eggs, almost all fertile! lol. that is like a pinky garbage disposial. They eat tons.

Anyways like everyone mentioned try and just enjoy the hobby, if you want to breed stick with what you like. I am a HUGE colubrid/mainly kingsnake fan and any snakes I breed the money goes right back into kingsnakes, they may not be worth much but they are my favs and you will enjoy the hard work more if its for something you love.

Marisa

[Gary D.]

Here's a link on schools offering studies in herpetology. A brief summary is Calgary and Guelph.

http://www.anapsid.org/resources/univ.html

TARAS also offers a small schollarship to one herpetology student yearly. No regional stipulation has yet been placed on this award.

GD

[Nicky]

wow thanks ya lol i have a pretty big collection of rubbermaid continers of all sizes pinkies are no problem for me to get and heating all have to save up for, I'm flat broke for christams i'll probabkly start next year no room right now moving soon gonna get nice big room for all my pets then i can start. Oh ya so what age do corns mature at?

[marisa]

Males can breed earlier than females.

With females (and males really) its not about age its about size. A female corn should be at LEAST 36 inches with really good girth. My female was about 45 inches long, and thick before I breed her.

Another thing is the more time you give your female to mature, the larger your first clutch will be. Smaller females= smaller clutches generally. So its even better to wait an extra year.

Pick up: The Cornsnake Manual by Kathy Love.....its a great book on corn genetics, breeding, care, everything.

Marisa

[Nicky]

my corn is about 4 feet maybe a little less but she defently needs more girth so i'll probably wait till 2005 beofr i start any breeding projects. Ya i got the cornsnake maual befor i bough my corn its an awsome book I just never read the breeding part befor because when i was 12 when i got the book i never consedered it. thx for the info. Gary D thx for the excellent site i looked over and read some of the articals and will continue later. I never thought of taking other languages incase i dp field studies in another country (if i ever make it that far.) I'll probably take french throughtout all of highschool and take spanish too thx for everyone who helped it really opened up my options and gave me a more realistic sense of what I have to do to accomplish my dreams thx

[BoAddict]

Nicky its been way too long since i graduated and course outlines im sure have changed
but im guessing to get into guelph vet school you should take biology right up to grade 12 , and probably chemistry as well
your best bet would be to go to your counsellor and talk to them tell them that your goal is to become a vet and ask them how to go about achieving success

82 is a good mark well back in my day that was i dont know if that would cut it now adays thats another question your counsellor could answer for you

good luck and dont let anyone tell you its not possible

[Lisa]

Tou might need your maths as well, even if you don't end up using them in RL. I think the people that decide what you need don't actually work in the field or if they do, make you take those subjects because they had to.