Pewter (Graziani Line)

Sex = Male
Snake ID = BP08#38
Hatch Date = July 10, 2008
Current Weight = 216 grams
Feeding on rat pups
$ xxx
** Click on image for a full size version. **

We had the opportunity to vend at this years Reptile Expo in Mississauga. It was a great show, with lots of traffic of herp fans and ball addicts everywhere. It was a pleasure meeting everyone today at the show and best wishes to everyone with their purchases that day. There were beautiful examples of ball pythons everywhere! A big thanks goes out to Grant and team who put on another great successful show. We did not have time to really comb through the show but we did take a few minutes to take a few quick pictures for those who missed it.

The pewter morph of ball pythons are amongst our favourites around www.BallPythonAddiction.com. The pewter mutation is a morph that was first created by Greg Graziani when he crossed a pastel jungle and a cinnamon pastel. The Black Pewter line is a darker colored animal derived from breeding a pastel jungle to a black pastel. Some people prefer black pewters and some favor Graziani line pewters. They are both cool animals that make great pets and create great breeding projects.

Pewters are labeled as a triple-threat animal. When bred to a normal ball python each egg has a 25% chance of being a pewters, a pastels, a cinnamon, and a normal. Bred to a pastel jungle, one can possibly hatch six different morphs all in one clutch; pewters, pastels, cinnamons, sterlings, super pastels and normals to be exact. When bred to the multitude of morphs and combos today, the designer crosses become infinite. The Pewter morph provides pure, diverse breeding power. It can create a new inventory of different morphs for future projects, all in one breeding. (Read on …)

Living in northern climates can be tough on a reptile enthusiast who must maintain proper humidity levels for their animals. Generally, reptiles will seek different humidity levels at any point of their cycle. Increased humidity is always ideal near shedding time and during egg-laying times. Ball pythons normally will do well at around 50 – 60% humidity and should increase slightly during sheds. But as hobbyists, maintaining steady humidity is challenging. Living in Toronto, our summers can be quite humid, and snakes can slough their skin with minimal help. During winter, the air is dry because we heat our homes with furnaces and baseboard heaters. If we add a humidifier in the room during winter, our collection always needs assistance in the shedding process. Incomplete sheds are not the end of the world, but when a collection grows, we try and keep them to a minimum. Who wants to bathe a snake for hours and peel bits of skin off all day, right?

Maintaining proper humidity levels for our ball pythons depends on what type of enclosure you keep. Two of the most popular are aquariums and plastic tub rack systems. Keepers who house ball pythons in aquariums must seal the top at least by 90% with plastic to help trap humid air to help during sheds. Providing a humid hide is ideal in this scenario. Most ball python collectors will house their animals in a plastic tub, rack system. These systems are ideal in maintaining good humidity levels with proper ventilation. Improper ventilation can trap too much humidity and increase the risk of mold build-up. You can tweak each tub with a soldering iron and melt holes in the tubs for airflow. (Read on …)

Whether African Soft Fur rats (ASF’s) make picky ball pythons into better eaters, is a debate amongst ball python keepers. When you keep a large collection of ball pythons, you will occasionally run into picky snakes that will feed sporadically. When we researched ASF rats on the web, many ball breeders were claiming that these rats were great on problem feeders and getting wild imports to get their first meals in captivity. ASF rats are claimed to be a natural food item that cohabitates with wild ball python populations in West Africa.

At www.BallPythonAddiction.com we strictly feed domestic rats to our collection, but we experimented by purchasing and breeding a trio of ASF to see if certain sporadic eaters could be enticed into becoming routine weekly feeders. Our conclusions found that ASF rats are a great tool to have in a ball python collection. We find that in most, not all ball pythons, ASF can trigger a food response out of a fasting ball python. We have had males that refused food after the breeding season for a prolonged time. We offered rats and they simply refused rats over and over. Take out the rat and throw in an ASF and WHAM; it drew a quick food response. Two ASF feedings helped the snakes routinely feed and by the third feeding, switched over to its regular rat staple. We had one large female this season that refused to eat regular rats for a month after egg laying, where as our other females quickly took first meals after laying eggs. An introduction to an ASF drew an explosive food response and now has resumed feeding on regular rats.

(Read on …)