Ok I just wanna get out a few questions that have been floating in the back of my head.....

1. Where would you go to have a BP sexed? I know in another thread it was said that you wanna go to a place that specializes in reptiles, but there is no place around here that does. And im sure a place like petco or petsmart wouldn't be able to help me, or am I wrong?

2. Correct me if im wrong, but I have been told that females will can get up to 6ft and males up to 4ft long. Me and my wife have been talking about gettin another, slightly larger breed, but we wanna stick with a docile breed of snake. We love our BP, he seems to be a very loving snake and loves to be held and thats our favorite thing about him. So with that in mind. We want to venture into other breeds to get a feel for different kinds of snakes, but we dont wanna jump right into a breed of snake that is very tempramental or aggressive. We would like to just slowly move up.. What would be a good recomendation??

well thats actually it for now... amazing.. i felt like I was full of questions haha.

You can call a local vet that deals with exotics to have it probed, maybe also a local zoo. As for an additional snake,,,I'm partial to redtail boas. I have 4 and all are quite docile. Though true redtails will grow larger than common boas. Hogg island boas on the other hand will be much smaller.

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Ken
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference in the world. But, the Marines don't have that problem." -- Ronald Reagan

I would never let a Petsmart or Petco employee probe a snake unless I had got to really know them and knew that they knew what they were doing. To much chance of injuring the snake!
A good herp should be able to tell you.
I like boas as well! They are not quite as laid back as balls are but still great snakes.
They do get MUCH larger.
And eat much larger
and poop,....You would swear a St Bernard stopped by the tank!

However you have to remember that each snake is different and you have no guarantees. I have known some really grumpy boas.

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Merlin,
What's Life Without A Little Magic!

A 6' Ball would be abit large 5.5' is a big female, though above the normal size. From the ones I've see the largest was about 5 foot. Males on the other hand tend to be more around the 3-4 foot mark if they make it that big. My one male was 4 years and only just under 3 feet. I really have only delt with pythons, but the few boas I've handled were fairly good, outside of one tree boa that thought I'd make a good snack.

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ok well I know not to let anyone in petsmart or petco touch my snake, let alone probe. Matter of fact when I was there, some people were looking at bps and asked about them and the "expert" there didn't have any idea and tried selling them the most expensive one they had (i can't remember what it was) and telling them that they were the best snakes for the money. So I interupted and answered a few of their questions. The guy couldnt even tell them how old they can get. I told them for someone new to snakes like me, get a BP, cause I did and im 100% satisfied with my choice.. haha. Ok well honeslty NO ONE in this general area deals specificly with exotic pets, but ill look around for one. And I was just curious what people would recomend for a bigger snake, but im going to stick with my bp for now. Another question I have is, i noticed that my BP has some shed left on its head but he gets a little tempramental when I try to rub at it to see if it will just flake away... what doesn anyone recomend I do????

Our favorite retained shed treatment is to get a tub of fairly warm water, add a couple caps of mineral oil, and soak said snake for about 20 minutes. This seems to work very well around here. The ball python at my daughters' school has a lot of shedding problems due to an abused lifestyle before they got him. I told them to start doing this for him, and his shed problems have cleared up. He also no longer wants out of his bathtub, so they have to cover him and get him out with a towel! He used to fight having a bath. The mineral oil makes him feel nice and soft and no itching from the dry shed. He always has a problem with the eyecaps and first 1/3 of his body, and this works for him. for ball pythons we use an empty cat food plastic container that we have put holes in the lid. for boa's we use a sterlite container that we have put holes in the lid. Hope this can help you.

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Kat

Ball pythons are by nature very head shy and don't like their heads messed with.
The simplest, least stressful, way to remove leftover shed is to take a wet towel, put it and the snake in a wet pillowcase, knot the pillowcase and leave it overnight in the enclosure. The extra moisture will soften the shed and the snake moving around in the wet towel will rub it off.

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Merlin,
What's Life Without A Little Magic!

ok, this sounds a lot easier than attempting to make him mad by picking at his head haha. I'll try that, thanks.

Just sec. BPs are head shy? I've never had that experience. Maybe the ones I handled were exceptions. Good to know though.

Ball pythons are notoriously head shy.
You can work with it to get them over it, but it is an instinct.
Both of mine will allow me to take their heads in my fingers and hold them.

__________________
Merlin,
What's Life Without A Little Magic!