Anyone NOT want to breed??

[acharpenter]

I adopted a male and 2 females 2 months ago. I ended up finding a new home for the male as I just felt that the females were to small to be breeding and on top of that I was/am so new to Gecko's - I really didn’t think I was ready for taking on the responsibilities of breeding.

One of the females has laid egg's 3 times now - (she is too small for this and I have compensated by making sure she gets lots of bugs to get her weight back each time).

All I keep seeing is threads about how to breed, what to do etc.....

Am I the only one that doesn’t want to breed to the point that I separate a trio?

Just curious......

 

[Thorgecko707]

I have kept my male with his girls since 2005 and just don't incubate until this year. Have been breeding other one. I notice everybody is breeding too. Supply is going up along with cost. No good.

 

[Tony C]

I am no longer breeding leopard geckos. I have no interest in competing in a race to the lowest price with people who throw unknowns together just because they can.

 

[acharpenter]

No - what I am saying is her breeding with how small she is has me thinking its not only a hazard to her health and longevity but has also been a factor that may very well reduce her lifespan.

I didnt get into this to breed - I got into this for having these adorable little guys for as long as possible.

Which means I know I could have left the male in with her but I re-homed him to try to reduce the stress on her physically so that I would have her as long as possible.

No - I know I can get egg's - she will more than likely continue to produce egg's that are viable for at least the next couple of months.

My thought is, I am not ready to take on incubating them and I am stressed out because she is just too small to be having them (past owners lack of knowledge to seperate them).

I just wonder - is anyone else out there accidentaly getting egg's/hatchlings....what are they doing about it?

And if anyone else out there knows they are going to get/or already have egg's that they dont plan to raise......what would they or what have they done and thier thoughts behind it....

 

[acharpenter]

I have kept my male with his girls since 2005 and just don't incubate until this year. Have been breeding other one. I notice everybody is breeding too. Supply is going up along with cost. No good.

So - are you worried about the toll it takes on her physically every time she lays egg's???

 

[Tony C]

So - are you worried about the toll it takes on her physically every time she lays egg's???

From what I have seen in my collection females who lay infertile eggs are more likely to have problems like egg binding, lose more weight, and take longer to recover than females who are allowed to mate and lay fertile eggs.

 

[Thorgecko707]

They can live up to 25 years with proper yearly cycling. That includes healthy breeding periods every spring. Throw the eggs away or make an omelet. Or donate for science. Microwave it for ten seconds to make sure it doesn't hatch. Sex is the most exercise they get besides crawling up on a rock. It's good for them like everyone else.

 

[M_surinamensis]

Am I the only one that doesn’t want to breed to the point that I separate a trio?

I allow very few of my animals to breed, and encourage it in even fewer.

I don't keep leopard geckos though, so the reasons behind my choices are a bit more varied.

Most of my animals are housed individually and never cycled for breeding. They're kept in conditions that are appropriate for maintenance, with pretty tightly controlled environmental parameters and never intentionally subjected to seasonal triggers which would provoke ovulation.

As Tony mentioned though, the incidences of complications with females who have ovulated is higher in many species when the eggs are not then subsequently fertilized. If ovulation is prevented entirely, then it's a bit of a moot point, but many people find absolute control over those seasonal triggers to be difficult, some species are more sensitive to conditions that are less easily controlled. Barometric pressure changes, the length and intensity of a light cycle, changes to humidity, precipitation, temperature and diet can all be potential triggers for the physiological changes associated with seasonally receptive breeding.

Your situation is a bit unique, in that the animals were paired up prior to your ownership... but I generally (these days) make a conscious decision not to allow or encourage breeding in most of my animals. Some of them I just prefer to avoid the additional work that comes with breeding; increasing calcium intake, monitoring lay-boxes, altered feeding patterns, the possibility of binding, the loss of nutrient stores, injury from the exposure to another animal. Some of them I don't want to or can't easily sell or move, which would mean housing all the offspring personally. Others I just... don't really care to bother, I keep them for them and feel no compulsion to do anything more.

Chondros I can't sell in-state, except to other permit holders and house individually year round.

The monitors I can't sell in-state, except to other permit holders. It took some effort to end up with a trio that was able to cohabitate though, so I don't really want to mess with that comparatively rare dynamic by splitting them up. I intentionally avoid seasonal cycling, but have destroyed eggs a couple times in the past few years when they were produced despite despite my efforts at stability.

The Candoia there's barely a market for and the babies are frankly a bit of a pain in the butt. It's more effort to get them feeding reliably and CB aspera tend to sell for a whopping twenty-thirty bucks each, if a buyer can even be found to begin with.

The 'benders I try to breed every year. Because they're rare, breeding efforts in captivity are only infrequently successful and it's worthwhile work. My own efforts have been severely mixed, but the notes from my sole genuine and few partial successes are of value, not just to myself.

The PTS I haven't really made much of an effort with, mostly back to my disinclination to produce animals for sale. I reconsider it every year because they're comparatively rare, there are some issues with the taxonomy and with wild collection numbers, slow reproductive rates and so on... but usually end up declining because I just do not want to really sell animals. It's a hassle.

Frogs, fish, garter snakes, inverts... all individual decisions, for specific reasons relative to what they are, what it entails and my own willingness to commit to the full process.



As a generalization, I think you see this rush to breed from a lot of people for two reasons; one old and one new.

The old reason... for a good chunk of the twentieth century, herpetoculture was kind of finding its following. It was a bit of a niche thing, this is why most the recognizable names as recently as up into and through the seventies and eighties were mostly herpetologists first and foremost. It was retired zookeepers, zoologists, naturalists, biology professors and so on who made up the majority for a long time, not exclusively... but substantially. Much of the focus among that group was on identifying the kinds of conditions that were required to keep some of these species alive in captivity, they had little commercial support and they were laying the foundations for what we think of as being the basics today. It wasn't "Go to a pet store and buy a UTH and this calcium supplement" kind of stuff, it was reasoned trial and error happening mostly among people with a strong educational background in the field. Breeding was a kind of grand prize, a way of proving expertise; to have these animals kept so well that they would actually exhibit the full range of healthy behaviors was a thing to be respected and admired. It really showed that a person was very good at what they were doing.

Because that earlier crowd tended to be composed of people who had a common background and thorough understanding, there was a lot of focus on the biological how-to aspects of breeding in everything that was shared or written. There was a sort of unspoken assumption that those who were involved and interested shared similar views on the when and why, the ethics and the ramifications.

That changed a bit with a few... well, fads really. The idea of herps as pets have had a few periods where they hit the general public and became more and more mainstream, wider spread and less of a fringe interest. Boa constrictors and iguanas in the seventies and again in the eighties, corn snakes and chameleons in the early nineties, ball pythons and leopard geckos in the mid-late nineties through to today. It became something participated in by a much more diverse group of people, the commercial success grew, companies started manufacturing herp products and pet stores started carrying more reptiles.

The idea that breeding is the pinnacle of expertise has stuck around though, just look at the attitude of pride many new keepers use when they self identify as "a breeder." Knowledge about reptiles and amphibians hasn't advanced equally though. The popular pet species mostly ARE the popular pet species because they're docile and colorful and easy to keep and hardy. The sheer volume of them that have been successfully kept in captivity has refined and honed what we know about them to the point where keeping them is a comparatively simple matter of following some very specific instructions. There are hundreds of species that are underrepresented in the pet trade because keeping them alive is still the kind of thing that requires experience and knowledge... but the label of "breeder" has never lost that old stigma. Not even when it maybe should have... or should have started including stricter criteria anyway, to differentiate between exceptional breeders and those who... aren't.

The new reason has a lot to do with the way the morph markets took off in the mid-late nineties and have really only slowed down in recent years. It wasn't the first boom, not even the first time the market had been driven by color mutations... but there was something a bit different about the way it was marketed and presented when it came to the leopard geckos and ball pythons (and to a lesser extent, other species like beardies, cresties and anything else with reproducible albinism). We saw people who took a color mutation and became millionaires. We had the magazines and the internet putting the accomplishments of professional breeders up on a kind of pedestal (some of them DO deserve it) where they were watched by an entire generation who fell in love with Steve Irwin.* The way we exchanged information, the way we saw what other people were doing, the way animals were marketed and reputations were built all changed, all became so much more visible. Breeders were leading the way, breeders were producing things we had never seen, breeders were writing the care sheets and building the websites and writing the books that were sold in the pet stores.

It's hard for a new person not to be a little overwhelmed by that, to look at it all and think that it's not something to aspire towards. And for those who make the choice to do it the right way, there really is something admirable involved. I don't view it as the end-all-be-all of herpetological accomplishment, I often have tastes that are wildly dissimilar to some of the things that are trending popularly in the market... but I can't help but have respect for the work done by some of those people who have taken the time and put in the effort to earn meaningful results from their projects.




I think we're kind of on the cusp of something, a change to the way we collectively qualify and quantify accomplishment. We're sort of rotating back around to an older type of categorization and recognition, where we judge not just if someone has done something, but how well they have done it. What choices they made and steps they took to get there and the value of their results. Some niche markets have long operated on these principles; look at chondros, grey banded kingsnakes of chameleons... but the more popular species are starting to see it a little more strongly too. There's a rising demand for quality and some backlash against those sources who fail to meet widely acknowledged standards. It's a bit more difficult to see right here and now, in the middle of a high production time of year, just because everything is inundated by neophyte keepers, many of whom are making poorly thought out decisions about breeding... but there are hints of it, the rejection of substandard animals, the lack of interest in offspring of poorly paired adults, the dismissal of some of those "morph boom" era marketing tactics.



*I am not a fan. I have reasons. It's a matter of taste though, so I'm not saying anything bad about those who may have been introduced to herps through his show.

 

[M_surinamensis]

Just one other thought on the appeal of breeding.

There is something fascinating about witnessing everything about an animal's behavior. I personally don't feel it is a sufficient reason to support a rush to breed when the person doing so really isn't ready for everything it entails, but it is a motivation that has nothing to do with labeling oneself as a breeder.

Selecting a pair of adults, provoking breeding behaviors in them can be something that is quite a challenge for some species, easier in others... witnessing the courtship and mating behaviors, nest site selection, some rare herps (more amphibians than reptiles) practice guarding and even some rudimentary rearing behaviors, watching the way they change and grow after they are born... it's this little slice of natural behavior, usually an incomplete glimpse, but there can even be hints of some of the natural selection and pressures that caused them to evolve the way they have, to be the things they are. We constantly walk this fine line between what is best for our individual pets as captive animals and (hopefully) an appreciation for what they are in the wild; breeding is often one more way to be exposed to another facet of the wide and wonderful, amazing and intricate, varied and beautiful natural world.

The things I do choose to breed, at the times I choose to breed them... that's usually the biggest reason why I decide to go ahead. Maybe other people are different, but I'd bet I'm not alone. Just ask Tony about some of the frogs he breeds and everything he gets to see when he does.

 

[AmberJean86]

I have NO interest in breeding. I much rather let others do that!

 

[Coby78]

I don't. I have barely any money as it is, and I always feel like if I have more than one of a species, I prefer one over the others and I don't like that.

I plan to just get more reptiles, instead of more leopard geckos. Next purchase will be a blue tongue skink.

 

[Wild West Reptile]

Chondros I can't sell in-state, except to other permit holders and house individually year round.

The monitors I can't sell in-state, except to other permit holders. It took some effort to end up with a trio that was able to cohabitate though, so I don't really want to mess with that comparatively rare dynamic by splitting them up. I intentionally avoid seasonal cycling, but have destroyed eggs a couple times in the past few years when they were produced despite despite my efforts at stability.

The Candoia there's barely a market for and the babies are frankly a bit of a pain in the butt. It's more effort to get them feeding reliably and CB aspera tend to sell for a whopping twenty-thirty bucks each, if a buyer can even be found to begin with.

The 'benders I try to breed every year. Because they're rare, breeding efforts in captivity are only infrequently successful and it's worthwhile work. My own efforts have been severely mixed, but the notes from my sole genuine and few partial successes are of value, not just to myself.

The PTS I haven't really made much of an effort with, mostly back to my disinclination to produce animals for sale. I reconsider it every year because they're comparatively rare, there are some issues with the taxonomy and with wild collection numbers, slow reproductive rates and so on... but usually end up declining because I just do not want to really sell animals. It's a hassle.

Frogs, fish, garter snakes, inverts... all individual decisions, for specific reasons relative to what they are, what it entails and my own willingness to commit to the full process.

I would love to see some of your collection of animals as well as the setups. Do you have them posted anywhere?

 

[IslaReina]

I'm with you, acharpenter. I am about to head off for college, and as much as I would like to get another gecko, it just wouldn't work out. I plan on breeding eventually, maybe when I'm like... idk 30? maybe 40? I want to have a steady income where I can afford to take all my animals to the vet and properly care for them before even buying the equipment. For now, I am very happy with my little Nova and I just wouldn't have the time for another. As a pet though, I think I want to get a little crested gecko when I get out of college ^.^

A pet is good enough for me. What is it about this hobby that makes people say, "oh, I've had my gecko for 2 days, let me get ten more and start a breeding colony before I have anything ready and I have no job???!!"

 

[stager]

My wife is pushing it, I told her lets wait a year but I really don't want to. I have breed dogs, snakes and chinchilla's in the past and it's more work than people think. My chinchilla's were producing some real nice silver and white babies, and they were still hard to get rid of, I eventually gave every thing away for free to a pet shop employee. And they only produced between one and three at a time. There are enough unwanted pets in the world. And when every one starts breading the prices plumit and the people who bread as a business get hurt. I remember seeing snakes going for a 1000 at the shows a year later 500 and three years later you can't give the things away. It's fun to breed but becomes alot of money and work. I already have 110 saltwater fish tank, green tree python was my first so will never part with, a pit bull, teady bear dog, two cats, and two kids.

 

[Thorgecko707]

My wife is pushing it, I told her lets wait a year but I really don't want to. I have breed dogs, snakes and chinchilla's in the past and it's more work than people think. My chinchilla's were producing some real nice silver and white babies, and they were still hard to get rid of, I eventually gave every thing away for free to a pet shop employee. And they only produced between one and three at a time. There are enough unwanted pets in the world. And when every one starts breading the prices plumit and the people who bread as a business get hurt. I remember seeing snakes going for a 1000 at the shows a year later 500 and three years later you can't give the things away. It's fun to breed but becomes alot of money and work. I already have 110 saltwater fish tank, green tree python was my first so will never part with, a pit bull, teady bear dog, two cats, and two kids.

ill take the kids off yer hands

 

[stager]

ill take the kids off yer hands

LMAO You'd pay me to take my 2 year old back within the hour. Most fathers save for collage I'm saving for bail.

 

[Thorgecko707]

LMAO You'd pay me to take my 2 year old back within the hour. Most fathers save for collage I'm saving for bail.

lmao. thats epic