RCReptiles.com

[deborahbroadus]

[junkopardner]

Junk,

You remind me of a member that we had some time ago. Your posts are very entertaining and give insight into your philosophy. Thank you for sharing. We value differences of opinions on this forum. The overriding concern that we all have in common is the safety of the snakes. That said, none of the older members would ever suggest that something be done that they knew carried risks, however small that risk might be.

I can understand the older members giving the danger's of it, but what I can't understand is that the issue of housing two BP's together is addressed by Ron, on this very site, and what he said about housing them together is practically everything I've read and heard elsewhere on this subject. I simply repeated the consensus on the question that was posed.

That said, I am surprised that someone that has just experienced a world shaking event would encourage (you seem to be) someone else to take risks. You state that you would not do it, but you seem to be encouraging other members to do what it not a normally accepted herp keeping method. By trying to act as Devils Advocate you aren't actually doing that, your posts read as an encouragement and not as a "well, what if?" post. That's the way I am reading the post, but if I am reading it wrong, I apologize.

I was also never encouraging anyone to take "risks". Again, I was simply stating the information that is widely circulated on the this topic, including on Ron's blog on this site. I also didn't say I wouldn't do it because I think it's dangerous. I don't see the point in general (but the case could be made for why "these" 2 should be kept together). I'm simply not a worry wart that's constantly bracing myself for the worse case scenario in every situation. You say that snakes have attacked one another recently, and then there's the horror show pix that were posted showing cannibalism. So how well are those cases documented, and all the records etc. maintained? And how many people have successfully kept 2 together? By successfully, I mean without any incident of any kind, ever? If you would call into question the facts of the people who contend they've kept 2 together successfully, then it would seem to me that you would have to call into question all the facts surrounding attacks etc. It works both ways. And although I don't have statistical data on this (I doubt anyone here does either), I could take a wild guess that attacks, cannibalism etc. are probably far more the exception than the rule when housing 2 together. It stands to reason that if this were anywhere close to common, there would be A LOT more negative information out there regarding housing more than 1 BP per enclosure.

Quote:
Just because humanity has turned into a bunch of worried pussies
Now that sounds like an insult to the esteemed members here, so you are being warned about the name calling...keep it clean please.


That comment wasn't directed at anyone on this site. If you notice, I said "humanity". It's the fear culture we live in. And as I stated in my previous reply, I didn't really consider that a curse word.

And while I appreciate sound advice on BP care, it seems there's a lot advice on this forum that leans a lot to the paranoid side. I was just trying to make an argument that while it's obviously important to give your snakes their basics, they are not delicate little flowers.

If they were, the ones that were housed together in filth for 4 years would be dead. Now I'm not suggesting that you should disregard temps, hygiene etc. but when the owner of this site says what many other reputable sources have said about housing two together, I don't understand all the negative, paranoid, better safe than sorry, what-if thinking advice by members who have never even done this successfully or otherwise.

If it's such a no-no to house together (even given that you follow the guidelines) then why are the members of this site contradicting what the site owner's answer was to the question?

I'd also like to thank you for your courteous reply. So are you the good cop Mod?

J

[deborahbroadus]

[junkopardner]

BTW:

I called and spoke with a herpetologist at Indiana University about this subject, and you know what he said?

The same thing various vets have said, owners who do have said, and Ron said in his blog:

Q: Is it Ok to keep more than one snake in a cage?
A: Yes and No. I don't advise keeping different types/species and/or sizes of snakes in one cage. After a 2-3 month quarantine, two or more Ball Pythons of similar size can be house together in a big cage. If they happen to stop feeding, I would suggest separating them to individual cages, and you'll want to separate them at feeding time. (Husbandry)


So while you're busy trying to "educate me", you might want to block off some time and educate the professionals as well.

J

[NickMyers03]

here are so many things i want to say to this.... most are not allowed on this forum.>>>>>>>

then PM me with them.

No need to PM i will say it right here

#1. the main out line for this "story" is to state that through evolution snakes are hardy... is this correct? with all that you said that seems to be the main point. Well i hate to break the news to you but snakes are not from this part of the world, sure you adapt but it takes MILLIONS of years for a creature to adapt to a diffrent climate.>>>>>>>>>>

That was ONE of my points. That snakes are "conditionable" to a certain degree, like ANY living thing. If this WEREN'T the case, then explain handling them often to get them "used to it", or feeding them frozen because it is believed that this makes them less aggressive as it doesn't stimulate the aggressive/hunting response, or feeding them in a separate container so they don't associate their enclosure with food....I could go on, but all these examples are examples of adaptation through CONDITIONING. You can't argue that. Well, I guess you can but then again you argue that the world is really flat.

By Stating that you think i would argue the world is flat shows somthing about you. conditioning to be held is one thing but changing instincts is another. we do change them to frozen thawed for our own reasons but at the same point you have to warm it up to beyond room temp and most of the time have to do the rat/mouse dance to attack it. if they were coditionable to what you are saying i would not have to do this to get their natural reactions. with frozen thawed alot of people say they dont constrict their prey but whats funny is every one i have gone to see still constricts...

As for the climate point, you are posing a straw man argument here. I never said throw them out n the snow and they'll adapt, did I? So where are you getting that from?

the climate point was from where you were talking about us walking on egg shells and that they have made it years of evloution and they arnt delicate flowers, my point was yes they did but in AFRICA... not in your tank at home. i see your set up and what you have in your post. it makes me sick that you think you can give out information based on internet care sheets ( most are written by people like you just starting out and have no real expierence) and PETSMART books/employees ... i hate to tell you but if your getting your info from these places you should give away your ball python


#2. when your snakes are " laying on eachother" they are NOT showing emotion they are combating for the heat spot.>>>>>>>>>>>

Where did I say that snakes laying on top of each other were showing emotion? I never said that at any point. In fact, all I said that was that they were part of each other's environment for years. Now, if that's a fact, am I making it up? And are you even reading these posts, and if so, who they're from?

"Add to that these two specific snakes have been living on top of each other for 4 years, and now you're past extremely rare" this is an exact qoute from you. living on top of each other stating that they are sleeping in the same cage which they lay on each other and fight for the hot spot.

#3. for having one snake and not alot of Know how about them you seem to preach alot. common sence doesnt work in this field with new herpers. you are on a forum that doesnt like to give out false info and yet you are spewing it to kids and adults that may be getting their first snake and may think about a second.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I'm not preaching ANYTHING, and I'm not stating anything that hasn't been stated by several BP owner's and professionals, including the information on this very site's Q and A. Are you saying that Ron, the owner of this site, is giving out false information about housing two BP's together?

i said it once and i will say it again, i dont know who you are getting your info from but its the wrong people. Ron does state this BUT he also say to not house them in 1 cage but two. he also has blogs on how you should set up your tank per snake. the BP owners you are getting this info from are prob the same type of people that were caring for these two snakes to begin with. when i first want a ball python i did research on them because my friend had two and kept them in the same tank and only fed them once a month. guess who told him that, PETSMART/PETCO and a friend that owns a BP. i talk to more LARGE breeders on a daily basis than you will ever talk to and i also do more research and info gathering on this species than you will ever do. this is my hobby. im at work researching, at home researching, at breeders facilitys actually working with ball pythons and giants. i maintain and clean more snakes a week then you will see at some shows you may attend. now with all that said what im trying to state is when i give info its from real life, from breeders who have decades of expierence, and from books from these breeders. So if you really want to debate on this species, i say lets go.


#4. i love the fact that you state how you eat candy off the ground. i do believe in the 5 second rule ONLY if it is on my clean kitchen floor OR in my own house where i know it is sanitary. now off the floor of a rancid truck stop bathroom floor? if your kids were tought these practices there may be a reason they now have ecoli. im sorry that your son has this but from just reading your post its now making sence.>>>>>>>>>>>

First, you better drop the "son" thing immediately.
Second, he's my girlfriend and her ex-husbands son, and his condition is a result of unsanitary conditions at her ex mother-in-law's house, which is part of the reason she's trying to get joint custody. I can't even believe you have the gall to bring this up. I would be very careful here.
Third, children, the sick and the elderly have very weakened immune systems, so what applies to resistance, conditioning and adaptation in healthy adults does not remotely apply to children, the sick and the elderly. Kinda like intelligent, articulate and tactful discourse doesn't remotely apply to you in this post.

Your son or not i said my point and im sticking to it. children reflect habbits from every source they can. if it happend at your house or her ex mother in laws house. if it didnt reslut from this and came from lets say chicken that was thawed to long then thats that. I tell it how it is and how you write it. This post has nothing to do with RCReptiles this is all me and i take responsibilty for all my own actions. I have NO feelings twords anyone. when i say this i mean it. my grandfather died and it didnt affect me, my nephew just had his second surgery with a 50% chance to live...did it affect me? NO. so if you think that me sateing that you acting the way you acted and maybe the kid picked up on this and did the same thing resluting in what happend is wrong...im sorry but its the truth.


#5. you state that snakes are conditionable... show me one snake that if it had the chance would not slither away. there is a reason they are called caged animals.>>>>>>>>>>>>>

"Slither away" from WHAT? What are you even talking about?

if a snake were to be conditioned like you say even to a point where it tolerated being handled and knew it had food coming every tuesday wouldnt you think that it ( like a dog or cat ) would want to stay where it was. if this is so why are there all these escape threads and posts? snakes so what is natural. we are holding them captive in a tank or tub because we want to.


#6. i do believe ther is more of a DE-stressing when seperating them not stressing them out more... if these two snakes were moved from one house to another there would be more stress there with new smells, so if it was done then there would be no extra stress factor.>>>>>>>>>>>>

"You" believe. "You" being the key word here. You expressed your beliefs, and I pointed out a long history of these two snakes sharing the same unsanitary enclosure with no problems. No imagine that enclosure was perfectly sanitary....yeah, I can see that you have a point. They may be so "conditioned" by their unsanitary conditions that they might get really ill or eat each other in a really clean one.

Long history being 4 years of undocumented health, eating habbits, temps and so on...yeah thats some history there. hmmm lets talk to a breeder that has had snakes since the 70's or 80's and who keeps around 1 thousand and see what he thinks? i know what he would say...and guess what its to seperate them

Now, that is obviously sarcasm. but you see my point. I have the past 4 years of facts, and you have what "you" believe about stress levels in separating 2 snakes that have been a large part of their single enclosure for the last 4 years.

show me your facts. if you can break out their feeding charts, shed charts, temp spikes and so on let me know i would love to see these facts. this guy said he found a SLUG in there so how would they even know they were breeding or if they even had a male and female. i have shown why i say what i say about how balls should be taken care of...i do this 24/7 365.

Now I'm not saying you're right or wrong, but there's simply no way for you to know. If they "adapt" and become "conditioned" to being alone for the first time in separate enclosure, then I'm right. If they do it without getting sick, we're both right. But even IF they don't get stressed to the point of illness, that still doesn't prove that they were no more stressed being separated than they would have been just being in a new environment. If you real his post, he didn't say they got stressed when he got them to his home, with new smells etc. He said they got stressed when he tried to SEPARATE them.

haha again new snake owner.. how does he know what it looks like when they are stressed because they are seperated vs. stressed from just being somewhere new or not having urnates and poo all the way around. you have no facts and your trying to build an arguement off of it.

#7 how can you think they are solitary creatures BUT think that its fine to have 2 together? ther are no anomalies with them, they dont all of a sudden want to have a family and stay home and take care of the kids.>>>>>>>>>>

Because many people in other forums, herp newgroups, vets etc. have said the same things about housing two BP's together that Ron has said in his Q and A ON this very site!! Are you even listening? And to say that there are no anomalies in BP's is absolutely ignorant. There are anomalies in every species of animal, human, tree, plant and on and on and on.....

Show me the Vet Report that says you can house 2 snakes together and what the vet says to do. what herp groups? what forums? i like how you state these but do say which ones...how much you want to bet i am a member of each and have been there longer than you. Im also on these sites everyday so please name them. if you direct me to some "off brand" site forum that is run by a 12 year old dont be mad when i start laughing.

( you are now Warned for the Curse word used in the responce)>>>>>

Well, I wasn't really aware that the word I used was a curse word. So, thanks Mom.

Now I know.....

No Problem little TIKE i want to make sure the rules are known

[a_green]

[junkopardner]

I'll let Ron answer why he has that statment on his site. I am assuming it's because once the snakes are out of his care, he has no say over the snakes and doesn't like to speak in absolutes. Even here, people mostly can do as they please, we just caution them.

"doesn't like to speak in absolutes"? If it's such a terrible thing to do, and carries such a high mortality rate, and is so common, then what's not to get absolute about? And I could say that "caution" (if you were to go back and read the responses) is putting it mildly.

If I'm being testy here, it's because I rightfully should be. I was attacked for not "being helpful" by stating the very advice that was stated by the owner of the site! If you can't see the insanity in that, then I must have just gone down the rabbit hole......

Quote:
And while I appreciate sound advice on BP care, it seems there's a lot advice on this forum that leans a lot to the paranoid side. I was just trying to make an argument that while it's obviously important to give your snakes their basics, they are not delicate little flowers.

You probably won't be happy here then if that's your perspective. Cool

The culture of this forum is education and helping and your posts aren't helping, really. You haven't read the post that was just made of a herper that kept his two hatchlings together and what happened? That JUST happened so it's obviously not so uncommon. It's a risk most of us prefer NOT to take and we give advice in that direction.

And why would people who have had success in housing two together feel compelled to post in boards about no incidences? That's like the news reporting all the people who didn't get into car accidents in a given day. You're only going to hear about the one's that got into wrecks. The same way you're only going to hear about the reptiles that "caused" salmonella infection, and not the thousands and thousands of Herp owners that never have an issue with it.

Look, as I've said before, I have no real interest in this topic OTHER than I was trying to give the guy advice based on what advice is commonly given in the professional community "should" someone choose to keep two together.

And then I get called out for giving bad advice, being uneducated, not helping....surely you can understand why I might be a touch indignant.


J
[/i]

[Buck_99]

We've reached the end of this rabbit hole.

[deborahbroadus]

[RonCrawford]

[PlayBall]

I know this has nothing to do with this thread but I'm a big Family Guy fan and I was just remembering the episode where there's a donkey and a man seating on a couch and they're both talking about the movie Footloose and the donkey is like "No! Kevin Bacon was not in that movie" and the other guy is like "yes he was! he was the main actor.." and donkey continues to disagree...blah blah and goes on for a minute. Just wanted to share that with you all
It was very funny, but I suck at telling stories, once again I'll go shoot myself

Ok, I found the video here it is:
http://www.snotr.com/video/141

[ryancbj22]

This is a direct quote from junkopardner in a previous thread. I think this states it all:

''I know very little about snakes (and BP's) in general, but it would seem to me that a primal creature that has been around longer than the beard of Moses would adapt to two different enclosures over time. But what do I know? That's why I'm here."

For someone who know's so little about snake's your pushing a pretty lousy argument with a lot people who have more than experience in this field than you ever will.

No one here is a vet or has all the answer's but they have year's upon year's of experience not to mention the trial and error's that they've been through. I can't speak for everyone on here, but all of the answer's that I have received have all helped me beyond beleif. I think I can speak for a lot of other people on here when I say without this forum I would have been over my head.

[deborahbroadus]

[Feral]

Aww poo I started a disgreement and got called a guy...I tend to be a girl, but that isn't of too much importance. And yea, I agree that a nice chill is in order. *twiddles thumbs* I'm a pacifist at heart so it is a touch upsetting to me to be the cause of an upstart. Thank you all for your input and help.And playball do not shoot yourself I just saw that episode of Family Guy lately and just started laughing when I read that. This does sort of remind me of it.

[deborahbroadus]