By now, most people who seriously deal with the topic “boids” have encountered the issue involving hybridization and integration. This has since lead to enthusiasts - especially those of Boa constrictor - placing strong emphasis on acquiring pure-bred animals.

As a result, it is becoming increasingly difficult to sell crossbred boas, as the demand for such animals is decreasing.

For instance, if you acquire a pair of crossbred Boa constrictor for the purpose of propagation, you must consider the possibility of being unable to sell the offspring later on. Many breeders in that situation then turn to pet stores. For that reason, you cannot be certain that they will take your animals even there. Crossbred boas pretty much fetch the lowest sales price of all boas and pythons anyways.

You may now ask yourself why we are talking about money. Very simple: As consulting authorities for the district councils in Bavaria, we are regularly consulted for inventory and facility evaluations. In our experience, it is ALWAYS the “cheap snakes” (please excuse this terminology; it is not regarding the quality, but the monetary value of the animal) that are kept in the worst of conditions. The majority of these snakes were purchased at pet stores for relatively little money. Because of the low purchase price, the buyer does not put a lot of considerations into the needs of the animals, going by the motto: “If that thing dies, there won’t be much money lost”.

We are by no means saying that all keepers of inexpensive boas and pythons keep their animals in bad conditions. It is simply a fact that all those poor creatures without a suitable enclosure, whose keeper had never even purchased a book to familiarize himself/herself with its husbandry requirements, were all “cheap snakes” (e.g. crossbred boas, ball pythons, Burmese pythons).

Therefore, if you give a litter of crossbred animals to a pet store, you can be certain that some of these poor creatures will not survive their first year of life due to the insufficient care by their future keeper. Would you like that? Again, the following sentence applies: “The responsibility of the breeder is often underestimated.”

You should NEVER breed a true Boa constrictor to a crossbreed Boa constrictor!

You may now say that you don’t even want to breed your animals, but rather just keep one single specimen. Be assured: Very few of the keepers, who later produce offspring, had planned on doing so from the start. We therefore recommend for you to consider this, even when purchasing a single animal only.

 But even we own some crossbreeds.... 

. . . this email correspondence shows how things are going. We thank Daniel Nägele (www.dn-reptiles.de) for putting these lines to our disposal:

----- Original Message -----

From: Nägele

To: webmaster@boa-constrictors.com

Sent: Thursday, January 29, 2009 11:50 AM

Subject: Fw: surinam male

Hello Stöckl family

enclosed a fancy example...

I WROTE HIM BECAUSE OF HIS TRUE SURINAME-MALE AND THIS IS HOW IT ENDED :-)

Maybe you can use the emails for your website or so...

regards and have a nice day, Daniel

www.dn-reptiles.de

----- Original Message -----

From: xxxxxxxx

To: d.naegele@gmx.net

Sent: Wednesday, January 28, 2009 7:12 PM

Subject: RE: suriname male

Hi Daniel,

thank you for your interest. The boa is from Germany and is cb 2006.

Enclosed some pics

regards xxxxxx

From: d.naegele@gmx.net

To: xxxxxxxxx

Subject: Re: surinam male

Date: Wed, 28 Jan 2009 23:26:43 +0100

Hello,

thank you for the photos...

Who is the breeder? In true boas it is quite a matter...

Looks a little emaciated, the little one, how big is it and what's the weight? What's the price?

Thank you and greetings Daniel