male/female without probing

[Specks]

i heard that a breeder told someone i know a baby snake they bought was a female. but hadnt probed it but they said know it is a female because they say females have longer tails than males. is this true? as this will help me out when i breed net year if it is true.

personally i dont think it is but.. u never know.

 

[bfg23]

i heard that a breeder told someone i know

that says it all!

If you want to breed them, just get someone to probe them. Your 'guess' work could end up being a costly mistake.

 

[Andrais]

lol bfg quick to the mark arnt u?

 

[Specks]

but is it true. i would get mine probed but if this is an effective way i may consider it.

 

[AMY22]

The only positive way to tell if it is a male or female is by probing. Tail length and the width can sometimes be a clue, a wider tail is meant to indicate a male due to the hemepenes, but even then I think that is only ‘obvious’ in certain species. There is also the idea that the spurs near the vent will determine the sex based on size (as males are meant to use them to stimulate the female during mating). But it does not mean that the guess will be correct. If they want the sex to be accurately determined it should be probed.

 

[Specks]

yes. i would rather have them probed as then i am asssured their sex. i was just creating this thread to see if this was valid or not

 

[Niall]

Determining the Sexes of Snakes

You can do it without needing to probe the python if you know what you are looking for.
It took me around 2 months to start seeing the bump (M) or no bump (F) at the start of the tail and now i get most of them right, just the big Adult imbricatas are a bit hard to do i find it easyer to do it in different lighting, i prefer doing it facing a white wall.

 

[garycahill]

Another method you could try is suspending a coin over the snake & seeing if it spins or swings.

 

[Specks]

haha good one lol

 

[garycahill]

Some people actually swear by this method, believe it or not.
(I am not one of those people, probe them)

 

[Specks]

Some people actually swear by this method, believe it or not.
(I am not one of those people, probe them)

omg for real. cant beleive pplz actually do stuff like that

 

[JrFear]

Hmmmmm i thought it was the males have the longer tails since they need to hide/ or have room for there longer / hemipenes?
anyways i say probing is the best way to be 100%
i found this video on youtube which mite be some interest also!
[video=youtube;EpMUlkOTzKI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpMUlkOTzKI[/video]

 

[Sdaji]

I'm yet to hear of anyone who probes with 100% accuracy. I know of snakes missexed by probing by all of the well known breeders. Some get pretty close to 100% but surprisingly few, and some of the ones who tout themselves as the best are little better than Gary's method.

The only absolutely positive way to tell for sure is to breed them. The one which lays eggs or gives birth is the girl, and the other is the boy.

Some species are extremely easy to sex by tail shape, including many of the small elapids. Many species can be visually sexed much more easily than by probing (such as Bardicks ). In these species, the visual difference is extremely easy to see.

Males have longer tails on average, and in some species it is very obvious. In most species of pythons (which I assume is all you are interested in) the average difference is small and there is a lot of overlap between the sexes, so measuring tails won't help you.

Here is a picture of a male and female Little Whipsnake. You can see the male's tail is far longer, and has obvious hemipene bulges. The sexual differences in this species are unmissable.

Male:

Female:

 

[kidsheart]

probings definatly not 100% either. (beat me to it sadji)
there are a few ways you can pretty confidently tell the sex of a snake, probings probably the best way.
i believe popping is a pretty sure way in some species also.
and alot of the time you can tell pretty much beyond doubt with bc's by their spurs, pretty good indicator in brums and a few of the other larger snakes i believe?

 

[Lonewolf]

get it probed but if you like take a gess useing the other methods and see what your results turn out like we did this and got luck 4 times but let us know how it goes