El Salvador boa

[rice333]

Recently, I got wind of a "colombian red-tail boa" that was for sale with a cage. It peaked my interest and I decided to go see this boa. Well, when I got there I knew it wasn't a colombian. After some checking - I am almost positive that it is an El Salvador boa. Problem is - I can find much info on them. I know they usually max at six feet, but that is it.

I was wondering if anyone had an El Salvador boa or had any more info on them. Thanks,
Rice333

[LukeUK]

Just pics at www.boa-constrictors.com hope it helps ;D

That a great web site for trying to identify where your boa is from.

[The_Boaphile]

The link above is fixed now. Just missing an "r" in constRictor before. Now it's in there. It's a great site to see lots of cool Boas but don't believe everything you read there. Hermann tends to think every Boa Constrictor in the Unites States is a mutt. That is ridiculous. Otherwise there is certainly a lot of good stuff there. Mostly I agree... mostly.

[surfimp]

I like Hermann in the few times I've interacted with him, and I really respect what he and the rest of the locality people are trying to do in order to maintain locality-specific examples of boas in captivity.

That being said, the process of domestication dictates that humans will breed their animals selectively for the traits that we find most desireable...i.e. hardiness, temperment, ease of care, phenotype, etc. By definition, it would seem, this means that "artificial" animals are created...hence the difference in meaning between the words "dog" and "wolf".

We're still really early in the domestication process for boas, and to be honest I'm not aware of any reptile that's ever been truly "domesticated" in the sense of a dog, cow, or goat. It may not be possible. They meet the definition of a "domesticated" animal in that we control their eating, breeding and all other aspects of their lives as they live under our care; however, I don't think that anyone, at this point in time, truly considers a pet reptile as anything more than an ultimately wild animal--though possibly quite tame--that is being maintained in captivity.

Which is not to say that a pet snake can't tame down nicely--but they're still wild animals "at heart". It's probably going to take 5,000 - 10,000 years (if the dog, cow, goat, pig, sheep and chicken are any indicators) to truly "domesticate" the boa constrictor, if it can be done at all.

At the same time, if it weren't for people like Hermann and all the others who are working hard to maintain locality-specific boas in captivity, we might have little way of knowing what a true locality boa looked like. I think that's one of the main reasons why the boaconstrictors.com site is so awesome--it's a great reference device.

It's my personal feeling that the morph/locality debate shouldn't be an either/or proposition--like most "fence sitters", I think that any animal should be represented as accurately as possible. If it's a Quintana Roo Mexican boa, it should be represented as such; likewise, if it's an imperator x constrictor cross--a "mutt"--then that should also be represented. And if it's a truly "artificial" boa--like a snow, ghost or etc--then that should of course be represented as well. But in essence, it's all good; all of these animals deserve our love and respect, and the best captive living conditions that we can provide for them.

And in the long, long run, after all the localities have changed and all the wildest morphs bred to such large quantity that they're no longer high dollar animals, the people with truly locality-specific bloodlines will probably be able to charge top dollar! :)

But in the meantime, making "mutts" of fundamentally locality-specific animals is what I really believe that "domestication" entails, by definition. And I'm personally a fan of mutts--you get the best traits possible, if you do it right.

As a sidenote--it's interesting to see that Americans, in general, seem to be, at least in the research that I've done, more accepting of mutts than most Europeans. Which should probably be no suprise....LOL!!! I think I'll leave that cultural discussion where I found it, having done enough flamebaiting as it is.