On a fall day in Gainesville, Georgia, Justin Kobylka, the forty-two-year-old owner of Kinova Reptiles, was preparing to cut open two clutches of snake eggs. He was hoping to hit upon some valuable, beautiful reptiles. Kobylka is a breeder of designer ball pythons—one-of-a-kind, captive-bred snakes whose skin features colors and patterns not usually found in nature. “I think of myself as an explorer,” he told me. Nicking an egg with a pair of surgical scissors, he exposed a live hatchling in its goo. “Even when they haven’t yet touched air, you can sometimes see the tongue going,” he said, making a flicking gesture with his thumb and fingertip.
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