How about trying to fill her whole cage she is in now with the same nesting mixture, which is not normal to them. You can see if anything comes out different, then next year try a substrate that is more natural to them.



If I were to question your reply I would do it like this.



1. What is an appropriately size nest box and why?

2. what makes you think she likes it? if you took the nest box out she would lay in the water bowl, would you say she liked that?



The point, I now gave you a realisitic method to gauge what they like, how long they hold the eggs. You know the maximum, how about looking into the minimum.



I would say, the minimum sized SMALL nesting would be a 16 quart sterilite box, and it would help if the sides were painted out to allow the feeling of total darkness.



A couple of things I would like to ask you. Do you think they have a sense of in, out, under, up, etc. If they do, how does that apply to their behavior in nature.



If they had no sense of in and out and up and down, how come they are not all over the place in their natural habitat?



With your fence lizards, did they lay eggs willy nilly? and after you turned them loose, did they go around willy nilly? What did they do? So why do you think your snakes have less of this sense then those lizards?(lizards are great teachers of reptile behavior)



THe problem is us, we have weird priorities, like you somehow think a nest box, goes in another box. maturity box. Or most think a nest box goes in its normal sweater box. When in fact, none of that thinking relates to what the animals actually do or want.



In nature, these animals go to rookeries(nesting areas) in the late fall, stay there all winter, breed in the spring, hold the eggs and lay them RIGHT NOW(mid may for pyros around here) All that time is spend in the maturity area( i do like your term and my adopt it) They will stay in these areas until the reproduction season is over, then Expand there range to include a greater access to prey(if necessary)



I will do my "normal" and add more, more, more, hahahahahahahahaha



what is important about this is, wild pyros are a product of constant culling. Any individual that does not make these decisions prefectly, is erased out of the population. And a good percentage of those that do make these decisions perfectly are also culled out. If in nature they hold the eggs a day or two to long, they are culled. Or put them in the wrong place, they are culled.



Aprox 95% of all pyros that hatch in nature will not make it to adulthood. Of that five percent, they are under constant pressure to Stay by making the right decisions. Then something changes like lack of rain or too much rain, then a percentage of that five percent is erased from the colony. So what you have is the right of the right. an example with pyros is. Pyros live in rocks and in the ground and in dead trees. Or hollows in live trees. During periods of wet, you can find pyros commonly in trees, then drought comes and fires burn ALL those dead trees and hollows. So that option is erased along with the pyros that used them. Whats left are the individuals that were safe down in. Not even those close to the surface. This is re-education of pyros, Fire taught them that trees in this enviornment, are a bad choice. They will be erased.



This is how nesting is developed, it has to be safe from the whims of nature. Their lives depend on that.



What you have in your cage is indeed the product of those whims and of nature. They are not a toy in a box. They are tens of thousands of years of those behavioral decisions.Best wishes

[ Show Entire Thread ]