Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Err...I know I'm being insane, but it's day 60 and I have a few eggs that are pretty much done sweating and REALLY starting to shrivel, and have remained that way for over a day...no pipping, no slits...I reduced the humidity dramaticly in the incubator, as well as the bedding....riht now humidity is at a steady 75%...should I mist them ?? should I just sit tight?? oh man this is driving me insane....

....this baby pipped, this was the egg I was so worried about this morning, and obviously for good reason..anyhow only an eye was showing through the egg by the time I left work at 3, I went back about half an hour ago to see if anything had happened, and the eye was dried out so I opened it and the baby was dead, here is the weird part, the yolk sac was not liquid like I thought it would be, it was like a soft paste, is that normal ?

I can not see the pic... Anyhow: The yolc sac of basilisk hatchlings when hatching starts is typically about half the size of a pea and more of a pasty consistence. than being fully liquid.
There are three frequent reasons for dead hatchlings in B. plumifrons:
1) Too moist substrate-that factor you can largely exclude for your case. If you have the impressions, the eggs literally drie outr, you may even increase substrate humidity abit,.
But as I said- close to hatching, my basilisk eggs always lie in almost fully dry substrate.
2) Often overseen but very mportant: Suboptimal condition of the mother. Espacially a lack of calcium and Vitamin D seems to result in Babies which are unable to manage hatching.
Even with well supplemented female, hatching rates drop if they produce clutches too frequently.
3) Egg shells are too thick. That often happens if the female does not find a optimal nesting site. In such cases, she carries the eggs longer than normal and may add additional shell leayers. Also, if the pH in the incubation substrate is 7 or higher, there may not be sufficient erosion of the calcium content of the shell.

I keep my fingers crossed.

Ingo

Wow, Ingo, you are so knowledgeable!!! (sp, lolol??) I just may be knocking on your door soon! My Charlize, a cwd that has lived with me for two and a half years, should be laying shortly, fertile. Her crest is pretty much gone, and that is what I have been focusing on.

However, I have ordered an incubator, the same kind that the daddy was born from. Second generation captive bred. This will be third generation cwd babies!

And no, I could not see the pics either!

maybe this will work...

Yes, this works.
The yolk sac looks a big too big and in fact the eggs indent too strongly.
This can mean that either it is in fact a bit too dry for the eggs (which it should not bee, if relative air humidity is indded around 75%) -you may drop a bit of water close to the eggs, but it may also mean that the babies have already died.
Its not easy to judge from a Pic, but to me it looks like the egg shells may be very thick.
Typically they look less smooth at that age and have a more yellowish to orange coloration.
But not easy to tell form a Pic.
Even though I normally try to avoide this, I would now open all teh eggs which show indentations. But be prepared to find suffocated babies.
Check the shells of the opened eggs. Do they consist of more than one thick layer?

Good luck

Ingo

OK, opened the dented eggs, which was all but one...they're all fully formed, some had their eyes open...but they're not moving at all...I havent taken them out of the eggs or anything...they all have color and don't seem to be decaying in any way...but like I said, I see no movement when I've checked on them, I'm not sure what to do...leave them there until it's really obvious that they're dead ?