After taking every step to breed, incubate, and hatch indigos it's certainly disappointing to have less than perfect live hatchlings. Mother Fingers, a female that produced three good hatchlings this year with three other seemingly good eggs going bad early produced four hatchlings last year. Two of those were severely kinked with one also being bifurcated. Last year I worked at keeping the temps in the low 70's. This year I didn't. They sometimes went over 80 degrees F. but never for more than a day or so. I do agree with others that lower incubating temps, while taking longer for eggs to hatch, does lead to larger, more robust hatchlings.
One breeder has told me that he can get good fertile clutches with one male mating with three different females two times apiece. Another has suggested that the key to getting clutches that are completely fertile may be having multiple males breed with one female.
At any rate, even as folks still have clutches hatching this month, it's hard not to think ahead to November and how well things will go in the upcoming breeding season. Two young female Easterns, Sister Fingers and Michelle of Ohio, will be ready to go. Skink, my younger male, will be with Sister Fingers first. Mullet Fingers, my older male, will be with Michelle. I plan to alternate them a few times after that. Mother Fingers will be left alone this year. Sister Skink should be ready in another year.
Jeff, I'm sorry for the setback you had this year. You've worked hard to establish a solid rubidus population in the U.S. I finally acquired a pair recently, one of your 05 females and an unrelated male. They were not in good shape, but should come around.
