Reptile & Amphibian Forums

About 2 weeks ago i had a clutch of 4 ball python eggs. they have all been fine and doing well and this morning i woke up to check on them and they have started to wrinkle. i am not sure why. the temp in the incubater fluxates from 88.9 to 90.1. with 70% to 80% humidity. i thought all was going well until this morning can someone that has more experince with this reply back to let me knnow if this is normal.

Could you describe your setup and maybe provide a picture of the eggs?

I wouldnt keep opening the top to look at them, if thats what your doing.

It sounds like maybe the humidy is too low.

You really want to weigh them right before you put them into the incubator. That way you can periodically re-weigh them -if they are loosing weight the humidy might be too low. If they gain weight the humidty is too high.

Did you candle them to make sure they were fertile?

Alan

i have brand new incubator. with a fan and a water pan at the bottem. i keep the eggs in a large tupperware settings on spagnum mose and perlite mix. i have a hemostate to measure humidity and a digital thermonetr. i keep the temp regulated between 88-90 degrees. its the best i can do. i also keep the humidity as close to 80% as possible. then i have a lid that goes on the tupperware on the inside of the incubator. the help with the humidity. it is clear so i dont have to open it to much. i candled the eggs a few days ago and 3 out of 4 are fertile they have little veins in them the other there are no veins and it is pretty much clear.

What kind of heating element does the incubator use? Is the egg container far enough away so it only receives indirect heat and doesnt dry out the eggs?

Did you poke holes around the sides of the tupperware container?

Also you want to dampen- not wet- damp, the spagnum / perilite mix and place the eggs about 1/3 or 1/2 buried in the mixture.

I prefer to make the perilite mix very wet and then place two pcs(use 2 not 1) of the plastic eggcrate ontop of this wet mixture (you can even use water only, but I prefer to have something like the perilite to keep the water from sloshing around and getting on the eggs). The 2pcs of eggcrate will keep the eggs from getting wet and the humidity will stay really high.

I really dont worry about getting my humidty too high (as long as the incubator isnt dripping wet), too low humidity is far worse IMHO.

If I were you I would weigh my eggs today and get a baseline to go from here on out. In the future weigh them right away so you have a reference to go by.

Also, if your incubator is on the smaller side, I would only run the fan for a couple hours every few days. My incubator is smaller, so I dont even use a fan, I just open the top to get fresh air insde evry few days.

If at all possible take some pics of the eggs and the setup. You have to figure out if the eggs are collapsing or just wrinkling up a bit.

i keep reading and reading the post, but for some reason i dont understand teh egg crate method?

could you explain that again?

these pinstripe x pastel eggs are on 2 levels of egg crates with perlite/vermiculite/water as a medium. Hope the picture helps.

steve

Thanks Jenny, the photobucket tip worked great!

thanks for the help. i am trying to figure out how to post a pic on the site not sure how to. i think the eggs are just wrinkling. as soon as i figure out how to post a pic i will get one up. thanks again for the help

How to post pictures

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Tosha
JET Pythons

Tosha you are always so helpful AND you have all those cool little face people. Jenny is also always willing to help us new to the forum people. Its much easier to list adds in the classified, but I think I may be getting the hang of it. Thanks for the help, it is greatly appreciated.

Steve

trying again

sorry everyone it took me some time to figure this out.

They look to be too dry. Not sure if you need the lid on inside that type of incubator. I can see the humidity through the window of the incubator but I can't tell if its getting into the egg container. Are there any holes in the egg container? does that incubator have a fan inside?

the incubator doese have a fan the eggs didnt wrinkle until they were exposed to the fan for 24 hours. i have some people telling me to use a fan and others telling me not to it is very confusing. so far the eggs are still alive and growing.

I think the mix up is when you have a larger incubator like a converted upright freezer (or something similar)you need a low speed fan to circulate the air because the heat will rise and it will be a different temp up top than what is is at the bottom. I don't think you need one with such a small incubator, it will tend to dry out the eggs.

My set up is an upright freezer I converted and also put a large window in it. It has 4 shelves with a 13x9 glass pyrex filled with water on the bottom shelf. Under that at the very bottom I have a light fixture & 75watt light bulb controlled by a Big Apple proportional thermostat set at 89 degrees. About 8inches away from the light and off to the side I have a 3" square computer fan which is controlled by a zoomed rheostat (basically a dimmer switch) which I can turn the speed of the fan way down with, just enough to circulate the air. I also have 2 different digital thermostats which sit on the top (outside) of the incubator. I drilled a hole into the top and put both of the probes inside and caulked the hole. One of the probes is hanging about 5" down from the top and the other is hanging way down about 6" higher than the bulb and way off to the side.
I only get a 1 degree difference from the top probe and the bottom probe and the humidity stays around 80 percent. My egg containers have a mix of perlite/vermiculite/water and the eggs sit on 2 levels of egg crates as pictured earlier. They also have glass covers and the containers themselves have small holes in the sides.
This has always worked well for me. I hope it gives you something to go on.
Sorry for going on and on.

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Steve