Reptile & Amphibian Forums

You may remember my post a little over two months ago about a clutch of mostly infertile (maybe completely) yellow ackie eggs. Well, today I dug up another clutch. It was about the same as the last clutch, with 2 fairly good-lookin' eggs (nice and white and firm), and then then the rest all infertile (a little shriveled and a little brown). There were 11 eggs in the ground, and then another slug I found on the surface.

I never saw them mating before this clutch, or the last one either. Yet, I still received a few good eggs from each clutch. What's the catch? I check on them every day, maybe he's just breeding her when I'm not looking. But then he must have a low fertility rate (I could be keeping it a little too warm, or he could just be a screw-up). Or maybe the good-lookin' eggs are parthenogenetic or whatever? Anyways, with two clutches being thrown at me in a little over two months, I think it's the male, not my conditions. Seems to me he'd breed that girl every time she gave him the chance ('cause that's what normal male animals seem to do, haha). Somethin' ain't right about that boy...

Thankfully, I'm raising up another trio of hatchlings, and when they mature I'm going to try moving the female and maybe the male in with them. Hopefully they will accept each other.

As an update on my previous clutch, my single egg left is a good 70-something days in, and looks great. If it goes full term and lives, it should be hatching around the 4th of July. But something tells me it'll go past 90-100 days and then eventually I'll cut it open to find a dead baby ackie, 'cause that's just how my life goes.

Cheers,
Ryan

There were also two bad eggs stuck to one of the 'good' ones. I already removed one of them without breaking either shell, the other didn't come off so easily. Would you recommend trying to remove the other one or just let it be?

Cheers,
Ryan

Good luck with the few good eggs you have. I'm curious to see what the experienced ones have to say about your situation.

Later!
HH
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Due to political correctness run amuck,
this ol' hillbilly is now referred to as an:
Appalachian American

First, let me reprimand you, you have read this many many times. So you know the answer/s

In the case of ackies, THEY COPULATE, for 3 to 5 days, NIGHT AND DAY, so you have to be on vacation to miss it. I guess is possible, but not likely.

Next, what does a couple of good looking eggs have to do with anything. Have any of those hatched???? If not, what do you know of good looking? hahahahahahahaha until they hatch, they by difintion looked BAD.

Also, we now know, they can still produce hatchable eggs without breeding(parthnogenic abilities) This normally results in a few eggs in an infertile clutch that hatch, and hatch out males(kinda cool design, if there are no males around, make some and problem solved). This was known in many other reptiles for decades, in fact, as long as I can remember(not sure what that really means) But only recently has been documented in varanids.

I have seen it many times, but I am too stupid(stupid keeper syndrome) to have kept tract of it. I believe I have hatched a few, but only a few of those BAD eggs. Since it became know and discribed to me. I have not, I came close, a couple reaching full development, then dying in the egg. But truthfully, I rarely get infertile eggs(is that a good thing?) Couple that with, if there is no male in the cage, I do not dig the eggs up. Heck, I rarely dig up good eggs anymore. (I am becoming a zoo keeper) its said in zoos, the best pair is a pair of males, that way, they do not cause more work.(for the same pay)

These things have all been mentioned and talked about many times. But your forgiven, as its not important until it happens to you/us(a human quality U know)Cheers

Frank embryos (eggs) have no legal statue, apparently they can be exported without any documents. Have you ever heard about this?

It seems like even human embryo have no legal statue, some birders have been using this law flaw to exchange rare birds between countries.
Don’t know if its true, however I remember we use to import many turtles eggs after they banned turtle import, we would import them in box of 1000 and hatch them hear in Montreal.

So I am wondering if this was a possibility would you dig these eggs up for export?

When dennis king came to my house, he explained how he was very limited with his varanid work. He could not even ship into australia the dna from monitors outside the country. So I imagine, eggs would be prohibited as well.

I think CITIES states parts thereof. Which was directly for skins and meat. But it can and is used for any part thereof. Besides, eggs of varanids are hard enough to hatch when you have them laid at your place, I do not think they would travel well. Cheers

I do remember all of those things, thanks for reminding me. Oh, and by "good-looking", I meant that they looked good from descriptions I have heard and pictures I've seen of fertile eggs, not that I knew they were actually GOOD. Sorry for my bad description. And those things I listed off, I was just brainstorming what they reasons could be.

A little background info, this pair DID copulate (for several days straight)(she swelled up, but no laid eggs came of it; I imagine she absorbed the ova) way back about six months ago or more. Could these "good" eggs be from retained sperm? I know that you have theorized that "reatained sperm" could often be a likely case of parthno, but just thought I'd ask.

What would you imagine my problem is?

Cheers,
Ryan