Reptile & Amphibian Forums

72 days at 78 degrees and viola - Louisiana pinesnake - one mean little punk. Hopefully five more heads to appear. Parents were a Vandeventer female and a '04 male from Tom A.

daveb

really nice, i like the pattern from mid body to the tip of the tail.

Real nice, fat little guy too. Will you be selling this year?
Kevin

Wow-78, really? Do you always incubate them that low, Dave. I usually do my pits at 82....

Brad Chambers

Joanna Burger published a paper that there is some level of sex specific temperatur sensitivity in pits. she suggested that females do not tolerate higher incubation temps among other research points in the paper. I have not read it in a while, I should find it again. If I do I will send you a copy.

I guess it is one of those things, if you've had success it is hard to change a routine!!!
daveb

Brad,
I went to scholar.google.com to find the paper. She did a bunch of studies in the late 80's with Robert Zappalorti and a M. Gochfeld.

Burger, J., Zappalorti, RT. (1988) Effects of incubation temperature on sex ratios in pine snakes; differential vulnerability of males and females. Am Nat 132:492-505.

daveb

...routinely gives me high female ratios. This year we are at 3.8 with a clutch of six more eggs to go. That year I did 84 degrees "just to see" and we got 2.12. Never again. Hatching is around 66-70 days.

Cheers,

Terry Vandeventer

Because with bulls and northern pines I've always had close to an even sex ratio at 82. Plus I scarcely need mention that it is taken as a given among herpetologists that "no snake species has TDSD"...

Brad Chambers

When I did 84 they were male dominant. At 82 yours are 50/50. At lower temps Dave's and mine are female dominant. As you mentioned, it has always been a published and well known fact that sexes in snakes,(unlike turtles, lizards, and crocs)were not temperature related.

Now, many years later and literally millions of baby snakes born in the collections of private breeders worldwide(more than all other herps together), we may be seeing something contrary.

Cheers,

Terry Vandeventer

Pretty earth-shattering if true. Definitely calls out for a large controlled study!

Brad Chambers

"That year I did 84 degrees "just to see" and we got 2.12. Never again. Hatching is around 66-70 days."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that the first digit in the 2.12 was the number of males. If so then the higher temps prduced more females?

You're absolutely right. 40 years of breeding snakes and I get this thing wrong. At the higher temps I got more MALES than females. As the temps go down, the females go up. I'll re-post at the top of the page. Thanks for catching that!

TV

thanks Derek.

We have family in town this weekend, so I haven't really had a chance to get a good look. Probably tonight when everybody settles down.
daveb

Very nice Dave. Congratulations!

Phil

I sold the majority of my animals last year (kings and pines) and have gone from incubating 10-15 clutches a year down to only one this year. there has been an echo in the incubator, hahaha.
It is always exciting to see something like this hatch out. I have been lucky to have had contact and help from good people and have had good customers. That is what makes it work.
daveb

Awesome!!! Plump little guy! Kevin

I weighed him just before I took his pic, it was 82g.

daveb

Congrats, Dave. Those La. Pines sure are beauties. How big are they as adults?

reako45

i haven't measured the length of my adults but by looking at them in a 4x2' enclosure, some are 5 to 5 1/2'. i weigh them once or twice a year, and they range from 1.9 to 2.6 kilograms (4.2 to 5.7 lbs).
daveb