Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hey guys, thought the inquiring minds on the bp forum might want to know about stuff like this. it involves a real life account of my adult female het-albino rosy, her clutch from 07, and her retained product of reproduction from this past week.
today, as i've done since 1996, is the day i take my rosies out of their winter cooldown. all juiced up to start a new season. i'm loading this year's hopefuls back into my rack, changing water and cleaning tubs. i'm psyched 'cause my big het-albino whitewater finally gave me my first-ever albino neonates last aug, 27th. het to het breeding, 2 out of seven were albinos. i open her tub to prep it before going into the rack and...BAM, there is a freshly delivered(probably less than two days) neonate laying there almost exactly six months to the day since the live siblings from mom's august clutch popped out. it was of course stillborn, and of course it was an al-freakin'-bino, but it looks better than walt disney probably looks, even though it's been sitting in my female for six freakin' months without the benefit of the oviductal cryogenic freezer attachment that was only available as an option the year i got her from tracy barker. not only did this thing look good, it smelled like nothing, if you didn't see it, you'd never know it was there, which is more than i can say for some of the living creatures i know.
believe it or not, this is not the first time this happened to me in my years of rosy breeding. the first time was in 01-02, different female, same thing, same time of the year, apparently not that uncommon, at least not at my place !
anyway, if anyone has any idea how a fully formed creature can last this long in it's mother unit's oviduct without rotting and without putting formaldehyde in mom's water bowl, i'd like to hear about it. how did this little demon-child not rot in mom, and take her down too ? the only thing weird about the aug. 27th delivery was that babies were flying outta her WHILE she was shedding. since then, she's eaten 13 lg. mice and 6 sm. rats (back in the fall) before going into winter cooldown on 12/01/07.
what do you have to say about that ?
here's some pics from today.
thanx for reading, ck

ck

last one,
ck

I've never had this happen to me before, but it's not surprising that it didn't "rot". It should be a sterile environment in there; protected within the egg-sac & all. I've heard of similar things in humans; skeletal fetus's being removed from women whose pregnancey was miscarried years before...
-----
Thanks,
-JC
www.rosyboas.to

50 plus rosies
0.1 Boa constrictor
1.1 cats(bengal & bengal mix)

np

i had an amazon basin emerald tree boa die due to two necrotic fetuses left within her. she died within a few months, so while some advocate waiting to see what nature will do, that can backfire. nature kills alot of things. i did not even know she was still carrying unpassed fetuses. after she gave birth (all 7 still born and gorgeous w / full white stripes at 9.5 months), she went on seeming normal, ate a few meals, then boom - dead one morning. it was odd, so i had a post-mortem examination done, and voila - unpassed fetuses that went necrotic.

another of my basins stumped vets for over 18 months holding onto ovum sacs that never fetrilized and never reabsorbed. i finally got hold of a very good vet and we had to perform surgery and remove them, and its a good thing as two or three out of the 14 were necrotic and she may have died. she passed one on her own 6 months prior, just the one. very odd.

basins are tough! and you think balls are expensive...