Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm off for a few days of field herpin' (a.k.a. goofin' off) so I may not reply right away but I was reading below and got to thinking....
Also,you may have covered this before and I missed it. If so I apologize.
Now I know you keep and breed many herps but for the sake of this forum, let's say Cal kings.
O.K....Once your snakes have laid eggs in their nest, how do you "incubate" them?
That is, do you just leave them as is or do you have to dismantle the set up you have for nesting to get at the eggs and then place them in another container?
What would that look like?
Are there differences in lay-to-hatch times vs. in shoeboxes?
If you leave them the way they are, I would be interested in any observations you may have regarding the parent's actions and habits - post laying and up to and including hatching of the babies.
Have you then just let them be? In a quasi family type setting??
Multiple females laying in the same nest?
Any cannibalism? etc.?

Thanks for your patience and all your input here..
:Mark
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Surrender Dorothy!

crimsonking.piczo.com/

I do not leave the eggs to hatch in those boxes. I have done that with other reptiles, turtles, torts, and several species of varanids.

On our montane rattlesnake study site(18yrs and still going) We tag animals in one canyon and four touching adjacent mini canyons. In the 18yrs of tagging many hundreds of snakes, we have not had one individual move from one mini canyon to another. They have all stayed very close to were they were born.

Our largest recorded movement was around 200 yds. Some of these individuals have many contacts over a decade. Yet, no major movement.

To clear this up a little, 65% of the animals we tag, disappear, never to be seen again. But the other 35% are contacted over and over. Again, none of these 65% have been seen, in any other area, they just disappear.

This is not speculation, its number crunching. It appears aliens get them.

More clarification, most disappear after the first contact, but others take several contacts before they disappear, with the remaining being the 35% that tolerate our pestering them. Even those tend to move at least 50' after contact.

If you compare those individuals we do not tag, the individuals we do not tag tend to stay in the exact same spot for long periods of time.

To make this about kingsnakes, once coming down at our site, I stepped on a rock and it rolled and I did a 360, while upside down, I noticed a large pyro under that rock. So, we took a bunch of wander shots and fixed that rock and put him back. I found that male pyro under the same rock for three weeks in a row.

This site is very much lacking pyros. Where this one was found, we have seen a small number(compared to other snake species). On our other sites, there are lots of pyros, they kinda get in the way, hahahahahahahaha naw, I love seeing them. The pic is that pyro and my partner.