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Learned a Lesson

FunkyRes Jul 15, 2008 06:56 PM

My second clutch (PURE Cal King, AFAIK) was many days overdo, and the eggs looked ugly the day they were laid.

Also - I noticed the rubber band holding the saran wrap was not very elastic anymore, and may have let humidity out - which can make the shells tough for the neonates to slit. First time I've had one stretch out - but I'm not a mass producer.

Note to self - replace the rubber bands halfway through incubation next year.

Yesterday - I made a slit in one to see if they had died. The fluid that came out looked good, I saw fully coloured pattern inside - many years ago (as a teen) when a cat knocked a clutch off the table (not only pure cal king, F1 locality from the same hill) I was sorely disappointed because when we opened the eggs, it looked like albinos. Owen at the East Bay Vivarium made us aware that no, all albinos from 2 WC normals was extremely unlikely, color was the last thing to come in - they died before color came in..

So anyway - I saw full color, but I didn't see movement.

Today - two other eggs pipped on their own. Hopefully the one I pipped last night to see if they had died long ago will continue to develop normally, it must be almost ready - but now, I wish I had waited and not pipped that egg - it was just a slow to hatch clutch.
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I decided my old sig was too big.

Replies (19)

FunkyRes Jul 15, 2008 07:02 PM

Well - I know I didn't kill it, it was just sticking its nose out of the pip I made.
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I decided my old sig was too big.

charleshanklin Jul 15, 2008 07:03 PM

It should hatch out just fine. Have you tried using the gladware containers for incubation. I have found they work really well and hold the humidity even better. A lot of ball python breeders do it on a certain day no matter what. I did cut open a clutch of bps this year after I thought they were over due and went bad but that was because my ac broke. The temps spiked in the house for 2 days but all is well with them. They were about a week early but they are fine.
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don't marry the cow when the milk is free when the milk drys up it's time for a new cow

brhaco Jul 15, 2008 08:02 PM

You were lucky-cutting eggs almost always works fine with pythons, but almost always leads to disaster with colubrids (unless the eggs were within a day of pipping anyway). In fact, I've heard of people miscalculating the time and cutting their python eggs open over two WEEKS prematurely, yet still getting a successful hatch! Try that even a couple days early with a colubrid clutch and all you'll end up with is fly food....
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

FunkyRes Jul 15, 2008 08:17 PM

I hope that cutting it isn't going to result in it coming out before it should, time will tell.
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I decided my old sig was too big.

Bluerosy Jul 15, 2008 08:50 PM

Nah,,, I cut all my eggs, I forgot to cut some in a clcuth a couple days ago and 4 drowned in the egg. They are T negative snows as posted in the thread above this one.

Cutting is madatory IMO.
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ÌÏËÙÍ ËÁÂE!

"I have high friends in places."-H.Sherman in some bar

daveb Jul 15, 2008 09:35 PM

>>Cutting is madatory IMO.

are you sure????????????????????????????????????

what is causing in egg hatchlings to drown?

daveb
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in the light, you will find the road...

Bluerosy Jul 15, 2008 09:50 PM

what is causing in egg hatchlings to drown?

Just part of natural selection I guess. Since i produce a lot of eggs I get this quite frequent. When i cut I don't have any problems. When i don't cut I get a lot of dead in the egg babies.

I would guess this is caused ny the same things that cause kinks. But nobdody has a definitive answer to that either.
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ÌÏËÙÍ ËÁÂE!

"I have high friends in places."-H.Sherman in some bar

FunkyRes Jul 15, 2008 10:07 PM

If I was hatching snakes as valuable as yours, I might be inclined to do it as well.

If I ever breed pythons though (fat chance) I would be inclined to let the mother do it.

My two burms that I had in the 80s were hatched that way - they would daily mist her enclosure, she occasionally left the clutch to get a drink but not often.

It was really a neat experience for me to go in and see the mother of the eggs tending them. Then she left the eggs when they were pipping and coiled up on the other side of the enclosure (huge enclosure).

I understand why so many ball breeders remove the eggs - it's probably easier to keep things right in an incubator, but I think it is so fascinating that the mothers actually want to tend to them.
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I decided my old sig was too big.

Brandon Osborne Jul 16, 2008 12:33 AM
Bluerosy Jul 16, 2008 12:37 AM

n/p
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ÌÏËÙÍ ËÁÂE!

"I have high friends in places."-H.Sherman in some bar

FunkyRes Jul 16, 2008 05:56 AM

Yeah - just like that.
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I decided my old sig was too big.

Lindsay Jul 16, 2008 08:36 AM

That photo deserves a big space on the wall.

Brandon Osborne Jul 17, 2008 01:15 PM

Thanks guys! I took this exact picture again, almost exactly 2 years apart to the day. First clutch pipped on 3/26/01 and the second on 3/23/03. She's been a good mom. I'm just hoping she has at least one more clutch in her. She is now 13 years old. I did hold SEVERAL of her offspring back over the years though......Hot stuff!

thanks again.
Brandon Osborne
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www.brandonosbornereptiles.com

daveb Jul 16, 2008 07:52 AM

I think you're just in a hurry to see what's hatching next, lol. I bet you like to peek at presents on your birthday, Christmas, etc., too.

What do you use as an incubation medium?

daveb
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in the light, you will find the road...

brhaco Jul 16, 2008 07:28 AM

This is inexplicable to me-9 out of 10 times I've tried this, the hatchlings have died. Do you wait for the first one to pip on its own before cutting? I've never heard of anyone successfully cutting colubrid eggs, but HAVE heard of MANY failures!
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

Bluerosy Jul 16, 2008 08:15 AM

I don't know what other people are doing hut when the eggs are ready to hatch and the first snake or two comes out it is time to cut the eggs. When it is that late nothing can happen to the snakes. They stay in the eggs and absorb what they have left and then come out.
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ÌÏËÙÍ ËÁÂE!

"I have high friends in places."-H.Sherman in some bar

Bluerosy Jul 16, 2008 08:22 AM


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ÌÏËÙÍ ËÁÂE!

"I have high friends in places."-H.Sherman in some bar

brhaco Jul 16, 2008 06:08 PM

I do the same thing if more than 24 hrs from the first pipper has passed. I was concerned that you guys were doing like the python folks and counting days, then cutting regardless!
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

charleshanklin Jul 16, 2008 09:40 AM

I wait for the first one to pip then I cut the rest mtself. I had a couple temporalis not slice through and die some time back. After that I started cutting them. No problems yet 10 years later. I think you just have to be careful and I am only cutting the egg to make it easier for the baby to poke his head out. Egg clusters probably pose a bigger problem than loose ones but I don't take that chance anymore.
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don't marry the cow when the milk is free when the milk drys up it's time for a new cow

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