well... first of all i want to let you all know where i've been. i quit my job and decided to go back to school, so i've been spending all my time studying and i don't have much time to post anymore, so i apologize for being MIA. congrats to all the great litters born this season and goodluck to all expecting.
this is my first litter, it took me 4 years but it was well worth the wait.
so here's the story....
it all started out with this sire (the sharp strain pictured next to an albino jungle kahl strain) and this dam (harlequin orange tail hypo from an 03 ot harlequin back to one of the original females of the line)
got them going
about a week ago (please excuse the urates, i didn't want to touch the female at all)
and yesterday she was digging around the tub i gave her, trying to find a place to drop the babies. i must have checked on her about 100 times yesterday with no luck. then my gf suggested that we go check one more time and here is what we saw...
a little head poking up! i almost s*!t my pants. it was such an incredible sight.
i waited for her to stop her contractions and i pulled out the tub
now if you notice, she still had a lump towards the end of her tail. i couldn't see it when she was in the cage so i put her back in without the babies and she proceeded to pop out another!
and on to the baby pics...
playing with the 2 slugs... i felt like a kid in a candy shop.
the litter (minus the last baby)
cleaned up somewhat...
and the proud, deflated mama...
i want to thank all the people who helped me get to this point. derek yagi, alex barreiro, tony phommasith, matt crabe, ruben michael, big mike for some words of wisdom, and anyone else i might have forgotten (sorry my heads going a million miles an hour).
so the total was 8 ot hypo and 12 normal all het for sharp. 2 slugs in the litter, but the babies are all healthy with no big bellies or yolk. not sure yet which are considered harlequins or not. there are abberrancies, nothing super crazy but there are some nice colored ones as well =)
one thing that was wierd... after the last baby she dropped, she was still contracting and moving a lump towards the tail. it would start bulging towards the tail and the when she would push further it would disperse and nothing would come out. she did this for a little while after she dropped the last baby. any ideas? i tried holding her down and feeling for a slug but i couldnt feel anything. wierd. any advice would be appreciated.
i'll post some more pics once they shed. witnessing the birth was incredible. i highly recommend it. lol.
oh and here's my motivation for making some ot sharp sunglows =) hopefully the owner won't mind my posting these pics.
thanks for looking!
-eddie kim
