Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I came home this afternoon and checked on my clutch of normal x pastel eggs, which were due to hatch this week. I noticed an egg had multiple slits in it. generally, I cut after the first pip just to see whats going on. I decided to wait until I saw a head before I cut. I checked on it a few hours later, and nothing had changed-but something didn't look quite right with that egg, or a few other ones. I ended up opening all 7 eggs, and found 5 pastels and 1 normal that had gone full term and died in the egg. They looked as if they somehow got too dry during the last few days. I've never had this happen before, and I don't think I did anything drastically different than any of the other clutches I've hatched. I'm wondering if the vermiculite may have gotten a little too dry over the last couple days? I'm, to say the least, rather unhappy at the moment. Has anyone had this happen before? I want to avoid it happening again.

The eggs were in a plastic shoebox with a lid, on vermiculite mixed 1:1 with water by weight. My incubator is a cabinet style Natures spirit model with a helix thermostat, set at 89 degrees. This is the same set up I used to hatch ball pythons last year.

I can't offer and advice on this matter, but I wanted to say I'm very sorry for your heartbreaking loss.
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This is courage.. to bear unflinching what heaven sends. -unknown

1.0 Chocolate lab (Harley)
1.0 Basset Hound (Capone)
0.1 German Shepard (Misha)
0.1 leopard gecko (Nacho)
1.0 Normal ball python (Arwen)
1.0 pastel ball python (Merlin)
0.1 Spider ball python (Rogue)
1.0 100% het pied (Dojo)
1.0 Normal male (Rebel)

It does sound like dessication-a lot of shoe boxes don't have a good enough seal to go through an entire incubation period without adding water. This is definitely the kind of thing that can happen in such a situation, particularly in smaller egg containers like shoe boxes. Has happened to me-now I use 3 gallon size tubs without further incident. Very sorry to hear it.
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

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

Hey Jason, Sorry for your loss. It stinks when you wait all that time, just to end up with tragedy. Well I use shoe box style egg containers and I noticed that the lids really don't have a good seal to them. So I started using (PRESS'N SEAL) by Glad. I put it on top of the shoe box and then put the lid on, and I've had eggs go 64 days without a problem. The only thing I do is every 2 to 3 days I open it up to let air in and to wipe the water off the sides of the box from the moisture. I also use crate materal from light fixatures. I call it egg crating!!! I use 4 layers! 3 layers under water, and 1 layer on top out of water with the eggs sitting on top. I always have 85% to 100% humidity inside the egg box. Here is my incubator before breeding season to show the egg crating in the egg boxes. I have 5 clutches in my incubator now with # 6 due in about a week. Hope this helps and once again sorry for your loss. Sorry so long!!! Bob

Press'n seal works great! I use it too. My clutches this year haven't hardly dimpled.
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Coolluigi

1.0 Pastel
1.0 Yellowbelly
0.2 Normal
0.1 Spider
1.2 Het VPI Axanthic (Babies are getting bigger!!)
and soon to be more. *fingers crossed*

I incubate eggs above water, that way it's easier to keep the humidity up high enough. Use a plastic lid , PVC strips, or stack two layers of that ceiling light grid on top of each other. Basically just making it impossible for the eggs to touch the water directly, you only need about 1/2-3/4" of water in the bottom and a good container with only a couple 1/16" holes for air exchange and a good sealing lid and obviously the proper temps (87-89.5F is best I think). Substate is fine if you really want to perfect that method , simple is better I think, less to go wrong then, easier to fix things when the setup is simple too.

Sorry to hear about your eggs, most of us have stories like that. I lost an entire 8 egg clutch like 6 or 7 yrs ago from Albino x Het Albino , back then Albino Balls were something like 5k each and 100% Hets weren't cheap either, so you learn from it , move on, and try not to make the same mistakes again! You'll figure out what went wrong, then decide how to prevent that situation.

Anthony McCain

After the advice I have received from everyone, I am going to switch to larger boxes with tighter fitting lids and I am going to use the incubation over water method to try and remove as many variables in the humidity as I can. Thanks for the advice.

No problem, you can email me directly if you have questions with the no substrate method. I have done it that way for about 10 years now so could probably assist you if need be. One other thing, be sure the tub is close to level so the water level is the same in the tub , doesn't have to be perfect either but you do NOT want the water to touch the eggs, they soak up to much moisture if they contact the water and that will kill them too . Droplets of water landing on the eggs at times when your removing the lid won't hurt them but a constant exposure to water causes them to soak up fluid , this soaking action changes the pressure inside the egg (by osmosis I think) this change occurs to rapid for the embryo and kills the snake if not corrected fast enough. You can't just dry them out quick either , you have to make gradual changes if something goes wrong , sudden changes shock the embryo to much. Common sence goes along way , prevent the problem from the start and you won't have near the trouble.

Anthony McCain

I went out this afternoon and bought everything to set up new boxes with the no substrate method. The boxes I bought were about twice the size of what I was using and have the locking style lids. I made 1 1/2 inch legs out of 3/4 PVC for the light grating and have the contraptions in the boxes. I'm still waiting on eggs from a stubborn female, so hopefully I'll get to have some success with this method.

Good start I'd say!
Best of luck to you!

ps I remove the platform about day 52, that way nothing can go wrong, at that time remove the water too and just lay the eggs on damp paper towels , they will hatch fine on their own at that time. If you incubate them on the cool end of the spectrum then wait till day 55 or until one slits it's shell to remove the tray and replace with towels. You still should keep the humidity up while they are hatching , if it worries you setting the eggs directly on damp towels I think you could place the eggs directly on the bare floor of the tub your using and just have wads of damp paper towels in the corners to keep your humidity up during hatching, that way the eggs aren't actually touching the wet towels.

Anthony McCain

Thank you, I'll keep that in mind. Now if this female would just lay...

I swear, sometimes I want to take a rolling pin to them.

Last year with one clutch I used a plastic lid to hold my eggs. I used "completely dry" perlite as the substrate "placed on the plastic lid". I made an area in the perlite "in the middle" sort of grooved out to hold the eggs so they would not roll off of the perlite. I placed the "lid with perlite and eggs" on top of two plastic egg crates stacked on top of each other which were resting on sloppy wet perlite about 1 1/2 inches deep. I closed the container with its lid. I had NO holes in the container or its lid. I wiped the lid of the container once every day for the entire incubation. The eggs were "text book" in every way. They never got wet and they hatched perfectly. The dry perlite kept them dry but surrounded at the same time with maximum humidity.

I tried this because when I used the non substrate method I noticed underneath the eggs where they rested on the egg crate, water droplets were on the eggs from the humidity not from the wet perlite. You would not notice it unless you lifted the eggs and looked. It does not seem to bother the eggs, but it bothered me,

There is NO one way of incubating eggs as long as you abide by the basic principals.

sorry about your loss of eggs,
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