Reptile & Amphibian Forums

One of my L.T.Temporalis laid last week. I checked her in the AM before I went to work, no eggs, and I was not able to check on her until late that night. At that point she was a bit skinnier, so I knew she had laid them, but she was not as skinny as my others were right after laying, in fact, she actually looked pretty good. I searched the nest box and the saw dust but was only able to find two hardend slugs. I know she had more then 2 in her, so I have to assume she ate the eggs. Anyone ever have this happen?

I offer food to the girls during the entire gravid period, and they almost always refuse...but the day after the lay the eat pretty much as many mice as I put in the cage. My guess is, she just couldn't wait. Is there a lesson to be learned here?

The subject was recently discussed in the Kingsnake forum, here's a link to it. Hope it helps you out.

Gerry
Link

the good bad news....

if you found 2 duds....she more than likely ate duds...???...

.....really.....a thought.....

...good luck.....

my St Mary's threw them all in the wtaer bowlllthey may have been duds...huge duds....yet I am still not happy either......the striped one laid 13 then 9....of the 13 only 3 hatched...suxx.....and are they small....

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......JY

Well, while it's not unheard of for snakes to eat their own eggs, it's much more common for them to lay a slug or two a few days before the rest of the (fertile) clutch. I'd say give her another week; she may lay some good eggs for you yet. I would think that if she'd eaten her eggs, she'd be about the same size... the eggs would still be in her, just in the digestive rather than the reproductive tract, right? Here's what my L. t. gaigeae looks like after laying a clutch of eggs:

See how concave the ventral scales are? I don't know if the difference is as dramatic in the smaller North American subspecies, but I'd guess that if your female doesn't look like that, she's still got some good eggs on the way. Good luck!

Nate