Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Does anyone know what is the ambient soil temperature in montane Arizona in the spring and early summer time when montane snake species will be laying and incubating clutches? Like, in the nests, what is the temperature in the wild?

It is hard for me to believe that a wild female could find a nest site that would stay at an even 80 or _ F degrees 24/7, like captive conditions in an incubator.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

Funny question and the way you asked it, shows some sort of rationalization.

That is, they could find temps you use. Of course they can. But is that what they do, is another and better question.

You do understand, each and every year, is somewhat different. That is, this year, its still friggin cold(for us) and its friggin may.

Females normally start laying in May, and continue until Sept. Hatchlings appear in august until late Nov. This information was taken from a comunial nest, at 6000ft.

Now consider, they nest at elevations near me, from 4500 ft to well over 8000 ft.

In really all cases, even at different elevations and way different ambient temps, they still reproduce at nearly the same time periods.

So to answer your question, at the higher elevations, ground temps are still in the 40's in many areas, and 60's in areas in the lower elevations. Mind you, thats not surface temps. THese are temps where there ARE PYROS living.

So I do imagine, somewhere at some elevation and in some of the many mountian ranges, there are temps as you WANT.

But, in reality, the nesting areas, are a bit different, the temps fluxate more, they seem very dry. Cool to cold at night and very hot in the day.

I am not experienced with all species of montane kings, but I am familiar with a few. For instance, pyros like to comunnial nest. While thayeri do not. I have seen many nests of each and thats what I found.

I assume that can change with location and condition.

With Greeri and ruthies, I have seen only single clutches, once two clutches of greers in one spot. But I do not have enough experience there to really say.

With that said, the last ten years have been drought years(S.Ariz) and reproduction has dropped considerably.

So the reality is, sites do vary in temps and slope and elevation. But are within a range that females can use behavior to adjust. Deeper, if its hotter and dryer, closer to the surface if its cooler and humid.

You should also understand that surface temps, wave downwards. That is, if the surface temps are 120F at 3:30pm, they radiate into the mass. So where the eggs are, increases its temps in the middle of the night, and then drop hitting their lowest by mid-day.

And man do they have a huge range of temps. Found eggs in the forties and in the high 90'sF

But thats not our worry is it?

Most interesting answer! Thanks. I was mainly interested in temp fluctuations during incubation, and what sort of range the eggs could tolerate. Not that I plan to try to hatch eggs in the 40's F, or as high as 90 F. I am aiming for a steady state of 78 F to 81 F in my incubator.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

Like FR said. The temps range. I keep my eggs in a room where the temps drop down to 55 in spring and get as hot as 90F during summer. There are also temp flutuations between day and night time drops.

In a nut shell these eggs are pretty tough. I also think they would do better with the natural temp fluctuations. I have seen more people lose eggs every year because they used a incubator that malfunctioned. With colubrid eggs they are totally unecessary. All they need is a shoebox put up on a shelve and forget about them.
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www.Bluerosy.com

I have a friend who is an experienced snake breeder of many species of colubrid. A couple years ago he lost an Eastern Indigo clutch when the incubator malfunctioned. Now he just puts all his eggs on the top shelf in his snake room, and things hatch out fine.
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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.

In my experience the only temp that will kill good eggs is one that changes quickly. Eggs are never laid out in the open, they are always insulated. Even if they are exposed to a wide range of temps, the temp changes slowly and steadily throughout the day. I keep all my eggs in styrofoam boxes in the snake room. My snake room has large windows which I leave open, so night time temps drop quickly. The eggs drop too, but slowly over the course of the night. In my experience the worst thing you can do to eggs is keep them in an 85 degree incubator and then open them up once a week in an air conditioned room to check on them. Just insulate them, put them in a big enough container to maintain humidity and thermal mass, and leave them alone. The exact temps for most colubrids are not that important.

My eggs are in a lasagna pan with a plastic see through top with a couple of small air holes inside a big Styrofoam box with an UTH set at 75 to 78 F. Perlite/vermiculite mix. I like the lasagna pan as I can look at the eggs without having to open the pan.

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Bob
Pyromaniac AKA Greatballzofire
Keeping cats allows man to cohabitate with tigers. Keeping reptiles allows man to cohabitate with dinosaurs.