Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hello, as of now, my hatch rate is 10 live, 1 dead full term, 2 unhatched, on a large clutch of 13 greybands. I bring up this question because I was expecting all 13 to be good, as they looked great throught incubation. Of note, on the one dead one, I noticed a small slit on egg near where another egg was fused on to it, so after 18 or so hours I cut small window and although head was lined up away from other egg the baby had perished. It wasn't deformed in any way. Could it have been impeded by fused egg? The 2 other eggs that haven't pipped are also at some point fused with others. Should I have cut/should I immediatly cut remaining eggs?
Do most of you get 85% or better on large clutches or is it an all good/ all bad clutch thing? hoping others still pip as there is room for them. My hatch started Tuesday...Dave.

I've seen those guys who breed Pythons cut eggs and reach in to pull the heads out. They say it assures a better hatch rate. I don't recomend that with Colubrids at all. I hate even making tiny slits in eggs, but sometimes I do if I feel there may be a problem. Sometimes it has good results sometimes I wonder if me interfering actually doomed the baby?
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King Snakes! Who can make a better mouse trap?
Jorge Sierra

My Site > www.Sierrasnakes.com

My clutch of 14 alterna eggs resulted in 10 babies: 71% hatch rate. The other four had dead in egg babies, 3 of which looked near full term. I think I added too much water to the vermiculite and they swelled up too much.

My clutch of 8 all hatched this week while I have been out of town. I did not add any additional water after the original 50/50 mix. I did notice that 3 of them had dimpled before I left last Friday.

The only ones I cut were the four that died in-egg from the first clutch.
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Kent

1.1 Hypo (het lavender, striped) corn snakes, 2010
1.2 Gray-banded king snakes, blairs phase, 2008
0.0.10 Gray-banded king snakes, 2011
1.1 Oregon rubber boas, w/c 2000 and something

Colossians 3:17

By the way, I owe my wife a big thankyou for tending to the critters while I was gone!
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Kent

1.1 Hypo (het lavender, striped) corn snakes, 2010
1.2 Gray-banded king snakes, blairs phase, 2008
0.0.18 Gray-banded king snakes, 2011
1.1 Oregon rubber boas, w/c 2000 and something

Colossians 3:17

First, please understand, eggs are living things, being fertile is only the first step to a neonate. It can die anytime along the way and for many reasons.

Your hatchrate is very much an indicator of your efforts(husbandry) But again, only to a point, but a good point. hahahahahahaha If you recieve eggs, you have reached at least that level.

Again a story from the past, Ernie Wager, a pioneer in colubrid breeding said, healthy neonates(good feeding responce) and good hatchrates are based entirely on a healthy adults. Which is true if your nesting and hatching methods are sound. In Ernies case, they were. So he was right.

Newbies must develop good nesting and good incubation. Mind you, colubrid eggs are amoung the easist to hatch, But still require some skill. Particularly over the long run.

Not everybodys nesting and incubation methods are sound.

So you have three basic areas of concern, health of the adults, nesting of the female, and incubation methods.

The combination of those three are measured by your hatchrate.

I am old and at a loss as to why people EXPECT so much. Why would you expect them all to hatch?

There are folks who say they have 100% hatchrate. Well they are either lying or only measuring one clutch. Or simply they discount the ones that don't hatch, so it keeps their hatchrate up. Don't laugh, that occurs. Like, it didn't hatch because something was wrong with it, so I don't count those, I still have a 100% hatchrate. hahahahahahahahahahahaha

Don't get mad folks but down below theres a thread that indicates the poster expected all his babies to feed right off. That is odd to me. Where do those expectations come from. Do you newbies really think your that good?

Again, I am only attempting to figure out those people, its kinda like your model builders that work from a kid, if you follow the instructions, its suppose to come out well. Unfortunately, snakes are alive and all manner of things can go wrong, at any time for a million reasons. The truth is, most of those reasons are NOT INCLUDED IN YOUR KIT(husbandry recipe) that you get over the internet. Those are the fun things you get to learn on your own.

Its like you folks think your perfect. Well how you judge that is not what you think, but your results. They tell you how good you did. And that means, past tense. As each and every time you do it, your can succeed or fail. There are no guarantees, no matter how much you know. You must apply your knowledge, each and everytime, and each and everytime the results are a measure of your ability and effort.

So the answer is, you WORK towards high hatchrate levels, you do not expect them.

As mentioned above, a fertile egg is only a start, there is plenty of time to fail from there. No offense and good luck

No offense taken and I appreciate your answer. I guess I was expecting all to hatch because they all looked so good throughout incubation. When it comes to breeding, I'm still a newbie, with only 4 sucessful clutches to my name and I feel I'm getting better with experience. Where as in the past with eggs that didnt hatch, I would try to find out the reason. I'm sure it was always/mostly my fault. I had infertile eggs once from snakes that I didnt cool, and when I brumated those same snakes, the next year I had all good eggs and a 100% hatch rate. I've lost eggs to an inferior incubator(again, my fault) and when I upgraded incubators, my hatch rate increased. It is good to know that not everyone gets 100% hatch, even though that is the goal. Snakes were very healthy before breeding this season, I used damp moss for nesting and moist(not wet) vermiculite as incubation substrate. I know that you cant tell how my husbandry is without seeing my set up and only having a little info, but, if anything sounds out of whack please let me know. I have thick skin and am always looking for and appreciative any any and all advice given. Thanks...Dave.

Could not have said it better. This is Biology, not Physics
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

Boas, Pythons, Colubrids, Tortoises and Turtles