Reptile & Amphibian Forums

On http://www.leopardgecko.com/color.html Ron Tremper writes of his studies in incubation. He states that the higher the temperature, the brighter the coloring you will get out of your gecko in incubation. This is true because the higher the temp you have=less time for the dark pigment to set in the skin.
He also states that, you do this by incubating at 89-90 degrees. This will give you all males of course. Further reading, he says to get bright color in females you must incubate them at about 80 for the first 14 days(to let the female hormones to set in) then rise the temps up to 90.(Thus getting good looking females)
If I was to do this for females, would they be "Hot Females" or unbreedable geckos?

I have read both sides to this. I asked Rob Jenkins the same thing and this is what he said.

"I’ve heard good and bad about this method of incubation. I have heard from a couple people that it didn’t work at all for them; they hatched out some deformed geckos and some didn’t hatch at all. Others had okay results, but it is too early to tell whether they’re hot or infertile geckos. I don’t agree with this method of incubation, if for no other reason, then it looks like you’re misrepresenting the genetics behind your geckos. If you do this, I believe ethically you’re responsible for letting your customers know that you created the colors artificially. Because when someone breeds those geckos expecting great, magnificent babies, they’re going to get average looking babies. Of course, unless they also incubate using this method."

I would appriciate any idea on this matter.

Austin Rice

Leopard Geckos
1.1.1

This topic has been discussed in detail a few times here, you might want to search through the old posts to get some more opinions.

I first heard of Tremper’s incubation method a year ago, when I was just begging to breed leos. At the time it sounded good, so I tried it for my first 15-20 eggs. I followed what Tremper described, and I personally had poor results. I understand that some of the failures could have been due to my inexperience at the time. Anyhow, I had 6 of them hatch, one with eyelid and a leg deformity. All of them turned out to be males, when I was trying to get all females.

Since then I have been incubating females at room temperature, with much better results, and they still look very pretty too.
I agree with Rob that if you use this method of incubating females, you are misrepresenting their true color/appearance. If you plan to sell babies incubated this way it is important to let your customers know.
I guess the long story short would be: I don’t recommend Tremper’s incubation method, especially for first time breeders.
As for ‘hot’ females, that is another highly debated subject, ill save it for another day.
Just my 2 cents, hope it helps.

DaveCable

Yes, Thank you very much. This is enough for me not to even think of trying it. Your results sound unbearable.

Thank you for your opinion on this subject. I won't try this with my first eggs.(Witch will be comming soon)
Ill have to post some pics.

Yep it was a pretty discouraging start to my leo breeding career. I look at mistakes being ok, as long as you learn from them, and try to steer others in the right direction. Glad to hear you have some eggs on the way, it should be a lot of fun for you. Keep us posted!

I posted a study a week or two ago that showed that incubation temperature produces changes in the leopard gecko brain that are independent of gender, in particular the areas responsible for aggressiveness are enlarged. Try searching using key words incubation temperature study, that should turn it up
-----
Sarah Stettler aka Starling
Sarah@stargecko.com
StarGecko.Com COMING SOON! Star Quality Leopard Geckos
Specializing in Hypotangerine Tremper Albinos