Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My NJ/NC female is laying right now and so far has laid 7 slugs and maybe 1 good egg. My question is are infertile eggs the females fault or the males ? A little background both the male and the female are first time breeders and she is 37" long and a 2001 hatch which is a little smaller than I usually like to breed them but I did none the less. The male is a 40" 2002 hatch anima. She has great weight and they locked up multiple times. Im wondering if my male has bunk sperm or the female has bunk eggs. I hope its the females problem as this male knocked up my Burlington Co., NJ female (who is a proven breeder). Any thoughts ?
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I am sorry to hear about this Keith. I think it is impossible to guess which snake is the problem. I got myself a microscope for doing fecals and recently looked and some snake "juice' under the scope and saw living swimming sperm in a first time breeder too which made me have a lot more confidnce in him. In 03 I had a large but young pair of Brooksi that bred and the female laid a clutch of slugs. Don Soderberg checked the pair out for me and she was full of follicles. He and I thought she was ready, apparently she was not. Last year the same pair produced oodles of babies. I bet next year your pair does too, but of course if female #2 lays slugs it is most likely the male[which I am sure you realize]. You and everyone who reads this should try the micrscope out. I juts ran a slide through a puddle and low and behold there it was, just like Discovery Channel but in person it is truly a rush. Life in liquid form. On the bright side my first clutch of Brooksi slugs was not very large, but her clutch the next year was HUGE. The wait sucked but knowing you have nice breeders that crank out babies when they're mature enough makes it well worth the headaches, and MOST of us can not resist to try any given snake when we feel they're ready. Tom Stevens

For what it is worth, I bred a bunch of young snakes last year ~ 1 goini king and several corn snakes. All of the young animals laid at least 50% slugs.

I am guessing that it was the youth of the female snakes.

I wish you luck with the rest and do not dwell on this - I am sure you took extremely good care of that female.

- Peter

First time breeders are always a coin toss. I would not take this as any indication for their future fertility or for the other female that this same male bred also.
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Rick Staub
R&R Reptiles

Keith-
Just out of curiousity, how much did the first female weigh, pre mating?
I have been having a horrible year as far as breeding goes, I don't think any (maybe one or two) pairs have successfully mated so far. but I have a lot of nice animals to look at! Any how I have a brooksi female in that length range that did mate, I will be interested to see what develops.
Best of luck with the rest of breeding season!
daveB

... they'll come through for you I'm sure. Some of mine are "on again-off again" this year. At first they seem to be going full bore, but maybe not as long as I'd like? As long as they get it done I will be happy. Their shed cycles seem a bit late/off this year as well. The males will invariably be blue when I need them to perform. Maybe I'll bring the males out earlier (or later?)than the females by a few weeks next year and see if I can get some better results.
The females I want to get eggs from are the two I got from you and it sure looked like my male from Tim will do the job. I hope so.
My big eastern is busy trying as well with a big female.

:Mark

Hey Bud,

Could be either, but I would suspect the female. In boids, slugs are often the result of the female being too heavy. I have also considered this very same cause in the collections of friends who produce corns and common kings (brooksi, eastern & cali), as many of them have slugged out during their girls best feeding years. When I bred Kenyan sand boas, on my years when I had the highest hopes with huge females, I always got slugs. During their lean years I got lots of babies. It was only in hindsight that I realized that my Kenyans were way too fat. I don't believe in getting a girl to breeding weight anymore (unless she is a ball python). If she is solid and has good muscle mass within a couple meals of coming out of the big chill, she's good to go. If not, she has the year off. In fact, I think my original GA female took the year off last year because she became my garbage can for uneaten food and grew obese.

BTW, I'm certainly not implying that your snakes are fat, in fact, from all of the pics that I have seen and the animals I have received from you, I'd say you are a very consciensious caregiver who has very well proportioned animals. I'm just stating that slugs from fat girls are a more common occurance than most herpers realize. You also mentioned that it was her first season, for some reason, it seems that many girls that go on to have steller breeding careers start out as a female who dumped a bucket of slugs on her first go 'round. I think this issue is also related to those young girls being too heavy. I have been lucky, as I routinely bred my first time female easterns at 18 months and as of yet, I haven't gotten slugs, but perhaps it is because those girls who went at that age were fairly lean.

Who knows who is really at fault, but you'll certainly know if it was the male soon enough with that next clutch. That sucks, sorry to hear it bro.

Will

...over the years I have heard many stories similar to yours and I'd say that of the people who really kept good records and double checked when they got slugs, it ended up being the female in question more than 50% of the time. That said, I think many of those same females ended up producing at some time later. The guys who depend on their animals to produce ($$)can't wait around on a female like you and I can. If they don't pay for themselves, then they go.
I have had snakes produce good eggs one year and jelly beans the next... With the same male. Sometimes it is good to breed different morphs, that way you can back up your breeding and tell which male did the trick. If you double up the same tag- team on different females then you might end up with even more data(evidence) to base your opinion of which snake is at fault. Know what I mean?
In the case of easterns though that obviously might not work too well....
So... if you think you need to give up on her, well, just put her in a box and send her on down. You know where I live...
:Mark

There is no escaping it, its always the keepers fault.

As you know, I am an oldie, but some of the old learned lessons still need to be discussed.

Bad eggs come in many colors.

1. They can occur from no sperm/unviable sperm.The ovum is either absorbed or squibbers(small slimey ovum laid around the cage over many days). this is caused by the males timimg from shut down hibernation. Males take time to develop the gonads. In other words, the tanks empty, but the males mate anyway, hahahahahaha. These are, yellowish soft, no thread pattern and do not stick together. These are actually unfertilized ovum, and not eggs. Squibbers is a term coined by John Ruiz many thousands of years ago.

2.To the sperm dying in the oviducts before fertilization. laid in a nest but do not inflate. Caused by poor chemistry or bacterial infection. These have some thread pattern, soft, greyish and do not stick together. These are shelled ovum but were never fertilized.

3. fertilized eggs dying in the female, thread pattern and white, may even fill out, but fail to develop. This is caused by improper nesting. very common in some pythons and monitors. But does happen with kings. These are dead fertilized eggs.

With kingsnakes the sperm is stored from the time of breeding. The ovum is then passed thru the oviducts and fertilized and shelled about the time of the pre-deposition shed. The development of the embryo can be timed to this. Eggs laid within a few days of the shed have very small embryos, and eggs laid much later(up to 14 days) have large embryos.

We were able to get many species of kingsnakes to drop good hatchable eggs within a day or two of shedding, this was done with different types of nesting. I will say, not with getulus, with these, the fastest and best was about 6 days from shedding.

The quality of nests is based on depth, darkness, temps and humidity(not wetness) Don't be offended, but kingsnakes were not designed to lay eggs in a rubbermaid. They are designed to deposit the eggs in places that are secure and safe(deep dark) and have the right temps and humidity to allow the eggs to hatch and more importantly, allow the neonates to survive. Without the later, theres no need for the former. In nature, the eggs are normally laid in very dry spots with a fairly high humidity. They are also exposed to much higher and lower temps.

Please understand, the above is only a basic outline and there are many more possibilities and combinations of the above. Also I may have forgotten some of the ways eggs fail(lack of practice)

I hope this helps narrow it down. I also hope it may cause some discussion. There still is much to discuss. FR

Frank-
what is your opinion on first time female breeders for size and weight? I choose females that are at least 40" and 400g. I know its not perfect, females above and below that criteria fail/succeed, but at least its an attempt to limit egg binding (muscle mass and length) and that there is enough fat (not a FAT snake but a snake with fat) to stimulate hormones for egg production.
I agree on the nesting component- dry with high humidity. Have had the best success in recent years with wrung out long fiber sphagnum. I've come across a couple of books dealing with reptile egg development/incubation if anyone is interested...

D.C. Deeming, ed. Reptilian Incubation: Environment, Evolution and Behaviour. Nottingham University Press 2004 ISBN#1-987676-11-5

Deeming and Ferguson, eds. Egg Incubation: Its Effects on Embryonic Development in Birds and Reptiles. Cambridge University Press 1991 (reprint 1995) ISBN#0-521-39071-0

- good way to cure insomnia, but some of the best reading I have found on matters of the egg. Can find both at amazon but I had better luck going through the publisher.

anyhow, enough.
dave B

I never set rules for the snakes to follow(ok, I try not too), I let them tell me(i try to listen)(sometimes my ears are clogged).

I did not see any pattern of young or small individuals having problems.

Also, I have always been fasinated by wild skinny females that had no problem breeding and laying. Considering most wild breeding females are fat and healthy, but in some years, they can get skinny and still breed well.

I believe there is a reason small females can reproduce. Its takes far less energy(food) for a small individual of a species to reproduce then a large individual. Most reptiles that I know of, can reproduce starting at about 50% of their adult lenght. An example would be, Gophersnakes they can get larger then two meters, but can and do reproduce at one meter. This allows for success in a varity of conditions(for that species). Again this is true for most species.

With the above in mind, my job as a keeper is to support what they do, not tell them what to do. If they decide to form ovum and reproduce, my job is to supply them with food and nesting.

On our study site(rattlesnakes, but same idea) all we saw after prolonged drought is smaller clutches and smaller females being gravid. While that could easily be guessed(less food) what was a huge surprise was the age of these females, some had a rattle base, one rattle and a button. Thats two sheds, hmmmmmmmmmm And yes, they were very small, but very gravid.

I hope this helps. FR

You seem to place more emphasis on the male than the female. Not that I disagree but I have always felt the timing of breeding played a large role, especially in boids where breeding can proceed ovulation by a month or more. Probably not as big of a deal for kingsnakes, but when a female holds ova (developing follicles) for too long a period before being bred, the viability decreases. In Boa constrictors, females frequently lay litters with slugs (infertile ova) usually accompanied by stillborns due to the delivery being premature. Some breeders will wait until their females swell up to the football stage (follicles developing in the ovary make it look like she has swallowed a football) before introducing the male. I always felt this was too late as some ultrasound work we did showed that breeding usually occured when the follicles were still small, but quickly grew in the month after breeding. One snake that was not bred until it had large follicles (45 mm) laid stillborns and slugs. Like I said, kingsnakes do not seem to be as sensitive, yet waiting until your females have large follicles before introducing the male may not be advisable.
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Rick Staub
R&R Reptiles

Please reread my post, #1 is a male problem, #'s 2 and 3, are a female problem. Thanks FR

Seems like #2 could go either way.

>>Please reread my post, #1 is a male problem, #'s 2 and 3, are a female problem. Thanks FR
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Rick Staub
R&R Reptiles

Hi Frank,

I skim varanus.net very frequently checking to see your captive and field photos and related experiences. I find it very informative, and I appreciate the info that you have freely shared over the years. In fact I (and others I'm sure) would love to see some of the field photos of wild kings that you have shot, as well as your related experiences.

I know of the emphasis you place on suitable nesting for monitors, and I'm aware of the relationship between the availability of a suitable nesting site and the time between mating and laying of eggs. I've read that it can occur at 2 weeks or less in monitors when nesting conditions are favorable. Do you find that with kingsnakes there is a relationship between the quick turn around you mentioned, a few days from shedding to laying, and an extended incubation time because the eggs are dropped with much smaller embryos? Or is it possible that development is speeded up because of factors related to the eggs being out of the female sooner? I guess this is just a long winded way of asking if a shorter holding time by the female results in an extended incubation period.

Also, I apologize for drifting off topic here, but do you think that all of the trouble folks have been having getting good eggs from boleni (even captive hatched specimens) is more nesting related? Because, I hear of every factor under the sun being mentioned (heat, humidity, barometric pressure, age, size altitude, etc.) but I haven't heard much about suitable nesting. Are they holding their eggs too long because they don't like what folks give them to nest in? Thank you.

Will Still

Frank, you mentioned that rubbermaid containers were not exactly ideal for egg laying sites. Is there another type of box or set up you can recommend? I also wanted too mention that I have tried using 2 egg laying boxes[Will , you may wanna hear about this]with different amounts of moisture and also one on the warm side and one on the cool side. I feel Mexican Black Kings are very easy snakes to produce from. However they[like all female Kings] can make you paranoid for no reason with their nest searching behavior. In all honesty it basically doubled the anxiety level for me LOL. She continuously went in and out of both boxes. However I have always tried to let the snakes clue me in too what they prefer, and that particular experiment did not get me any answer. I use a cage with 6 sqaure foot of floor space for a few females[ in individual cages of course], and when they do search....it is much less stressful, meaning they do not seem in a panic, but calmly cruise around looking for the ultimate spot. In smaller cages I find that females are actually looking to escape their enclosure and seem quite wound up. I also use oversized boxes,some people use very small things for their snakes to lay in, I am sure in the wild that may be a preference for the snake. But in captivity I think they feel secure in a box that has a lot of room for them to push the substrate around, and they usually dig to the very bottom and sort of hide within walls they made out of the substrate. I actually do not even use lids very often. But these cages do not allow light in from above, they open from the front. Does this help? I can't tell you that, but knock on wood, I have never had an egg bound snake and pics I have seen of lousy looking eggs or eggbound snakes often seemed to appear to be within a small container for them to lay in. So far I have succesfully produced quite a few colubrids, I am happy with the results at the end of the day but like to hear about other people who do things differently. In closing I am wondering if anyone uses a nesting site with completely dry substrate??? Tom Stevens

Hi Tom,

Very interesting. I agree, my females also seem to casually and comfortably explore in larger cages with roomier nest boxes. This differs from the early days when they would fidgit for days and then reluctantly drop them in the moist moss in the box. Actually, I have used relatively dry sphagnum moss for nesting the past couple of years. I give the moss one or two light spritzes with a spray bottle just to boost the humidity a tiny bit. This (again, in my experience) seems to cause the female to be more comfortable and allows her to settle right in and lay within a day or two of the introduction of the nesting area. Coincidentally, I have also been very lucky to receive very few slugs and a nearly 100% hatch rate on fertile eggs since then. While I doubt that the nesting area has much to do with fewer slugs, I suppose that less stress on the female during nesting would cause less stress on the eggs and perhaps give them a better shot at going to term and hatching. I think keeping things dryer in the nest box and incubator have played a role in this. Good discussion.

Will

Oops, that third sentence should read "small, shoe box sized, dampened nest box". They seem much more comfortable in a larger, dryer nesting area.

Will

Thanks for writing, I truly believe the extra space benefits them in every aspect of keeping and breeding snakes. I am still not happy with my gradient for temps but I am going to keep working with that. I know many succesful breeders who have good results with small set ups. However I really think they could possibly yield larger clutches from thier same snakes kept in larger enclosures. Especially the females. Almost everyone I know puts the male in with the female. I do the opposite. My males are almost always smaller and do fine outside of breeding season in a smaller cage than the female. I also know he gets some extra exercise even when he is not courting or breeding when they're in with the females. I wish more people would think less snakes and larger cages, or simply make the best of thier space and use every inch to its potential. Many people are influenced by the commercial breeders set up. I have many snakes set up that way too but it's my goal to gradually house my collection in large cages....the display aspect makes enjoying them 1000 times better Tom Stevens