Reptile & Amphibian Forums

FR,
I gotta laugh at this one. I agree on much of what you have said regarding egg laying, nest selection etc., so when I received a gravid female several weeks ago, I set her up in the largest setup I had available (4' x2')to try (as best I can) to offer the nest conditions I think I have harvested from your posts.. Just before she shed I prepared the whole enclosure with ~4" of nesting material and thermal and moisture gradient: 85 degrees wet to dry substrate on one end and to room temp (72-73)wet to dry substrate. the substrate is covered with cardboard. In addition I included my standard rubbermaid tub containing my standard nesting mix of wrung out sphagnum moss, one at each end. The enclosure is kept dark.
Well, I hypothesized I would find a clutch of eggs somewhere in the middle of the cage after day two post shed. What I have today( day 7) is a female hunkered down in a rubber maid tub preparing to lay her eggs.
We could yammer on for days about soil particle size and oxygen tension and moisture content and egg physiology, but she chose the best site, the variable being the enclosed space,maybe a little tactile security. It is my fault she did not choose to nest in the middle of the enclosure. It is also my fault she has chosen to nest in the rubbermaid. So, I think a properly prepared nest will work no matter its relative size or location. note I did say proper, which includes darkness, maybe a choice of sites, etc., but in this relatively simple "test" rubbermaid won.
Do I think snakes can determine those factors (particle size leading to a particular oxygen tension and moisture content)? Yeah. Where do you find most eggs? I believe in organic material or sandy soil that allows required conditions for development. Also I think pythons that coil around their eggs and "thermoregulate" are really controlling those factors. I can successfully incubate an egg in a fairly wide range of temps but within a narrow range of humidity/air.

-just an observation.
daveb

First, You misunderstand my efforts. I already know what they are looking for, thru nature, as I explained and thru years of trial and error. I do not offer a zillion choices in nesting, in my humble opinion, thats too many cooks in the kitchen. Which means, theres not enough room for one good cook, muchless having a whole bunch of them. As I explained, not what you interpid, I offer a large nesting area, thats deep, and very importantly its dark, no lite what so ever. I never mentioned various temp choices or various humidity choices. IF you go back and check you will see that I recomend humdity and not moisture. I never said, a bunch of choices.

I feel this is a problem of confusing different areas, I recomend choices in living conditions(to a degree) Not in nesting. That is, unless you have a rubbermaid that ten by ten, sorry in feet.

Consider, in order to make choices, you need space. X conditions requires X amount of space. So in a crowded condition, offerring more choices is worse not better. Consider that please.

What I showed was a minimum of what I feel is tolerable. Not a maximum. If your starting with experimentation, you should not be restricted by size. Remember the considerations above.

Now your task is to refine what you tried and offer more of what you think is her choice. Do that a whole bunch of times and you and I will be on the same page. Remember, deep, dark, humid without moisture, and proper temps, WE ALL KNOW what those are, anywhere for 75 to 88F. Common incubation temps. Lastly, my nesting boxes are in a dark incubation room. No lite and constant egg hatching temp. Thanks and good luck FR

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sorry, if i was not clear. i have considered the difference between humidity and moisture.

Your test is very inaccurate, if you wanted the test to be accurate, you needed to give me that snake and let me do it. You see, I know and apply the conditions, you are only guessing.

So its not a test at all.

As I stated, we commonly get eggs from 1 to 5 days after shed, If you matched that with any method, that would be meaningful.

And lastly, you seem to want to make it a contest, as if I thought mine method was the best. I never said it was, I only stated that is allowed quick delivery and expressed great nesting behavior.

Also, in you post, you said the female was getting ready to lay, did she??? any pics??? you see, getting ready and laying to two different things.

In all honesty, I would love to learn a better way, my method is from the seventies. I surely thought, there would be someone out there that has developed a nice method too. Thanks FR

no contest implied as there is nothing to win. the test is inaccurate as i was guessing at what you were doing with your nests and trying to simulate that sort of experience. now that you replied again i understand your technique "better", will make notes and may consider it with my techniques in the future as needed. i know what environmment is required for nesting and embryo development,and apparently those needs were met in the rubbermaid as she laid the eggs yesterday. so, no need to send you the snake ha ha ha.

It appears your very scientific, and I bet you are. But from your comments, it seems your trying to convince yourself and or others that what you have been doing is OK. Your last paragraph.

This is common here. In all reality, even those who post pics of a kingsnake squirting out eggs in a empty plastic box is, in a sense OK. Heck its OK even if they lay them in the corner of the cage. As long as the female survives and the eggs hatch, surely its OK.

To be curious or pramatic or scientific, you may want to test many methods to see if any of them, change the meaning of OK. Or at least add something to fire up your brain and keep you interested and growing.

If you remember, when I started that post, I explained how I came about playing with nesting. The original method, was far better and more effiecent then what I showed here. I mentioned I often recieved eggs, one day after shedding. Again if you remember, I am averaging 3 to 5 days with the method I showed.

What I did show, was a beautiful nest and hole, which resembled exactly nests I have seen in nature. Sir, that was the important part. Not whether what you or other here are doing are worse or better and surely not that its the only way or a better way. I merely expressed "another" way that allows nice behaviors.

If you were as scientific as you sound and boy you sound very scientific. You would have investigated, you would have remembered the original nesting type(the best one) You would have thought of and possibly set up a varity of nesting containers. Then decided which one you would try this time and which one next time. You would also have asked me, more questions, like what is the most important, or whats important in the maintenance of these nests, etc. You know, the elements that are very important.

Again, I think its childish for so many to make everything about right and wrong, and about them and I, instead of approaching this in a scientific way or even a herp culture way.

With testing you should be interested in different results. Results of positive interest should be things like, health and strenght of the female after laying, health and strenght of the eggs, health and strenght of the hatchlings and possibly a higher hatch rate, if your having problems. The expression of new(new to you) behaviors. Lastly, the continued growth of your education. No offense, but the sphagum method you showed was done in the sixties.

Which is why I even bothered to post on this forum. Other then the crosses and new morphs, snake husbandry has somehow got stuck in the seventies.

Forgive me, but I was away for a decade or so and I had hoped there would be some interesting developments, you know, something to get excited about, something to perk my brain up with renewed vigor. So you do understand my disappointment. So if I seem grumpy or mean, now you understand why.

On another note, I am appling some things I learned with monitors back to kingsnakes, maybe I will get some pics today.

Again, please take it as its meant to be givin. As you should understand, its about me, of course. I am very spoiled, I grew up in the time of invention, and with people like Ernie Wagner, who invented a new tool each and every day(it seemed like), I guess what I am saying is, where are these people? Where are the curious? where are the inventors? where are the leaders to new things? FR

Hey Frank, Don't be upset! i didn't find a grayband yet this year either! All joking aside, I like to get out in the field and study what the snakes do in nature, and next year I will try to replicate a few things I saw in the field as well. I keep in terrariums but will downsize #'s of snakes and lizards to provide larger and more natural settings. I have begun with my subocs and collard and crevice spiny lizards by providing a "cut" and long, flat spaces with small boulders for the collards, mimicing the habitat they were caught in.
I very much enjoy reading your posts and learning new ways to do the same things we all do. But I don't so much like to keep them as study them in their environment. Keep posting, and do you keep any other snakes from your area, or just kings? I have some whipsnakes and local rats from around my area as well as the local kings. I'm trying to find the east/west boundary for the speckled and desrt kings, and I do understand that I will find many different "phases" of each in my search. Seems the specks are invading the south Texas coastline and coming on down. I'm glad you are trying to lend some of your expertise to these forums, and hope some of us come up with some original ideas to peak all our interests. My small part makes me happy, and if someone else learns something from it, all the better! Show us some more interesting pictures, please.
Todd Hughes