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A photo of 1 of 10 black rat snake eggs hatching. Hatching commenced this morning 9-1-05.

The eggs had been addled and turned over and what not about 2 months ago when a front end loader picked up a bucket of mulch and the eggs spilled out of a nest that had been in the mulch pile. The eggs were brought to me by the maintenance crew. As you can see in the photo below, almost all of the eggs had stress splits in the shells from being dropped, but only one had actually ruptured slightly. I wasn't sure if any of the eggs were going to make it or not - but they've seem to have beaten the odds. Even the ruptured egg is showing signs of hatching - a small egg tooth slit appeared this afternoon.

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PHWyvern

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PH,
What locale are the baby black rats that you are hatching?
Brad

BLB1029@cs.com

>>PH,
>>What locale are the baby black rats that you are hatching?
>>Brad

Locale - Southern MD, PG County.

Out of the 10 eggs, 5 hatchlings have left their eggs. The first one out of the egg is a sweetheart - very curious and just cruising all over - no striking or s-curving or anything. The 2nd one is highstrung and tail rattling, striking, biting lol. The other 3 out of the egg burrowed down into the vermiculite so no early look at what they look like yet. The other 5 have pipped and the hatchlings should be out in the next day or so.

Babies appear to be of normal size and weight. On the surface there doesn't appear to be any overt deformities from the abuse the eggs suffered early on and I am very shocked all 10 eggs survived. The eyes and heads on the two I have been examining appear to be a shade smaller / thinner than what I am used to seeing in baby black rat hatchlings but not enough to consider it out of the ordinary.
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PHWyvern