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This is more easy then you think, a lizard who digs without nesting (test digging) BAD OPTIONS
Lizards who drop eggs without burying them BAD OPTIONS
Lizards dropping in water BAD OPTIONS

When good options are provided, lizards will dig and nest in one shot, saving energy in this first stage is important, as once the eggs are laid the female will cover them with a little dirt and compact using her head, she will cover them again with a little more dirt and ram it tight with her head again, she will do this over and over until she’s satisfied.
An exhausted female will not perform this task, if she’s exhausted after nesting she will cover the eggs without compacting, this means your conditions aren’t right or the eggs aren’t fertile.

nesting is the part where you can learn the most about reptiles, once you understand nesting all other aspect of herpetoculture seems easy.

What ARE good options?
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Ryan

Never mind, I just read the below post and think I have a good idea. Thanks Jobi!
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Ryan

A very important question that only your lizards can answer!
One thing I have learn thru the years with reptiles, working with them is always different, I could tell you exactly how I do it, but when you apply my way to your animals it may fail, this is because theirs to many variables to control.

The best way is to start with a base, and work from there by watching how your lizards are progressing.
The key to good husbandry is support, to support a lizards physiological needs is to offer usable temps and hydration, tools he physically needs like logs, branches or rocks to rest or heat on, substrate the lizard recognise and use.

Support is also about feeding, this seems simple enough but theirs many ways of feeding, depending on what you want to achieve, theirs maintenance feeding when lizards are separated or at rest, theirs conditioning feeding when you want your females to cycle, and there’s trigger feeding when you want to create a breeding frenzy, then theirs feeding of a gravid female, she needs consistence and devotion from a keeper, this is where the calcium and vitamins really matters.

Maybe you guys got this covered, where you are failing is at nesting, first make sure she’s feeding and drinking until nesting time, then you have all the evidence you need that something is wrong, when she digs without nesting, this is when you make changes in your temps or substrate, to fine tune nesting with any species takes time and efforts on the keepers part, and once you nailed it good, you realise theirs no one single factor but a multitude of events that leads you to make life saving decisions and changes. This is experience, you can’t get this from a book or the net, trials and errors is the rout for success, I can only help a little but your lizards can help a lot, they know what they need and will let you know if you allow them.

Before a lizard dies he shows symptoms, reading these symptoms is the job of a keeper, surly a gravid female will show sings of distress long before dieing, mine will feed or drink less then usual, if I have to I will assist feed and drink at this point. Once she starts digging she’s due, if it doesn’t happen then, monitor the conditions and make changes. In any case such a female must be alone in one cage until she nest.

Thank you so much. I like how you explain how to take care of lizards. It's not just telling us numbers and pecentages and telling us exactly what to do; you actually explain how to find out the numcers for yourself. I like that.

I am kinda going through this nesting thing now. I have a gravid female (the eggs are not fertile of course) but she has already dug and has seemed to discard that nest. I am now trying to raise the temperatures of the nesting area to see if that will get her to nest. I also have oak leaves for her but that has seemed to help none.

Regardless. I have one simple question though. It is about nesting temperatures. Obviously you can't tell me exactly what temperatures to offer her, but I need to have some Idea of what they like.

Room temperature now stays 70°F-75°F. What do you think would be a good warm temperature to try? I'm thinking 80°F, but maybe that shows how ignorant I am of this situation. I really have no idea, so if you could just offer a suggestion or whatever to help me out. It would be greatly appreaciated.

By the way, I am thinking about isolating my female now, in a seperate tank. I am also plannig to give her

1)Warm and moist option
2)cool and moist option
3)Warm and dry(er) option
4)cool and dry(er) option

Hopefully that will be enough. Hopefully it also isn't too late. I think she is begining to show stress signs. And I really don't want to loose this lizard (she was my first MHD)
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Ryan

Ryan I posted these last week for all of you guys to see, this is a nest of armata, they love to nest under things, the temps are the same temps I offer all my dragons. Usually the basking shuts at night allowing NTL 76f, I only leave it on 24/7 to provoke females in nesting.

They don’t always nest at the same temps, I don’t know exactly why?
They can nest in relatively dry medium as long as the air is saturated, never keep a female in dry conditions.

Alright, thanks. I'll give this my best shot, and will be sure to inform everyone when these eggs arrive!

Sorry I overlooked that before. I'll go back and read some more posts about this subjuect.
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Ryan

2 weeks ago I got a phone call about a dead female, the owner read this forum and followed my advise about nesting temps, however he also followed other advise on the net, so he opted to go 50-50 and supplied an 82f basking at nest site.

The reason why I offer 130f is because once you dig a few inches the temps get lower, in his case the temp was 75f only 2 inches deep from basking, of course the female refused to sacrifice her eggs.
Even with capra’s the minimum temps should be no less then 75f, and this should be baked up with daytime temps in the 80s, anything lower then 75f is too low.

I have proven these lower temps are unnecessary, in fact they retard development.
As a herper I move forward and progress with my husbandry, when I find a better way, the old way is trashed and I move on. I don’t understand why peoples stay stuck with outdated husbandry.

jobi,
Sometimes I know people don't want to leave their comfort zone. I know I've had trouble doing that. It's kind of like you feel most comfortable with what you hear first. I think it's impossible for any one person to take a group of these lizards and find a common thread that will definitely, without a doubt help other keepers. I think there is too much variation between methods, etc. Like for example, you don't treat for parasites, peoeple like Marcia and myslef do and yet we are successful. So I think it depends on too many factors to really pinpoint any one thing as the culprit for any one problem. I haven't tried to breed the armata yet, but who knows, I will probably have a different experience than Marcia or Bonnie, who both had different experiences than you. We'll see. That is one of the things that I love about these lizards, not only are they awesome looking, but they are viable study subjects as there is so much ambiguity left in their requirements. As I said, I am possibly going to acquire a rather large group of coronata, I am looking foreword to observing them and trying to identify differences between them and the armata and the capra. Only time will tell, but I think most of us have lots to learn about them even still, I know I do.

Evan

First any claim to success should be attributed to the lizards, we only provide the tools.
Second my definition of success is obviously not the same as yours, females dieing egg bond is no success to me in anyway.
In fact if you guys where successful I would not have posted this last week, sins when do I tell you guys what to do? Never I only present you with alternative, other ways of doing things witch for the most part you do not understand.

Long ago I was breeding leopard geckos in rack system, 1.8 per sweater box, I sold my colony to a lizard guy, he managed to produce many and actually made a profit out of it. then this guy started to obtain other species thinking he was going to have the same success, he failed, the reality is some species (like capra) are very easy to breed others will be a real challenge.

If you don’t look for the culprit you will fail repeatedly, until you give up or try a new approach.

I keep live animals, there well being depends on my ability to make decisions, if you present me with a better husbandry method, no dough I will embrace it and forget my ways, being conservative is a useless approach to herpetoculture.

Alright.

So I moved Dixie (Gravid female) to her new set-up. She has several nesting options. Not just whith temperatrue and humidity, but also between coconut fiber and oak leaves. The temperature of her new enclosure is higher than her old, and it is a little more humid. She has only been in there for a few hours, yet is already going to town in the leaves.This is a good sign!

Hopefully she digs and lays in one shot, like you said Jobi (Can I call you Steve?)And if she does I thank you! Well I thank you for the help anyway!
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Ryan

I just want to point out Ryan, I have never seen or use coconut fiber but I dough lizards understand this medium in anyway?
I use leaf litter to cover my dirt-sand mix, it helps retain moisture and keeps the lizards clean, this is how I use leaf litter. Lizards do not nest in leaf they nest in the substrate under them.

I use sphagnum moss in the same manner as leaf, to cover my dirt-sand mix.
Mix sand with top soil in about 70% sand to 30% soil, 5-6inches then cover with moss or leaf litter. Proper nesting for these lizards involves a media that can be compacted by the female, lose substrate cant be compacted.

Maybe I am not explaining things enough, or maybe you guys don’t ask enough questions?

Ryan I read your post on the other forum, I think you still don’t understand.

The compactable material goes at the bottom, it’s mostly sand.
Theirs a reason I only add 20-30% top soil to my sand, it helps keep the humidity and hold a borrow, other then this I try to avoid all organic material.

The reason reptiles don’t normally nest in organic mater, is because of fungus, microbial and insects live in organic materials, these will kill the eggs long before they hatch, your female knows this.

In my cages all resident bugs live on the top layers, not in the nesting material.
All lizards understand sand, in fact most will nest in sand, some will prefer sand-gravel mix, others sand-dirt mix especially if these are covered with a few inches of moss or leafs, species witch prefer the sand-gravel will prefer nesting under slabs or flat rocks heated by the sun.

All the above mix are mineral rich, they drain easy and don’t promote bacterial, they also have similar ph levels, this in any place in the world.

None of these properties can be attributed to commercial herp litters, and peat moss is to high in ph and stick to all orifice of your reptiles. This is in my 5 top worst medium.

Top 5 worst
1, cedar
2, silica
3, pine
4, peat moss
5, cypress mulch, wood nuggets
Reptiles do not understand these in anyway, they may use it because they have no choice.
Top 5 best
1, sand
2, dirt
3, sphagnum moss
4, leaf litter (oak, hard wood)
5, all hard wood ships (chips made by chain saws) perfect size
Reptiles from anywhere in the world understand these materials, they know how to use them.

I am not considering any type of carpet, news paper or coconut whatever as something remotely useful to any reptiles, these are crap period. They are totally alien materials to reptiles.
I bet none even knew how to use these materials, welcome to herpetoculture!

jobi,
What's silica? Is it a type of sand?

Evan

Wait, why I don't understand?

Here is what I am going to do. The bottom six inches is topsoil/sand like you said, I think I labled it as dirt. Then on top is oak leaves. Is this not what you said? I'm really getting confused.
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Ryan

yes this is what I said.

you did label as dirt and you also said youd put compacting on top, I was confused.

Yes, this is my fault. I'm sorry. Bad labling is all.

But here is something else. First, the topsiol/sand stuff is going all over the ground. The nesting area, however, is seperate with the oak leaves on top. I want that area to be where the female lays her eggs. So, on the other part, is it all right to put some type of bark or something solid over the topsoil/sand mixture? This way, the dragons don't track the dirt in the water dishes, and stuff like that.

Do you think that would be okay? I noticed you have wood nuggets as one of your worst five mediums, I assume you are talking about commercial grade bark litter. Well, what would be a good alternative(think solid). Or is it just better to cover everything with leaves (a lot more work for me!).

Just so we are clear, here is exactly how I want to do it. Imagine a 2'x3' square. Put six inches of topsoil/sand down. Then on one half, cover in oak leaves. The other halve, something solid. This is want I am going for. I am open to constructive criticism only.

Thank you!
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Ryan