Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I acquired a pair of egg-eaters, Dasypeltis scabra about a month and a half ago. Three days ago I made the discovery documented below in two emails I sent to the person who sold them to me. These are wild-caught animals, said to be about 3 years old.

#1 message:

I just came home for lunch to find regurgitated egg (mostly semi-solidified yolk) in the cage and want to ask you for any insight you may have.

It's peculiar, I found the male (smaller snake) near it. However, the last time an egg was eaten by either snake was 24 days ago, and I am not sure which snake ate it since they share the cage. Previously, I had seen the female (larger snake) take an egg, 4 days earlier than that.

It seems a long time for food to sit, seemingly undigested, in the stomach of a snake.

Any ideas on the cause and actions I might take?

#2 message, sent later that day:

A follow up to this last message, below: I just cleaned the rock on which I'd found the egg. It looks like there was also some normal colored feces on the rock, so it is possible the egg was passed rather than regurgitated. If that was the case, it is still not very "digested" looking and I remain concerned.

New info:

The male has spent the time since that day in the corner of the tank, curled up under a rock. This has led me to wonder whether the temperature may have been too high, and I am adjusting the daytime temp. down now. I use a heat lamp to bring up day temperatures and an under-tank heater constantly. The snakes spend most of their time in a weaver nest suspended over the warm end of the tank.

Any ideas?? Thanks!!

Is it possible that the female laid a slug rather than regurgitated a meal? Infertile eggs can lack much of a shell and appear as a more or less oval mass of semi-solid yolk.

-Alice

As I did not witness the event, that is certainly possible.

There were two or three 1/4 inch long segments to the yolk, multiple slugs?

It would seem to make more sense than undigested food resident over 3 weeks in a snake's stomach.

Thanks.

It's hard to guess without seeing pics but infertile eggs can have pretty variable shapes. That would be my best guess as to what she passed.

-Alice

Did you say pictures?

I'd forgotten that I had taken a couple before cleaning it up:

I'm new to egg eaters but have tons of experience with a multitude of other colubrids. I have seen this many times. We usually call it slug goo. It seems that sometimes females just lay slugs that are not quite fully developed. Not sure if she has possibly reabsorbed some of the eggs before laying or if they just never develop fully in the first place.
-----
2.1 dogs
0.1 cat
1.2.1 crested geckos
1.2.0 leopard geckos
0.0.3 Western Hogs
0.0.1 Vine snake (Ahaetulla nasuta)
0.0.2 African egg eaters (Dasypeltis scabra)