Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Everyone talks about weight, but what are the lengths of adult females. The shortest to reproduce, the longest? average? etc.

I ask because captive weights do not relate to wild weights.

I ask because I am trying to get an idea of what the smallest to reproduce in the field is.

I find many females over two foot and that's obvious they are reproductive. I also find females in the 17 inch range that appear to be reproductive. This is what I am interested in.

On a side note, I raised a 4 1/2 neonate(in oct last year) to that size(17 inches), but she is small in bone structure compared to those in nature I am questioning.

Those 17 inch wild females appear to have had a rough life and did not grow like the others.

Another question, do adults tend to fade as they get old? Thanks

Frank,
This season a few of my females were 20 inches and a couple may have been slightly under. Those girls were in the 170 gram range and my best producers of the season. Not only because they double clutched and dropped a bunch of nice fertile eggs (the only infertiles we got were from larger, older females) but also because they recovered very quickly after laying the clutches. I think offering calcium and vitamin supplements might have helped as well.

What kind of calcium and vitamin supplements do you offer to your Hogs Gregg? Do you only offer this to females during breeding season?

Thanks,

Jason

hey gregg,
you mentioned in the post that you gave your females calcium and vitamin supplements. how do you get them to ingest it? sprinkle it on the feeder? have a f/t and inject it? just curious. i read of a guy doing that with pitts years ago, but this is the first i have heard of it for hogs.
thanks...
jonathan

Hey Jon,
All I do is just dip the ass end of the mouse in a calcium/vitamin supplement. Very easy.

Gregg,
Thanks for the tip! I will give that a whirl next season
Jonathan