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Knormal Jun 08, 2005 05:23 PM

I caught a western fence lizard the other day, which I brought home to keep and photograph for a few days. I was holding the lizard for a little bit today to take some pictures, and shortly after I put it back in the cage it laid an egg. I'm planning to let this lizard go A.S.A.P before it lays any more, but it's suddenly gotten unseasonably cold and rainy around here and I want to wait until it warms up a bit.

But now, I've got this egg. I've put it in a small cup with some torn-up paper towels on top of a heat pad for the short term, but don't know how to care for it long-term. What kind of conditions do I need to make to give this egg a chance?

Replies (2)

aliceinwl Jun 08, 2005 09:01 PM

It may already be too late for the gg by the time you read thie...

What you want to do is get it off the heat pad asap or you'll fry it. Buy some vermiculite at a gardening / hardware store and mix it with water until it's damp but not wet. A 1:1 ratio by weight works well. If you can't find vermiculite, you can give perlite a try; I use a 1:0.8 ratio of perlite to water by weight. Make sure that you buy brands without fertilizers added. Put the substrate in a small plastic container and poke a few small holes in the lid. Bury the egg about 2/3rds to 3/4ths of the way. Be careful not to rotate the egg, keep it at the same orientaion it was at when it was laid. Reptile eggs are permiable, so they will actually expand and take on moisture as they develop. If kept dry, your eggs will shrivel up and die. Find a warm place in your house, where the temperature stays relatively constant and place the incubation container there. I don't really have any experience with Sceloporus eggs, but the above methods have worked well for me with alligator lizard eggs and the various exotics I've kept, hatching will probably take around 2 months.

If you plan on keeping the female for awhile, moisten the substrate in one part of the cage, if she needs to lay the rest of her eggs, she can dig her nest and lay them there. Watch for signs of digging and signs of major weight loss so that you can rapidly recover the eggs. If she decides to lay them somewhere dry, you'll have to get to them soon if you want them to make it.

-Alice

Knormal Jun 09, 2005 07:57 PM

Alright, I'll give it a try. Thanks.

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