The females do release the young from the mounds but the how and why has been conjectured for years. My theory is that cycling females doing test digs early in the season inadvertently release the previous year's young. Monitors are creatures of habit and will likely keep returning to the same termite mound to nest if it keeps working. I've looked at data from studies of wild monitors and there would be hatchlings in the mound at almost exactly the same time as the wild females start cycling for the next clutch.



The big question is, would they still be able to escape if the female didn't let them out? My guess is yes. This is where it gets interesting. Heath monitors, Varanus rosenbergi, nest in mounds constructed by the very same species of termite. They have a shorter incubation period, though, so they nest later than lace monitors in order for their hatchlings to emerge in spring. What this means is that female heath monitors are not cycling/digging at the time their eggs are hatching, so the hatchlings must escape on their own. A mate has photographed babies emerging and cruelly sent them to me at work, from his phone. I say 'cruelly' because the evening before we had a chat about heath monitors at a herp meeting and when he told me he was envious of me seeing females nesting I told him he should keep a look out for emerging babies, as they should start appearing at that time of year. He had a job which gave him free afternoons and he would often go mountain-biking in an area that was full of heath monitors, so the very next day he went out and found babies emerging. What are the chances of that? Sadly, all I've seen so far is the tiny holes the babies make when they emerge.

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