Inquiring Mind Wants To Know

[AliCat37]

I have a general curiosity question... Both of my girls just laid their eggs (yay!!)
I noticed this about a week ago. They has their Pre Lay sheds only one day apart. As soon as I realized this, I got to thinking.. I bred Envy on March 30, and Velvet on April 27. My first thought was that this was because Envy was making a LOT more eggs (she laid more than twice as much as Velvet). Now I am wondering if it is because Velvet had mostly slugs? I believe there are 4 fertile eggs from Velvet, and at least 28 fertile eggs from Envy. Envy had one slug, where Velvet had about 8 (I haven't actually counted, and Envy's are all jammed up in a clutch)! This is also Envy's second year, Velvet's first.

So why would they have such a difference in length of being gravid?

 

[AliCat37]

Envy's pretty eggs

Tiny egg! (There is an even smaller one too!)

Velvet's sluggy eggs

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[MysticExotics]

They can retain sperm and lay the eggs later. Maybe it was a seasonal thing, or light cycles, or ...?
I know last year, I started pairing my Coral Snow and RF Tessera mid December. The last pairing was January 24. I didn't think she took, but she laid eggs July 22!

Edit to add: it was also the largest clutch I have had, 26 good eggs, out of 30 total. (Four were slugs when she laid them.)

 

[kc261]

I think one possibility is that the pairing for Velvet came a little too late for optimal fertility. From my understanding of fertility in a few different species of mammals (which may or may not apply to corn snakes at all), it is best if the sperm are already in place at the moment of ovulation. A mating that occurs approximately simultaneously with ovulation or even a few days afterwards can result in a pregnancy, but with a lower chance of success and in animals that produce litters, the average litter size will be smaller, presumably because some of the ova had deteriorated too much by the time the sperm reached them.

I do think I've also read that first time females are more likely to lay a larger percentage of slugs, although I may have read that in relation to BPs and not corns. Not really sure on that one.

Certainly as has already been pointed out, it is possible that Envy retained the sperm for a while before she ovulated, so that could explain her longer period of being "gravid". She wasn't really gravid the whole time...just retaining the sperm for part of it.

 

[AliCat37]

Hmmm I don't know if it was too late for Velet, I placed her with the male once a week since January 1st, that was the first date she took. She then hooked up two more times after that. I suppose it is a possibility though.

 

[kc261]

Oh, I thought the sentence "I bred Envy on March 30, and Velvet on April 27." meant you hadn't paired them before that. If there were pairings but they just didn't lock up before then most likely she wasn't ready yet, and thus most likely it wasn't too early for her, I'd guess.

 

[AliCat37]

Yeah I suppose that could have been interpreted the wrong way! But nope, I always pair every week until they take. I guess retaining sperm makes sense, since it was such a long period after breeding that she laid the eggs..