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My first year breeding

inu009 said:
Oh her normal interval before I started pairing was a jumbo mouse every two weeks. Since January 1st, I've been feeding a large mouse weekly.

This was her in January
View attachment 198203

She's just starting a shed cycle so that could be why too, she gets really picky about eating during shed. Which also leads me to ask..this is way too soon for a pre-lay shed right? I thought it was about 5 weeks after first lock.
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Looking at this photo, she looks a bit on the chunky side. The indent on her spine is the indication. 700 grams is pretty big for a Cornsnake.

Overweight females can be at risk for egg binding, because of the excess fat.
I would work on reducing her normal weight, for her health as well as to help with passing the eggs.
 
MysticExotics said:
Looking at this photo, she looks a bit on the chunky side. The indent on her spine is the indication. 700 grams is pretty big for a Cornsnake.

Overweight females can be at risk for egg binding, because of the excess fat.
I would work on reducing her normal weight, for her health as well as to help with passing the eggs.
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Thank you! I always think maybe she's on the bigger side, but when I convince myself it's fine lol. I will definitely put on her a diet. Every year she goes off feed in May and June, but since she actually was bred this year she may eat. I think I'll lay off the jumbo's and stick to large mice.
 
So after I introduced the humid box she abandoned it. After adding the second bag of moss and letting it warm up a little, she's been in there since last night. I really wanted her to get familiar with the humid box so she can lay her eggs there.

IMG_4198.jpeg
 
Just an observation. This may not be necessary at this point for this occurrence, but I would fill your egg laying box to the top with moss. My decades of experience has seen that females prefer tight spaces to lay eggs and tend to lay eggs a few days earlier in tight packed moist substrate.
Want to add that your doing a great job and good luck!
 
I'll second Frank. Fill 'er up with moss and your girl will hopefully fill 'er up with eggs soon. And great job! And good luck!

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Frank Pinello said:
Just an observation. This may not be necessary at this point for this occurrence, but I would fill your egg laying box to the top with moss. My decades of experience has seen that females prefer tight spaces to lay eggs and tend to lay eggs a few days earlier in tight packed moist substrate.
Want to add that your doing a great job and good luck!
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Caryl said:
I'll second Frank. Fill 'er up with moss and your girl will hopefully fill 'er up with eggs soon. And great job! And good luck!

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Thanks guys! I definitely wanted to put as much moss in there as possible, but finding a big bag of moss on amazon has been a pain. Every time I order I keep getting these little bags lol. Right there is two bags of moss. And I was saving the two I have left in case she pooped in there lol. I'm going to stop at Lowes tomorrow and see if I can get a big bag.
 
Frank Pinello said:
Just an observation. This may not be necessary at this point for this occurrence, but I would fill your egg laying box to the top with moss. My decades of experience has seen that females prefer tight spaces to lay eggs and tend to lay eggs a few days earlier in tight packed moist substrate.
Click to expand...

Absolutely! She is looking for a SAFE place to lay her eggs, so burrowing into or under something is what she would like as a nesting place.

Use dampened peat moss if you can't find sphagnum moss. That will work just fine.

BTW, if you are using a large water dish, replace it with a small one. Sometimes these dummies will stick their head in the nesting box but have the tail draped into the water dish and lay the eggs there. Ask me how I know... :(
 
Rich Z said:
Absolutely! She is looking for a SAFE place to lay her eggs, so burrowing into or under something is what she would like as a nesting place.

Use dampened peat moss if you can't find sphagnum moss. That will work just fine.

BTW, if you are using a large water dish, replace it with a small one. Sometimes these dummies will stick their head in the nesting box but have the tail draped into the water dish and lay the eggs there. Ask me how I know... :(
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Yep already switch the water dish to a mug. Once she sheds, I'll give her a look over, also thinking about attempting to pair one more time to make 100% sure. I have bad luck and with my luck this would be her pre-ovulation shed lol.

But while she's out, I will pack that lay box with as much moss will fit.
 
I *think* I'm starting to see of that pyramiding that's supposed to happen when carrying eggs.

IMG_4224.jpeg

Since this photo was taken she's left the humid box, so I'm desperately waiting for amazon to deliver my block of peat moss, so I can get it saturated and added to the box. She still hasn't shed yet, she usually spends time in her hot hide before she sheds and that's where she is now so I'm expecting she'll shed either tonight or tomorrow.
 
Looks good! Normal, so very good. You've likely got time to get your moss delivery. If she follows the usual playbook, once she's shed she will spend the next few days being restless. On the other hand, she may settle rather quickly into whatever spot she chooses to lay her eggs. Hopefully this will be your wonderful nest box! Most likely she'll present you with eggs about 7-10 days after shedding. That mounding you mentioned usually occurs 1-2 days before she lays.

Exciting stuff, isn't it?

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Caryl said:
Looks good! Normal, so very good. You've likely got time to get your moss delivery. If she follows the usual playbook, once she's shed she will spend the next few days being restless. On the other hand, she may settle rather quickly into whatever spot she chooses to lay her eggs. Hopefully this will be your wonderful nest box! Most likely she'll present you with eggs about 7-10 days after shedding. That mounding you mentioned usually occurs 1-2 days before she lays.

Exciting stuff, isn't it?

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I've been so excited I've been having trouble sleeping the past few days lmao
 
From what I found, the females will lay their eggs 4 to 5 days after shedding if they have a really satisfactory place to lay her eggs. That means she will just stay in the egg laying box after shedding. If she can burrow in real good, you might not even see her. By 10 days, if she isn't really satisfied, and has prowled up a storm looking for a better nesting site, she will usually just compromise with whatever she has available and just lay them. That could be anywhere in the cage. The longer she holds the eggs, the more difficult it can be on her laying them. They are getting larger the entire time she is carrying them.

Of course, there are no hard and fast rules with this. Sometimes nothing you do will satisfy the girls.
 
Rich Z said:
From what I found, the females will lay their eggs 4 to 5 days after shedding if they have a really satisfactory place to lay her eggs. That means she will just stay in the egg laying box after shedding. If she can burrow in real good, you might not even see her. By 10 days, if she isn't really satisfied, and has prowled up a storm looking for a better nesting site, she will usually just compromise with whatever she has available and just lay them. That could be anywhere in the cage. The longer she holds the eggs, the more difficult it can be on her laying them. They are getting larger the entire time she is carrying them.



Of course, there are no hard and fast rules with this. Sometimes nothing you do will satisfy the girls.
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I bow to Rich's much greater experience.
(My girls have generally gone in about 5-7 days, for whatever it's worth. ) And I do hope you catch some shut-eye!

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Caryl said:
I bow to Rich's much greater experience.
(My girls have generally gone in about 5-7 days, for whatever it's worth. ) And I do hope you catch some shut-eye!

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It could be a matter of environment. Different lighting, different day night heat cycles. Or perhaps my girls were all just trying to gang up on me to see if they could push me into a nervous breakdown. They almost succeeded once. :poke:
 
Maybe so. In any case, Rich, I'm SURE they were trying to gang up on you. They can be wicked that way. I was planning to try and spread things out this season so that I wouldn't be setting up every hatchling at the same time. I'm confident that the females will scuttle these plans somehow.

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I don't think I'll ever get even close to the level you two are/were, probably only one or two breeding females at a time lol. It must be an amazing feeling have multiple clutches dropping at the same time, but unless I win the lottery, I don't see that in my future :nope:
 
Bean shed last night (right when I was expecting). I took her out for a little bit this morning to look her over, and I couldn't feel any individual eggs still, but that's probably just me doing it wrong lol. Just to give me a piece of mind, I put her with the male one last time, and she didn't want anything to do with him, a complete 180 from a few weeks ago.

The lay box is packed full of moss now, I tried to guide her back to it to show her it's full now, but she stuck her head in, and right back out x.x so hopefully she figures that out lol.

So now we wait. I know people say the wait for the eggs to pip is the hardest, but I cant imagine anything being harder than this wait. I've just been thinking hopefully she gets them all out okay, hopefully the are fertile (obviously the former is more important, but you know lol). I feel like once the eggs are out an in the incubator, (which has been working great after my tweaks, I'm only getting a temp variance of .03 degrees) I can relax my mind for 60 days.
 
That's all good news. Fingers crossed that all continues to go smoothly. We'll look forward to seeing those beautiful "new mama with eggs" pictures soon.

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inu009 said:
I don't think I'll ever get even close to the level you two are/were, probably only one or two breeding females at a time lol. It must be an amazing feeling have multiple clutches dropping at the same time, but unless I win the lottery, I don't see that in my future :nope:
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By the way, I was never anywhere near Rich's league. Very few have been. The hobby owes him enormous and continuing gratitude. At peak collection I had just over 100 snakes, apart from babies for sale. I've currently got 25. So far I've bred 4 females this year and will definitely do one more (God and snakes willing). Between PT and other commitments, that's going to be more than enough me this season. And yes, it's sure to be exciting; hopefully the excitement and the surprises will be of the pleasant sort but one never knows. I'm pretty sure Rich wouldn't even consider 5 pairings as an afternoon's work on a light day.

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