I'm with Meg, low and slow for milks. A few people I've spoken with non-corn related, feel we incubate colubrids too warm. I use to do corns, emory's rats, desert kings, cal kings, NM milks, and plains hogs 10+ years ago at 86°F as that was what I was told to incubate at. Out of all those, the kings and hogs hatched normal. My cal kings I had over 20 eggs that either slowly died 1 by 1 throughout incubation, died full-term in egg, and at the end I had a lone egg hatch at 86°. My milk eggs all died, the rat snakes (corns and emory's) were all kinked or dead-in-egg, and all the hog eggs hatched fine. It didn't help that I was using a hovabator either, but it was controlled by a Helix DBS-1000.
Talking with the likes of Damon Salceies, Joe Forks, Brad Alexander, and a few others now that I've shifted from lizards to snakes again, has me incubating at 81-83 (that's my limits due to a house cooled with a swamp cooler, too difficult to get any lower). Those first 3 gentlemen, Damon in particular with his alterna and celaenops incubate in warm rooms at 78-80°F with much greater results. Results like more robust babies and babies more willing to eat pinks. My best friend does the same with his celaenops. Eggs go into a sterilite shoe box, he places the box partly on a heat pad to keep the eggs at 80°, and then moves everything to a closet shelf. He's had 100% hatch rates for 3 or 4 years running and robust babies that he and I could get on pinkies with little to no problems.
