Woo-Hoo! My first-ever eggs!!!

[J_Daniels]

Hey there everyone! I'm not here as much as I used to be, but I thought that I'd share these pictures with all of you.

This is my first clutch ever, and since it's Akasha's (my female Anery) first also, it was kinda small, as expected. There are 8 eggs in there.

I do have a couple of questions that hopefully some more experienced folks can help me with...

1) Are these eggs about average size? They look pretty big to me...

2) Are the eggs ok clumped up like this? I cnnot seperate them, but am kind of worried about the weight on the bottom eggs, as well as air flow, and too much moisture on the bottom/not enough on top.

and lastly 3) I have the eggs in a Hoverbator (sp?). The humidity looks ok (90%-96%), with temps ranging from 82.7 - 85.6 degrees. These are good levels to keep, right?

Sorry for all the silly questions, but I love my snakes dearly, and can't stand the thought of killing the babies. (I don't have a pic of mom with me, but that's dad, my male Snow Malakii in my avatar).

Now, on to the pics! Enjoy, and let me know what you think!

and lastly (pardon the messy counter:awcrap:

 

[Marcel Poots]

Yes, they look big. Congrats! I would go with 80 - 82 degrees.. It takes longer but you will have less risk on kinks and they grow bigger because it takes longer.

 

[Simon]

Nice little clutch there~~
awesome and healthy looking eggs!

 

[J_Daniels]

The top two eggs in the above pictures are denting up quite a bit. They have not changed color, and don't feel slimy or anything. Do I need to bury the "stack" more?

I've had a heck of a time keeping the humidity up in the hovabator. I have taken to laying a very light damp cloth over the top of the container, and the denting seems to have slowed (maybe stopped, it's kinda hard to tell). And have been keeping two wet burp rags (hey, they hold water very well, and are the right size...) in the incubator wraped around the bowl.

I'm keeping the temps between 80.2 and 82.3... and the humidity in the hovabator is hanging around 85-88% (I'm sure it's higher in the container with the eggs, just because of the damp cloth).

All of the eggs under the top two look great!

Does all of this sound good to you more experienced parents out there? I just don't want to mess this up.

 

[J_Daniels]

137 views and counting... and noone can help me out?

 

[ecreipeoj]

Proud new papa

You may find that there are a lot of different opinions about how to incubate Corn Snake eggs and they will all work. I personally do not use an incubator but just stack the containers in my breeding room. The room temperature is between 80 - 82 degrees at all times.

I use the same plastic shoe box containers that I use to raise my young snakes in. The container is closed so there is very little air exchange except when I open the lid to check the eggs. My medium of choice is perlite. It is not messy and does not cling to the eggs. I feel the air humidity is the most important consideration and it needs to be high during most of the incubation. I do not like the container to be dripping wet trying to get the air humidity up. I also do not like putting wet towels on the eggs either. Perlite lets you put a lot of water in the bottom of the container and rest the eggs on top. I do not bury the eggs at all. They sit right on the top, whether or not they are in a clump or not. If the air humidity is high enough the top eggs will not dent. It is a lot easier to keep the humidity high in a closed container than it is in one with holes in it.

Incubation temperature is another area of debate. I go along with the standard of 80 - 82 where 82 is considered best. It is possible to raise the incubation temperature and lower the humidity and get good results. Dented eggs will fill out by raising the temperature easier than flooding the cage with water. I have found Mountain King Snake eggs several times in the wild and they were in a very tight closed space, usually behind a rock. During the day, the temperature had to get very high like it was when I found them. I did not measure the temperature, but it had to be around 90 degrees at least. At night the air temperature was only around 50 degrees and the temperature around the eggs had to drop significantly. I am sure that the rock helped hold the heat at night, but it was obvious that the temperature fluctuated a great deal. The area they laid the eggs was not dripping wet, but sealed and the air humidity was high, but stable.

It is possible to get eggs too humid and they will take on a very odd shape and seem like they are going to explode. I try to avoid this because I have had much more full term snakes dead in the shell under these conditions. During the last two weeks of incubation, I open up the ventilation holes on the container and allow some air flow and open up the lids almost daily. I actually like to see the eggs starting to dent a little at the very end of their incubation.

When I see the very first nose poking out, I slit all of the eggs, so they can get out easily. This needs to be done very carefully and not necessary, but there is nothing more disappointing than to find a few slits on a couple of eggs and wait it out and then discover that the entire clutch has went full term and died in the eggs.