Reptile Forum, Reptile Classifieds - CaptiveBred

[Scott W]

No idea who else has had any full term dead in shell but one thing I have noticed so far is ALL my dead in shells/pipped but die before hatching, have all come from eggs that didn't 'shrivel' at the same time as the others and once opened all were very full of fluid.

As to the reasons why I have had any dead in shells I'm not too sure but I guess the earlier problems with the incubator temps certainly didn't help
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[Mememe]

Probably doesn't help at all, but I have had the EXACT problem you described with my pygmy chams Opened an egg that had gone 'funny' up, loads off gunk, and and a partially formed head. Now it look like the rest of the clutch is going the same way
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No man is an Island. Except the Isle of Man.

[Drymarchon32]

HI Scott,
I posted about this when the discussion was about Ackie eggs, I care for a species of snake that has had a lot of full term DIS over the years, (in 30 years only one clutch has hatched with no infertile or DIS)and it doesn't appear to be related to inbreeding or temps in the incubator, but it does seem far more likely to be related to nutrition of the adults or humidity/water content in the incubation medium. My personal theory is that it if its about nutrition then the eggs would not develop normally or they would be funky looking when they are laid, and it is documented that water content plays a very important part in embryo development and is significant for the absorption of the yolk sac. I was hoping to test this theory this year but out of 3 clutches I only have one viable egg Last year I had 4 clutches with 14 hatchlings, but over 20 DIS. I really think that the issue is about water content in the latter part of incubation. However there are so many variables in breeding that finding that single thing that stops the problem seems almost impossible.
Are the hatchlings dying because a) The lungs have not developed properly or are full of water b)they are too weak to leave the egg(why?) c) They are lacking some sort of nutrition from the female.

I see exactly the same thing as you, they pip, even have their heads out and then retract them and die.

However I recently had a discussion with a lizard breeder who saw the same thing but only when the females were poorly nourished or were bred too frequently. This doesn't relate to my species as last year I bred one animal that had not produced a clutch in over 17 years, the clutch she did lay was excellent and eggs were twice the size as were the hatchlings, but there were still about 50% DIS. Most frustrating thing I've ever seen.

Confused? I'd say so. More discussion on this subject please!!

Al
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Complacency killed the keeper

[Rick_Albig]

There has been an excellent discussion on this recently on another varanus forum with people experiencing full term deaths in eggs. The Eggmanhas hit the nail on the head. Too much moisture. During the initial 2/3 of incubation eggs need to absorb water, towards the end the eggs need to loose some water, hence they dent just before hatching. If the substrate is too wet in the latter stages the process of osmosis can not remove and water from he egg and the embryo inside drowns to death.

Was the substrate still wet Scott? You may want to check on some of the other clutches and reduce the water content as they approach full term. Have you has any eggs explode? This is another sign of too much moisture.

Rick

[Scott W]

I certainly agree that too much moisture is probably the main cause, especially when an entire clutch fails in that way.

With these particular DIS's the strange thing is that the eggs that failed were closest to the heat mats and therefore in the dryest place in the box.

Also in one of the boxes were also the varanus tristis eggs that did hatch so this adds weight to the fact the substrate was not too wet at all (monitors being notorious for DIS's)
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Please DO NOT pm orders for reptiles, send email instead scott@captivebred.co.uk

[Rick_Albig]

Where were the eggs positioned in the box? There is almost always more moisture at the edges of egg boxes where the water condensates and runs back into the substrate. What do you use for incubation medium and do you measure the quantity or water to medium mix? Most people use 1:1 vermiculite or perlite:water by weight or sometimes slightly less water.

How big was the tristis egg in comparison to the python eggs? Larger eggs require more moisture so if the tristis eggs were turgid and larger than the python eggs this may be the reason.

Just a thought

Rick

[SteveL]

did you open the eggs up to jellied (drying out egg) or really wet and runny fluid ?

sorry if that sounded odd i had a few dead in the egg this year and they were all rather nice jags

i have come to the conclussion that i will not use the old vermiculite/perlite method , i will suspend the eggs in a water chamber with a nice mesh grill this year .that way they will absorb what they need hopefully

cool thread Scott
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[Mememe]

The 'gunk' in my egg was white/yellow, and very thick.

I'm going to try keeping them even drier. (I already tried with the last clutch)
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No man is an Island. Except the Isle of Man.

[royalpython]

this makes me think how lucky we were last year to hatch all ours. We just added water to vermiculite and sent them off incubating.. no measuring of parts water:parts vermiculite... eggs were directly on the vermiculite at 90F non stop.

This year our clutch - two eggs on top have dimpled slightly and early, so we put a little sphagnum moss in there around the sides to hopefully increase the humidity in there, while the remainder 3 weeks finishes. We've even sprinkled vermiculite over the eggs, some are burried with small gaps (for oxygen), and some just have sprinkles laying over them.

On day 50 in one of the books (cant remember, think its NERD), it says to remove all the layers of vermiculite over the eggs, so the eggs can breathe more, but hey, i'm new to all this, and have very little experience....... Might just take the eggs out to breathe now just in case.

[Mememe]

Well, I just dissected a collapsed egg, to find a baby chameleon, perfectly formed, but under developed - I think it had only just died. Extremely depressing sight.
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No man is an Island. Except the Isle of Man.