Eyeless Piebald Clutch

[All Balled Up]

We have 3 unrelated Piebalds, 2 females and 1 male. Each female has bred for us before, both in 2010 and one this season. Out of 8 eggs in 2010 only 3 of them made it, so when we got 6 good eggs this year we were really excited. We let them pip on their own and they started coming out today. So far we have 1 perfect high white piebald out of the egg, and three with their heads out. Two of those snakes only have one eye, and one of them doesn't have any eyes. We believe that one of the others that is still in the egg is also missing at least one eye, though we can't know for sure until he's out of the egg. We are impatiently waiting for the other two to come out so we can see what's going on.

This is strange for us. We haven't heard a lot about snakes hatching without eyes, though not a lot of people like to discuss the problems they've had with their own clutches. Does anyone know what might cause snakes to be born without eyes? Especially more than one in a clutch? We're looking at the majority of this clutch being hatched with the same abnormality. The parents are unrelated, and incubator temperatures were perfect (or so we believe), so we can't think of any red-flag problem that has gone on to cause this. Does anyone else have any thoughts? We'd love to hear from you. We have only been breeding snakes for the past 3 seasons, so we certainly have a lot to learn.

We will post full pictures of these guys once they're all out. Right now these are the best pictures we have.

[BWyant]

Markus Jayne from up in Canada just hatched a snake that doesn't have any eyes.

I've had a few brief talks with him and he's honestly the most helpful breeder than I've come in contact with.

If I were you, I'd get in touch with him.

There's an article about the snake somewhere. I think it might be on worldofballpythons.

[DavidMundy]

A few people on here currently have eyeless ball pythons. To my knowledge they live good lives, eating fine. Check out this thread as well
http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...cture-warning*

[AK907]

One of BP.net members also has an eyeless ball python. I forget who it is exactly, but I'm sure they will chime in soon enough. Apparently they fare extremely well in most cases.

[Don]

I've heard that it could be related to an incubation problem - spike in temps or unstable temps. Sorry about the clutch. It has to heartbreaking to do all that work and end up with this kind of problem.

[CaGirl5]

I think they're cute I want one!

[DooLittle]

There actually seem to be quite a few that I have seen/read about this year. Angllady2 has an eyeless girl, that is grown and doing well. She also has some fires that due to an incubation problem have one or no eyes. Valentine Pirate also just got a couple eyelesss babies from someone. And I believe there was somebody else I have read about recently with them. Seems some if not most of them may be ok. Cute little buggers they are! Hope your thrive for you. Keep us posted on the little guys!

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[satomi325]

Congrats on the clutch! Too bad about the eyes. From what I've gathered, eyeless defects are from incubation errors. Too hot or too cold at some point. If lack of eyes is the only issue, they can still eat and thrive fine.

I would greatly appreciate if you can update the Birth Defect Documentary Thread with your experience.

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...cture-warning*



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[scc_583]

I have a 2900 gram normal female with no eyes and she is the best snake I own. Best eater too. But will only eat live rats. She is also a good breeder

[jbean7916]

I'm wondering about incubation methods. for example is everyone using vermeculite of the same brand? Does everyone use glad press,n-seal? I does seem like there are more this year than in previous years. I wonder if there is some correlation

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