newest hatchling, rip

well tonight was kind of a bummer--i lost a baby crested gecko. :rainon: i know i should be counting myself lucky that this is my first loss when it comes to cresteds but somehow that's not a ton of consolation.

this was the second clutch from gidget and spice. one of the eggs went bad almost right away and this one was a bit late to hatch but nothing too abnormal. the baby managed to slit the egg open earlier tonight and i was all excited because i have never actually caught the first part of the hatching process--i always find them, head already out, resting to prepare to pull themselves the rest of the way out of the egg. i set up my camera and was all set to document the entire process, but then nothing happened. i sat glued to the egg for 2 hours but still nothing. generally it seems like babies will slit the egg and pop their heads right out--i'll check the incubator and see nothing at all and literally 30 seconds later there's a head! so anyhow i figured it was a watched egg never hatches type thing and went about dinner, feeding/cleaning cages and all that. still nothing.

finally about an hour ago i picked the egg up and gently lifted a piece of the slit eggshell with my fingernail to see if i could see anything. that pretty much proved that the baby was either very weak or already dead in the egg so i carefully cut the egg open enough that i could help the baby out. needless to say there was no life left in the little one, although visually there was nothing wrong with it that i could see. i know that some babies don't make it out for a reason, it's just tough not to know what that reason is when they look like a perfect, fully formed baby. :(

rip little one. :sniff:

http://mlededee.com/herps/cresties/rip031006.jpg

Oh Emily so sorry the little one didn't make it. I know nature has it's ways but they aren't always easy to accept. :hug:

Oh, poor little thing. It's always hard to lose a baby. Even worse when there's no obvious reason for it. My deepest sympathies go out to you.

Aww.. so sorry Emily. Such a pretty little thing.

I can't believe that lizard fit in that egg..

So sorry to hear about this Emily.. that baby had some serious potential. Man it is hard to believe that baby came out of that egg, looks like he/she would have been aweful crammed in there.

thanks all for the kind words. i'm wondering now if i had helped it out earlier if it would have been able to pull through, but it's tricky with geckos sometimes. it is amazing though that they can fit into the eggs the way they do. this one was tucked into the egg, arms and legs pointed backwards toward the tail and basically folded in half. it was a pretty tight fit in there. sometimes the eggs swell up so much they look like they are going to pop like a balloon.