Maternal Brooding

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Originally Posted by bigballs

i didnt read any of the links yet but im guessing that like incubation you would have to make the conditions appropriate for maternal brooding inside the females enclosure.

do you think though that there is greater risk of losing eggs by allowing the female to incubate her own eggs or is there equal risk with incubation?

and what type of supervision would be need for maternal brooding that is different from incubating yourself??

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For maternal incubation, ambient temps in the mid eighties with a basking spot in the low nineties is ideal. BPs cannot raise thier body temps with muscle contractions like some python species, so they will leave the clutch to bask and raise thier body temp before returning to the clutch. Relative humidity should be higher than normal, about 80-85%. I agree that maternal incubation is a poor choice, mainly because of cleanliness issues and it means two more months of fasting for the mother. There is little to no risk with artificial incubation if you have a reliable incubator, and the female can pack the weight back on sooner. I see no need for maternal incubation, except maybe experiencing how it's done in nature.

-Evan