Dealing with the unexpected...(Hatchlings)

i LOVE this thread!!!

Last season, I had 3 hatchlings(2 pastels and a normal, I think) that didn't want to shed. They ate, did everything normally, just no shedding. After a month went by, they started to shed, but there was excess fluid in between the old skin and the new skin. It made their eyes bulgy, and the new skin was very friable(easily broken). I had to hand shed them all, and their new skin was a bit flaky. They all shed fine the next go around, and none of the other hatchlings had any problems. I kept them all the same, on moist paper towels.

Why can't they all just read the book?

Last year, I had too much condensation inside of my egg boxes. I melted some holes into the egg boxes with a soldering iron. The temps and humidity in the boxes are, and were, spot-on and I hatched my eggs with a 100% hatch rate. The probes for my thermostat and thermometers/hygrometers are inside the boxes though, not just inside of the incubator, so everything stays just fine.

How about how to deal with unexpected eggs? LOL

Thats what happened to me, and with some major help from a friend, i got a Cooler type incubator set up with a herpstat T-stat and doing a great job. 3 weeks left!

Best thing to do in that situation is to make sure the temps in moms enclosure are appropriate for egg hatching, and she will do the rest while you get your stuff together for an incubator.

i dont know anything about breeding but i have a question,why get an incubator why not just let mom do her thing and hatch her babies herself?

sorry if thats a dumb question...

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Originally Posted by crystal

i dont know anything about breeding but i have a question,why get an incubator why not just let mom do her thing and hatch her babies herself?

sorry if thats a dumb question...

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Nah, I dont think its a dumb question- I asked the same thing just a few months or so ago. Its because after laying the eggs, mom is pretty small and looking.. Not so good- so most people wan to get them back on feed as quick;y as possible to recover faster.

Thats what I was told :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by crystal

i dont know anything about breeding but i have a question,why get an incubator why not just let mom do her thing and hatch her babies herself?

sorry if thats a dumb question...

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The mothers health is one reason and another reason is a higher success ratio with the hatching of eggs when an incubator is used. Mom doing the work gets between a 60 to 70 percent success ratio while the incubator gives a 90+ percent. These are of course rough numbers given to me by a breeder since we are still awaiting our first eggs. We got started late and while the girl has grown follicles and no more locks are occurring, we have not witnessed ovulation, but she has recently shed!

I just wanted to link this thread here because not only am I very thankful Susan (daaang) shared the experience with us, but Tim also had some good info about pairings which resulted in deformed hatchlings.

http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=71260

Thanks to everyone who has shared their experiences in this thread.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SatanicIntention

Last season, I had 3 hatchlings(2 pastels and a normal, I think) that didn't want to shed. They ate, did everything normally, just no shedding. After a month went by, they started to shed, but there was excess fluid in between the old skin and the new skin. It made their eyes bulgy, and the new skin was very friable(easily broken). I had to hand shed them all, and their new skin was a bit flaky. They all shed fine the next go around, and none of the other hatchlings had any problems. I kept them all the same, on moist paper towels.

Why can't they all just read the book?

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I have 3 that are doing that too me now - they hatched 3 weeks ago. It's 2 normals and a pastel (that's wierd!) I'm gonna set them up separately and feed them... Maybe I'll get a warm wet towel and see if I can gently get them started....