Has a mother ever died from maternal incubation?

I hear people talk about the females losing weight and not eating for like 2 or 3 months but have females died while doing maternal incubation?

Never heard of it. Ours eat while on eggs. Same feeding schedule as everyone else. Never refused yet. Ball pythons can go many months with out eating. Some do and will only eat 2 or 3 times a year.

I haven't maternally incubated a clutch; however, I have had females refuse to eat for a couple months after laying. They would be very thin but seemed to bounce back fine once they started eating. It's only happened a couple times but I've never had an issue.

the reason i posted is because people seem SO against it because they stop eating and its like.. why? if they dont die and dont get close to death like.. whats so bad about it?

Our females have never gone off feed after laying. On eggs or off.

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Originally Posted by sugamama15

the reason i posted is because people seem SO against it because they stop eating and its like.. why? if they dont die and dont get close to death like.. whats so bad about it?

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I dont think people are against it, as much as they prefer artificial incubation.

I don't think people are against maternal incubation due to them not eating because that simply isn't true.. It's more likely people are against maternal incubation simply because it's harder to provide a 100% stable environment for each and every egg during maternal incubation. Harder to keep an eye on each individual egg.

In reality it's not that hard to do, you just need to know what you're doing, but no, the female should not stop eating entirely. Certainly wouldn't starve to death.

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Originally Posted by sugamama15

the reason i posted is because people seem SO against it because they stop eating and its like.. why? if they dont die and dont get close to death like.. whats so bad about it?

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Some are against it because of the not eating thing because they want to make sure the female gains back her weight without any issues

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Originally Posted by jbean7916

Some are against it because of the not eating thing because they want to make sure the female gains back her weight without any issues

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The funny thing is, they DON'T go off feed while on eggs.

well i was in another thread and people were saying they would never do maternal incubation because its another like 2 months that they wouldnt eat or something.. but that didnt seem like a very good reason to me because i had never heard of a snake dying from it and i had heard what yall are saying which is that they still will eat while on eggs.

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they were saying you shouldnt feed them while they were on the eggs though also.. so i dont even know lol

I'm planning to try MI and so have been studying the subject. I agree with others here that they should eat & have no problems in most cases. I also read a study that compared MI to artificial incubation. The babies averaged higher weights and better coordination. That's why I want to try it. Of course I have an incubator set up just in case.

Generally accepted practices aren't always the best practices. When I was a kid, everyone knew that snakes had to eat live. No one questioned the fact. I ended giving up my snakes because I didn't like feeding live. I was thrilled to find out several years ago that frozen thawed can be fed. My how things have changed! :)

Maternal is the only method I use with my balls and I've never had any health issues with my girls. Most people prefer artificial incubation because there is more direct control over conditions and for beginners the majority of information available is focused on various methods of artificial incubation. There are very few, if any, guidelines for maternal incubation available. There is, however, plenty of misinformation out there and that dissuades many keepers from ever trying it - the big one being "females on eggs will not eat". Many breeders want to keep their girls' weight gaining steadily so they can make use of her again the following season and they feel it's in their best interest to remove the eggs from the equation. Most of mine continue to feed on a weekly or bi-weekly basis while on eggs though a few are more sporadic (they can be just as sporadic without being on eggs). If I ever thought allowing my snakes to brood their clutches was a real health risk I wouldn't do it this way.

It's sort of like how people still believe that pine bedding is bad for snakes and rodents.

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Originally Posted by Quiet Tempest

Maternal is the only method I use with my balls and I've never had any health issues with my girls. Most people prefer artificial incubation because there is more direct control over conditions and for beginners the majority of information available is focused on various methods of artificial incubation. There are very few, if any, guidelines for maternal incubation available. There is, however, plenty of misinformation out there and that dissuades many keepers from ever trying it - the big one being "females on eggs will not eat". Many breeders want to keep their girls' weight gaining steadily so they can make use of her again the following season and they feel it's in their best interest to remove the eggs from the equation. Most of mine continue to feed on a weekly or bi-weekly basis while on eggs though a few are more sporadic (they can be just as sporadic without being on eggs). If I ever thought allowing my snakes to brood their clutches was a real health risk I wouldn't do it this way.

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;) I was waiting for you to chime in.