Getting some rat snake eggs..

Well, Mark sprung something on me; my friend's yellow rats bred, and she has some eggs; wants me to incubate them here with my incubator. Well, I am pretty nervous; I don't even know, is it safe to take them from a rubbermaid with an UTH for heat, and put them into the Inc? I am pretty scared for them; wish I could have just gotten them after laying but it doesn't look like they'll be here until tomorrow evening.
Geez, I love surprises... hopefully this all goes OK.

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

Well, Mark sprung something on me; my friend's yellow rats bred, and she has some eggs; wants me to incubate them here with my incubator. Well, I am pretty nervous; I don't even know, is it safe to take them from a rubbermaid with an UTH for heat, and put them into the Inc? I am pretty scared for them; wish I could have just gotten them after laying but it doesn't look like they'll be here until tomorrow evening.
Geez, I love surprises... hopefully this all goes OK.

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Jen,as long as the person has kept them warm and enough humidity they should be ok to place in the incubator.Do you have it turned on now and set at 80 degrees? If not please do so;) .Have you ever incubated any eggs before? If not respond here and i will fill you in :cool: .

I tried incubating the BP eggs my female had last year, but unfortunately they molded off and died; I think that the problem was that I unknowingly sprayed water directly onto them in the beginning; I had no idea this was bad but now I know.. but I will definately turn that sucker on and get it pre-calibrated now.

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

I tried incubating the BP eggs my female had last year, but unfortunately they molded off and died; I think that the problem was that I unknowingly sprayed water directly onto them in the beginning; I had no idea this was bad but now I know.. but I will definately turn that sucker on and get it pre-calibrated now.

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Jen,i am sorry i forgot about that :oops: .Well get the incubator at 80 and keep the vermiculite kinda moist and in around 60 days you should get some pippers.You will know within a week if the eggs are good or bad.When you do get the eggs make a mark on the top as they lay in the container they bring the eggs to you in.Make sure this mark is up still when you transfer them to the container you are using in the incubator.I check my eggs maybe once a week to see if it needs any water added or not.Let me know if you have any questions;)

OK, I just got home w/ the eggs and the inc. is at a steady 80 degrees; they were in a heated tank so the temps aren't way off. I am going to go set things up right now! There are SO many of them! (think, 12? ) Wow...!

Here they be! 15 of the little suckers.. I am definately keeping one if they do hatch out.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...ive/eggers.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...e/incubatr.jpg

Jen,it looks like a couple are really dimpled in.It should come back up after they get some humidity going on.If you want to you can hold them up to a light to see if you can see any veins.This is totaly up to you though,if you do make sure not to turn the egg as it will move the embryo.Well wishes for the next 60 odd days till we see some pippers:fest2: .

I am debating on candling them. It is pretty bad, but they were at a pretty low humidity in the tank at my friend's store.
I am really thinking of keeping one if they do hatch; I was never crazy about the parents, that my friend owns; both are skittish as heck, but I figured if I have one from birth, I can accustom it to handling..
This got me pretty mad; but after laying the eggs, my friend says that the female has escaped. She really could have had a better-locking lid on the tank; only the male was left in the tank, ignoring the eggs of course. I feel abd because the mother is probably dead or a least will be, since she probably got out of the store and into the woods or creek area, or worse, the road, as it is in a rural area.
They did seem pretty dried out though; but they were in moist cypress over there, so they weren't done-dry. Maybe the dimplings came from the warmer substrate (UTH) with cooler ambient temps?
I just hope I am doing all I can now for them.

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

I am debating on candling them. It is pretty bad, but they were at a pretty low humidity in the tank at my friend's store.
I am really thinking of keeping one if they do hatch; I was never crazy about the parents, that my friend owns; both are skittish as heck, but I figured if I have one from birth, I can accustom it to handling..
This got me pretty mad; but after laying the eggs, my friend says that the female has escaped. She really could have had a better-locking lid on the tank; only the male was left in the tank, ignoring the eggs of course. I feel abd because the mother is probably dead or a least will be, since she probably got out of the store and into the woods or creek area, or worse, the road, as it is in a rural area.
They did seem pretty dried out though; but they were in moist cypress over there, so they weren't done-dry. Maybe the dimplings came from the warmer substrate (UTH) with cooler ambient temps?
I just hope I am doing all I can now for them.

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Wow that is bad they let mom escape:irkd: .Jen you are giving these eggs the best chance they will have if they are infact fertile.Do you know why i say this? Its because you care enough to try to get them to hatch out:cool: .Now let me make sure i read this correctly,they had dad in with mom while she was gravid:irkd: .That has probably made her so stressed out and then some:( .

Yup, you're right.. they were in the same tank. I bet mom couldn't wait to fly the coop.. pretty sad :(
The eggs look pretty good now; really un-denting a lot since the humidity they're in, is great. If you look at the image here of the eggs in the tackle-box thingie (first pic on this thread) you can see, it is a really nifty container; I added some water to the verm of course, but also some in the empty spaces in the container; with the lid closed, it's a darned nice humidity container!

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

Yup, you're right.. they were in the same tank. I bet mom couldn't wait to fly the coop.. pretty sad :(
The eggs look pretty good now; really un-denting a lot since the humidity they're in, is great. If you look at the image here of the eggs in the tackle-box thingie (first pic on this thread) you can see, it is a really nifty container; I added some water to the verm of course, but also some in the empty spaces in the container; with the lid closed, it's a darned nice humidity container!

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Jen,thats a good sign them undenting :cool: .Yea i see the extra spaces their,you might want to just add litte bits of water at a time though when its needed.Even though the spaces might have water in them i am not sure there is a gap between the lid for the humdity to transfer to the eggs.Some of the fishing containers are tight fitting so the contents do not move at all.Yes i love fishing also :P .Have you decided if your going to candle them at all or just wait and see? Not trying to push you into this at all ,i just dont want you to go thru all the incubation period and be heartbroken at the end :(.I am not saying this will happen,just thinking of the stress on you.

The humidity can transfer to the eggs; the lid does not cause the spaces to be cut-ff from each other. It actually had more compartments, but mark used a razor to cut out the partitions when he thought he needed its tackle box (that came with this piece) for tattoo supplies, but got another one.
I plan on candling them tonight or this weekend; been too darn busy! I will let you know how that goes though.

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

The humidity can transfer to the eggs; the lid does not cause the spaces to be cut-ff from each other. It actually had more compartments, but mark used a razor to cut out the partitions when he thought he needed its tackle box (that came with this piece) for tattoo supplies, but got another one.
I plan on candling them tonight or this weekend; been too darn busy! I will let you know how that goes though.

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Thats great Jen :sweeet: .I will be watching for your update.

Do you know how big they are when they hatch? (just curious.) I would think they're pretty tiny, since the eggs are so small (but I am kinda comparing them to BP eggs so..)

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

Do you know how big they are when they hatch? (just curious.) I would think they're pretty tiny, since the eggs are so small (but I am kinda comparing them to BP eggs so..)

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Well you are in for a surprise then lol.Do you fish by chance? Some of my corn snake babies are almost the size of a small nightcrawler.The bigger the egg is the bigger the baby will be from my experiances.If you candle them in about a month(halfway thru incubation) you can see how they are tightly packed in their lol.If you view some of the posts from people that bought corn snakes from me this year there babies are around a month old and 3+ meals.I think 4thesnakelady and brainman1000 took some pics and posted them.I have a short memory on who else posted pics lol.Word of warning get some VERY tight fitting totes for the babies when they do hatch because they WILL try and escape on you:P .I still have not found my escapee from earlier last month:( .

Joe is right they are little escape artists, able to squeeze out of tiny gaps. Hatch weight should probably be between 4 and 8 grams depending on egg size, if that helps you realize how tiny they are out of the egg. I'm excited for you Jen!! How long since they were laid?

-Evan

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Originally Posted by Evan Jamison

Joe is right they are little escape artists, able to squeeze out of tiny gaps. Hatch weight should probably be between 4 and 8 grams depending on egg size, if that helps you realize how tiny they are out of the egg. I'm excited for you Jen!! How long since they were laid?

-Evan

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Evan,they were laid on the 12th i think as they are her freinds eggs.

Jen, I betcha they all hatch for ya! GL

Yes, they were laid on the 11th-12th. My friend was keeping the parents together in a tank, and they must have mated; apparently the female laid the eggs and then somehow escaped the tank.
The thingie they're in now, the tackle-box tray, is sealed tight; I opened it a few times daily for air exchange (this is OK, right?) And once hatching time comes around, I will make sure there's no water in the spaces of the tray I described above; wouldn't want any of them to drown!
I had baby garter snakes years ago; they were live-birth, but for size reasons, I know how small they were!! Thinner than a pencil by far, and with little bubble-like heads..
So would these babies just eat small mice? I am thinking that even the tiniest rat would be too big unless maybe just born?

Yeah they will take pinkie mice with no problems. I love watching them eat their first meal, it just looks so large for them, yet they suck in down in no time. They will be a little bigger than most garter snake neonates, but not a lot.

You don't really need to open the box for air exchange that often, once every few days should be plenty. I usually incubate in sterilite shoeboxes (just sitting on top of a rack in the snake room, the perfect incubator :D ) and rarely, if ever, do I open them. The loose fitting lids allow plenty of air exchange for the duration of the incubation period, yet keeps the moisture levels such that I don't need to add water to the medium. Ratsnake eggs are really hardy, so I don't think you'll have a problem. You could even incubate them at room temp (as low as 65 degrees F) and they will all hatch with no problems, it will just take longer Keep us updated on them in the coming weeks.

-Evan

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

Yes, they were laid on the 11th-12th. My friend was keeping the parents together in a tank, and they must have mated; apparently the female laid the eggs and then somehow escaped the tank.
The thingie they're in now, the tackle-box tray, is sealed tight; I opened it a few times daily for air exchange (this is OK, right?) And once hatching time comes around, I will make sure there's no water in the spaces of the tray I described above; wouldn't want any of them to drown!
I had baby garter snakes years ago; they were live-birth, but for size reasons, I know how small they were!! Thinner than a pencil by far, and with little bubble-like heads..
So would these babies just eat small mice? I am thinking that even the tiniest rat would be too big unless maybe just born?

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Jen,i make sure the eggs have the water for humidity the whole time incubating.Its best to only check the eggs maybe once every week as you let out the humidity and then it has to be remade.Yea the babies heads will be a little bigger compared to the body size lol.I feed my babies day old mouse pinkies and for the first meal the smaller the pinky is the better.I have found that the size of the first meal can determine if the baby is going to eat well or be a finicky eater.Majority of the babies i had this year first meal was a frozen thawed day old pinky mouse.Out of the 5 i have left 3 will eat frozen thawed pinkies 2 will only eat live lol.

Thanks for the advice, both of you! I will not open the container so much now that I know that; I just didn't want them to suffocate. Is it OK for the container to be airtight, or should I leave the lid open a notch? I know this would lead to humidity loss though..

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

Thanks for the advice, both of you! I will not open the container so much now that I know that; I just didn't want them to suffocate. Is it OK for the container to be airtight, or should I leave the lid open a notch? I know this would lead to humidity loss though..

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OOOPS i forgot to tell you to make a few holes all the way around the container for air flow.I am so sorry i forgot that part :oops:

OK; done!
The eggs are doing pretty good.. just sitting there.. being eggs.. sorry, no real update :) One of them looks to be getting yellow and has a big dent that did not pop out like the others' dents did though; maybe a dud. I'll leave it in there to see anyways.

If they're anything like the black rat snakes we hatched they will be just about the most agressive little devils youve ever seen till you handle them a little bit. The babies we had more or less filled the entire egg, so they may suprize you a little bit on size.

::update:: (like on Unsolved Mysteries; remember that show? The eggs are doing good! 1-2 of them are dead looking but the rest are good.

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Originally Posted by Ginevive

::update:: (like on Unsolved Mysteries; remember that show? The eggs are doing good! 1-2 of them are dead looking but the rest are good.

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Wow i forgot about your eggs:D .Good sign that they should hatch some little ones soon:cool: .

Awesome Jen! My last clutch of corns just hatched the other day. I love havin' the little worms around, and I'm sure you will too next month! :D Keep us posted!

-Evan