pics of eggs..

It isn't pretty, but i posted for your opinions. I have the incubator at the right temp now and I do not think that it is going to spike again.. I was thinking of just using it for my next clutch. It has not moved from 88.7 in three days.. and I just read about a few people who have successfully used these.
Basically, should I keep these bad looking eggs going, or toss them and keep the one that does look good (bottom left) and use the space the bads took up, for the ones that Ginger will lay? I don't want to kick a dead horse by keeping these eggs if they are definately dead.. your thoughts?
I know that people might say, why use the inc. that spiked a temp, but I have heard of FWatt spiking.. so I guess now I feel safer about it now that it has not fluctuated in a few days.

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s...es/badeggs.jpg

I opened it a split second to get a good shot of the better egg.

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s.../eggopened.jpg

So sorry to hear bout those eggs :(

Wish i could offer some advice...

Jen,
Just my opinion if it makes you feel any better. Those eggs look like they were going bad before your incubator mishap. It looks as if they have been deteriorating for at least a week.

Thanks Tim; your opinion means alot to me. Maybe there was just something wrong from the get-go.. but that lone egg; we'll see about him. Do you think that it'd be as bad as the others if there were something wrong with it also? Thanks for your thoughts..
I definately appreciate your thoughts, Nate.
I am not letting this crap get me down.. all ya can do is move on. Breeders of animals always have ups and downs; my friend breeds horses and lost her whole foal crop (about 6 foals or more) one year.. just gotta keep surviving and going on! I feel bad about typiong that I wanted to scrap my whole collection; I love these snakes and even if none of them ever breed for me, that will not change.

So they are pretty much done; I should just scrap them?

You might want to check your vermic...it looks really wet, especially the way its actually sticking to all sides of the bad eggs in the second pic...but its really hard to tell by the pic...

Quote:

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I know that people might say, why use the inc. that spiked a temp, but I have heard of FWatt spiking.. so I guess now I feel safer about it now that it has not fluctuated in a few days.

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Flexwatt can't "spike" if a good thermostat is controlling it.

Were you using the wafer thermostat that comes with the hovabator? I'm pretty sure you've been around long enough to have read threads about how unreliable they are, I was surprised when I saw that you planned on using one...

Sorry about the mishap...if I were you...I wouldn't trust that incubator again.

Jen it's just a thought here but if there is a concern about the hatching substrate why don't you give Casey Hulse a call and discuss that HatchRite stuff with him. It's supposed to be amazing, especially for us newbie breeders....apparently quite foolproof.

I think it would be a mistake to use that incubator again. Those things are crap. As far as the vermiculite, I agree that it looks too wet. That stuff looks like the really fine stuff that they sell in the garden section of Lowes or HD. If it is, it takes much less water to soak it than the more coarse stuff. The vermiculite should feel almost dry to the touch. A wise man once told me, better too dry than too wet. (I think he meant eggs). You can always add more water, but too wet will definitely kill eggs.

See, I thought that the verm was too dry. It does not feel like you can wring it out or anything. I know why the eggs look so moist though; condensation was/is forming on the dead eggs, and the one that you can see in the bottom-right in the first pic, actually has a pool of liquid on one of its dents.. not sure if maybe it got a small hole, or if it is just from it being rotten. This is definately not from condensation in the tub, because the inner lid is bone-dry; this was my first thought, but no water has dripped from the tub lid to the eggs. I have decided to throw them out and keep the one that still looks good. This is a tough choice but I am not going to be incubating dead eggs thinking they will live. :(
I have a tub ready for Ginger's clutch, that is substrateless; water under a plastic grid for the eggs to set on. I figure that is foolproof; the eggs will not touch the water. I am getting some perlite like someone suggested to prevent water from sloshing when the tub is lifted up.
I think it was FreakieFrog whose snakes got thermal burns when his FW spiked.. I am Not 100% sure if it was him though; if not, I apologise.
I hate to blame myself, but I did switch the eggs to this new container on that saturday; maybe that caused the temps to spike? I didn't think that it'd make a difference, but I had to do this because the only container I had that day that could accomodate the piled eggs, was one that needed a sheet of glass for a lid, and it was not going to retain humidity properly. I bought the Ziploc tubs not factoring-in that the eggs could be in a pile that I could not seperate.. stupid on my part, but they did have Tiny yellow spots on them before the spike happened, and now hearing Tim say that they look like they were bad for quite some time (they were laid on the first) I do not feel so bad. For whatever reason, they were defective before the thermal spike. Now this remaining egg does not look rotten, so I am going to keep it and sit it out.. I am happy to say that I have my second incubator on and ready for Ginger's brood. I used a big styro cooler and put the incubator top over it, and this has been holding temps steady with the egg tub in..
I appreciate you guys/gals so much..

Jen,
Your plan sounds like a good one. Live, Breed and Learn. It's what makes us better keepers and breeders. Sometimes mistakes or mishaps are the most valuable learning experiences. I send many good vibes for that last egg. Hopefully you get a beautiful snake out of there.

I am just going to have to make do with what I have. My work slashed my bonus check and I barely have enough to make our car payment, it is so pathetic. I don't even have anything to sell on ebay like I usually would in this predicament. I don't think that the incubator is the culprit here though, because honestly now that it is up and going, it has held steady at 88.7 degrees and even though I look at it every chance I get, it stays exactly at that temp. This was from Sunday to today.. no variation at all.
I am definately going with the substrateless box.. so I have my humidity and temperature stability ready for the next clutch.

The piled eggs were obviously dead, so I got brave and cut one open. What came out was a bunch of white, but there was No embryo in it, nor were there any veins..! I read some of the book "The Reproductive Husbandry of Pythons and Boas" by Richard Ross and Gerald Marzec; it illustrates some eggs that were "born bad" and unviable; these eggs in the photo look just like mine looked the day theyw ere laid; they had small, less-than-a centimeter yellowy spots that gradually expanded as the egg rotted.. they lose their immunity either once the embryo dies, or if there was never one.
I feel so much better now, knowing that they were not viable from the start. Thank you Tim, for bringing this possibility to light, in saying that they looked like they were rotting longer..
I am actually glad in a way, to know that they were not viable, because it was not anything I could have changed.. the last egg has the yellowy spots and one is expanding; only time will tell but I kept it on in the incubator after discarding the rest.

I would not necessarily say that the hovabator is crap. When I first started out, it is what I used for many years. I believe it was on my third year of use that I had any problems. My elec. had flickered and tweaked the wafer thermostat. The temps shot to 120F!! My eggs were a week from hatching so I decided to cut them open to see the damage. My first two albino balls!!! Crap! :mad: :mad:

The really sad part is that I had just been told about two weeks prior that Big Apple suggested to change the wafers out every other year due to a high failure rate. I blew it off. I really felt like an idiot afterwards. :rolleye2:

Anyway I looked at it as a learning experiment and am glad to see that you are doing the same. I would just have the hovabator wafer backed up by a better thermostat.

Interesting.. if you don't miny my asking, how would you go about using a therostat with a hova? I am just curious; would it be by just getting one and plugging the inc. into it? I apologise for being a complete electronics dweeb. :)
The incubator is still at 88.7 degrees now, and I was just given a new-in-box incubator that's the same brand and model. I took the top of this and sealed off the bottom of a larger fish cooler for an incubator. This Sunday, I will be setting this up and stabilizing it.. since Ginger just had her prelay shed yesterday. :)

Jen, if you get a chance, take a pic of that last egg for me. I'm very interested in the spot on it that you were talking about.
As for the thermostat, just plug the bator into the thermostat ,stick the probe in the box and set the temp. The thermostat will pick up the temp from the probe and regulate the heating element.

This is that last egg today. (top left.) I moved it into the substrateless tub (substrate in water under the grid, not in contact w/ egg.) today. I did so because the nastiness from the dead eggs was seeping into the vermiculite of the other tub and it was just disgusting. :( I am taking out the other one on the bottom in this pic because it is obviously dead also; I will update you on that.
I don't know; this egg will probably die too. I candled it with a flashlight today and I actually do not see any veins.
http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s...Acres/dead.jpg
\These were the eggs when they were laid on the first. It is hard to see because my flash on the camera washed them out, but they did have small dented yellowy spots.. they were dented like this hours after being laid; not smooth and nice like I see most people's healthy eggs. :(
But after seeing that at least two of the dead ones had no veins nor visible embryos, I guess they were nothing from the start.

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s...g?t=1178847634

Jen I definitely do't want to be the bearer of bad news, but that top left egg doesn't look like it will make it to me. However, pictures can be deceiving, so I would keep incubating it until you were sure it was dead.
p.s. You'll know it's dead, because it will smell like a skunk died in there. Very odoriferous. Good luck on that one, and I hope you have much better luck with your next clutch.

Thanks Tim.. I do not know yet. It is not decaying as bad as the others did as fast for some reason. The other one in the pic is definately dead, and I am going to cut it open when I get home from wirk later on.. I'll keep ya posted.

Let me know how that egg cutting went. I hope you had some nose plugs. I cut one open last year that was a little bit older than that one. Man did that stink. Looked like a cooked egg inside.

Eew.. I know how it will smell because a few days ago I cut up that other one.. Blech! It is indescribable.. and I am someone who does not even like eating or smelling normal poultry eggs to begin with!
I will update after I open this second-last one.