maternal incubation - leave her alone?

[Quiet Tempest]

If I started breeding in the future and tried doing maternal incubation, would I just completely leave mama alone for those 50 some odd days before the eggs hatch? And by leave her alone I mean, don't take her out to casually hold her. Also, do you offer food in that time period? Make a nest for her to "lay" in?

If you opt for maternal incubation, and are keeping her in a glass aquarium type of housing, I would definitely provide her with a humid hide that she could use as a laybox. There are a variety of materials you could use to do this, but you need to make it available to her on the heated side of the tank at least a couple of weeks before she is expected to lay her eggs so that she can get comfortable in it and you can gauge how well it is holding humidity (compared to the rest of the aquarium) so that you can make adjustments if need be. Alternatively, if you're using a tub, you don't really need a lay box. Just make sure the humidity isn't dropping below 70% and the female should be fine.

If your female is brooding, she shouldn't be disturbed. Her top priority is protecting her clutch so handling her is really not a good idea and shouldn't be a consideration. You can (and probably should) offer SMALL food items during this time (rat fuzzy or rat pup, for instance) but don't be surprised if she refuses.

The first time I maternally incubated, I offered food early on and my female refused so I made the assumption that it was normal for her to go without food throughout the whole process and stopped offering food until her clutch was hatching. I've since learned that I was wrong in my assumption. This year I had three females give me eggs and all three I've allowed to maternally incubate. Two clutches have already incubated and hatched and I did provide food for both of these females midway through incubation. One female (the one who had refused the year before) was happy to accept the rat pups I offered her. The other one wasn't interested in any food until her eggs had hatched. My third female laid her eggs late last month and I've offered her food twice now, but she isn't interested in eating right now. I wouldn't be surprised if she doesn't feed again until September but I'll continue offering when I'm feeding the rest of my snakes.

I would also strongly suggest buying or building an incubator and have it running during this time just in case. Things can go wrong and it's always a good idea to be prepared for the worst while hoping for the best. Your female could decide she's no longer interested in brooding and abandon her clutch. You want to be ready to step in if faced with that sort of situation. On the same token, if I were artificially incubating my last clutch right now I'd want to have a second incubator ready to kick in if the first one fell victim to Murphy's Law.