Mother carpet and eggs

[JungleCarpet81]

If I breed my carpets in the FAR future is ok if I let the mother do what she'd do in the wild? if so do I have to help her do, if anything?

will she eat while incubating them herself or will she not eat until they are all hatched?
Does the hot spot temp need to be decreased/increased?

What are the pros/cons of letting the mother incubate her own eggs?

[mainbutter]

You can do maternal incubation, but I would not attempt it without first having incubated my own eggs. Here in Minnesota I believe I would have issues providing the kind of humidity needed for successful egg hatching inside my carpet python cages, which have a little too much ventilation for HIGH humidity.

I believe there are some threads over at moreliapythons.com that discuss maternal incubation with carpet pythons.

I sure do love the beehive-shaped sight of a big female on her clutch of eggs

One of the reasons that artificial incubation is popular is that, like you may have suspected, they do not get fed while they are on eggs. Artificial incubation lets you get two more months of feeding in, which IMO is necessary if you're going to breed two years in a row. If I was going the MI route, I'd definitely give the female a year off between clutches.

[Brandon Osborne]

We did maternal this past season with my IJ female. We set her up in a tub with a dry nest box and a large water bowl. The ambient temps were set a 84-85 so she didn't have to work too hard at keeping temps up. The cage was misted 1-3 times per week, or as needed. All eggs looked great up to the day they hatched and we were happy with a 7/9 hatch. She began feeding immediately after babies hatched and looks as good as ever.
These guys hatched around memorial day weekend and are growing like weeds.


Good luck.
Brandon Osborne

[JungleCarpet81]

We did maternal this past season with my IJ female. We set her up in a tub with a dry nest box and a large water bowl. The ambient temps were set a 84-85 so she didn't have to work too hard at keeping temps up. The cage was misted 1-3 times per week, or as needed. All eggs looked great up to the day they hatched and we were happy with a 7/9 hatch. She began feeding immediately after babies hatched and looks as good as ever.
These guys hatched around memorial day weekend and are growing like weeds.


Good luck.
Brandon Osborne

Gorgeous snake!, you have any for sale? (these are addictive lol).

how did you keep the temps up to 84-85 degrees in a tub that wouldve melted if you used a heat lamp? did you use heat tape? I dont know how to use that stuff can you explain to me how it works, where to get it from, and the cost? how long was the material incubation? I heard if eggs get touched by water droplets it kills the baby ..is this right or did i read that wrong from the place i seen it? can you explain that please. also when you misted the enclosure did you directly mist the mother and eggs or just the mother?

[Brandon Osborne]

Gorgeous snake!, you have any for sale? (these are addictive lol).

how did you keep the temps up to 84-85 degrees in a tub that wouldve melted if you used a heat lamp? did you use heat tape? I dont know how to use that stuff can you explain to me how it works, where to get it from, and the cost? how long was the material incubation? I heard if eggs get touched by water droplets it kills the baby ..is this right or did i read that wrong from the place i seen it? can you explain that please. also when you misted the enclosure did you directly mist the mother and eggs or just the mother?

Light bulbs and heat lamps are two very different things. You can easily heat a tub with a light bulb without the slightest risk or burn or melting. With a heat lamp...not likely even with a thermostat.

Although I used heat tape in this instance, a bulb could be used. My recommendation would be something 40 watts or less depending on your ambient temps. I generally use room heat with a natural night drop by opening windows.

For my maternal incubation, which I like to refer to as artificial/maternal I try to keep ambient room temps above 75 but even that isn't always possible. I use a thermostat on the individual cage with an incubating female and keep the temps at 84-85. This allows the female to regulate but not expend too much energy doing so. I place a nest box with dry sphagnum moss for the female to lay. A larger water bowl will help keep humidity up and I've even witnessed females take a drink from time to time regardless of what most people say.

When misting the cage, I spray the substrate and walls of the cage. Do not spray the female....although if you did, she would probably do a great job keeping water from the eggs. It is my opinion that females will expell small amounts of urine during incubation to help increase humidity to the eggs. This is only a theory of mine but I have noticed it with GTPs, carpets, balls, bloods, and burms.

I'm giving this breeding another go this season among other new projects. Good luck to everyone. The season is fast approaching.

Brandon Osborne

[Brandon Osborne]