cutting eggs

[loonunit]

We have been allowing all of the clutches to pip first and then cut, after my partner lost a clutch to cutting early I will never again, there is no reason to cut early except impatience.

Yeah, this is my big fear. I'm super impatient, but I'm getting such a wide range of answer in the "natural" hatch date, that I worry I'd cut a 64-day clutch at day 52 and lose half the babies:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...ght=hatch+date

But I've also read plenty of stories about babies not pipping and drowning in the last day of incubation. Once in a while they aren't born with an egg tooth, or they get wrapped up in their umbilicus, and you won't know they need help unless you cut. (Now, some people argue that snakes without egg teeth should be allowed to die, because they would die in nature... but what if it's the only lavender albino in the clutch? But that a whole other argument.)

Anyway, I like the "cut after first pip" compromise.