Twins and Large Masses in Eggs Causing Death

[joebad976]

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...type=1&theater
Just saw this, seems a lot of people are dealing with this type of thing this season.

Looks like that was due to temp spikes during incubation. It's not a pastel pied most likely passed away prior to coloring up fully and the funky pattern is due to temp Issues.

[MS2]

I had something like this last season. The baby pipped and the next day it was dead with his head and neck coming out of the egg. When I cut it open, the baby had a huge, white mass attached to him that was almost the size of the egg. The baby was deformed a bit. I wasn't sure what it was. I thought a possible twin that did not develop

[Slowcountry Balls]

We also had our first eggs die off this year. 8 egg clutch. All candled fine. Incubated same as every other year and all 30 other eggs hatched fine.

Three of the eggs started molding around day 42. But they still candled with veins, just no movement. When I cut on day 50 (bc I was way worried about the 3 very caved in moldy eggs) The hatchling were very under formed and completely dead. I assume they all died shortly before molding started happening. And most off the eggs were fill with a hard mass! Just like yours! The fourth egg died the day after cutting and other than being very little it looked fine. Very weird.

I am glad others are letting the general public know as well! Crap happens even when we try our best. And sometimes we will never know what happened...

That is very unfortunate, but we (as a community) can share information and help others to not get discouraged.

I posted a thread regarding breeding stats/clutch results....

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...esting-stuff-)

I think that you will find, the more eggs you produce, the more problems you will encounter. You can't save them all, but you can only try to do your best. Sounds like you are on top of things, and sometimes it just does not go perfect.

Last December we had a Pastel clutch that had issues on many fronts..... retained sperm from absorbing the prior year, and she held on to her eggs for 78 days after ovulating. Only 3/7 babies survived. All the babies appeared to be morphs from the retained sperm the prior season (Mojave x Pastel).... no Enchi morphs from her pairing last year. The ones that survived had slight tail kinks. They ate and behaved perfectly normal and were given away as pets with the problems expressed to the owners.

That particular 0.1 Pastel has put on ~400g since last December and is well over 2000g. She snuck up on us this year. Cleaning her tub a few weeks ago she was very fat looking. Palpating her revealed she has quite large follicles already. We just started to pair her this week to our Black Pastel 100% Het Pied. He will not see much duty this fall as we picked up another male for our Pied projects. Pewters will not hurt anyone, and maybe we'll see a ringer on one

Some females need a "red flag" on their tubs reminding us of any issues from prior breedings. Both of these females have a little red sticker on their tubs just as a reminder to watch for any issues. Keep track of any males you paired up that produced funky clutches as well. It wasn't the males (Mojave and Albino Enchi) in our case as they both produced perfect clutches with other females this season.

Corey, I plan on putting my numbers up on your thread once I have them. I do not know off the top of my head how many eggs have been laid. Once the last 3 clutches in my incubator hatch, I will add the preliminary results. There are still some questions about some combinations (whether they are 2 or 3 gene), so I wanted some more time to see them grow before I put my numbers on your thread.

I agree that taking good notes and flagging certain animals is very important. For both of these females, it was their first year of breeding, so I wonder how much of a factor that played into the situation? Ultimately, there is just going to be a percentage of loss every year, and I hope to do what I can to minimize it.

[Slowcountry Balls]

I had something like this last season. The baby pipped and the next day it was dead with his head and neck coming out of the egg. When I cut it open, the baby had a huge, white mass attached to him that was almost the size of the egg. The baby was deformed a bit. I wasn't sure what it was. I thought a possible twin that did not develop

That does sound very similar. It is such a bummer to see that head come out and move around, and then to go check on them later and find them dead. I am sorry that you experienced that too.