Figured I'd say hello :)

[Quiet Tempest]

I ran across this board while Googling for maternal incubation information and it seems like a nice place to settle in for a while. 

My name is Sandy. I live just outside of Knoxville, TN. I'm a stay at home mom with two kids, a pseudo-hubby, a reef tank, and plenty of snakes to keep me occupied.

I started breeding snakes in the '07/'08 season. My first clutch was a dozen corn snake eggs that yielded 13 babies.   The following year was my first go with jungle carpet pythons and ball pythons. It was also my first foray into maternal incubation. I have to say, watching babies pip is one of the best things ever and I definitely have a fondness for boid babies. This year, I have a clutch of butter motley corn eggs due to hatch in about two weeks and I have two ball clutches maternally incubating that are due to hatch in a week or so. I have a third clutch still yet to be laid and the waiting is driving me mad so I am up reading about other's breeding projects and the goings on in other forums to help pass the time.

[1softkiss]

Welcome to Dark Side, Sandy and thank you for the nice introduction :O)

[Quiet Tempest]

Thanks for the warm welcome.   

[ChaoticNightsReptile]

Welcome!

[Quiet Tempest]

Thank you!

[illbeyoursoldier]

  Welcome to the Darkside!! 

So why the maternal incubation?? if you don't mind me asking.

[Quiet Tempest]

Welcome to the Darkside!! 

So why the maternal incubation?? if you don't mind me asking.

Why was I googling for more info or why do I maternally incubate?

I was googling to see what the average day was for egg hatching. Last year mine hatched on day 53 and I read on a couple other forums that eggs had hatched on day 53. I wanted to look up other accounts of maternal incubation and see if others experienced the same. There aren't a lot of people who maternally incubate so I always enjoy reading more about other's experience with it as well.

Why I initially allowed my female to maternally incubate her clutch was because I just didn't want to take her eggs from her. I had already had a clutch of jungle carpets laid several weeks earlier and had put them in my incubator. I told myself after the ball laid her eggs that I'd let her keep them but remove them at the first sign of trouble. Weeks went by and everything looked great so I never removed them. There were 5 eggs and all of them hatched out with no trouble.

Here are some pics from last year:












I did offer the female a mouse a couple of weeks into incubation because others who had allowed their females to maternally incubate had said that they would leave their eggs to feed, but she wanted nothing to do with it. I didn't offer food again until after the eggs began hatching. She bounced right back to feeding then. I honestly believe that maternal incubation has real merits. I didn't lose a single egg, had no mold issues, and really didn't have to do anything extra to provide the mother with what she needed to care for her clutch. The JCP clutch I put in an incubator wasn't as lucky. One egg died just a week or so into incubation and mold began forming on other eggs. This year I've got three ball clutches to work with. Two of which are due to hatch next week and the third is due to be laid around July 20th.   

[Joe]

Hello!!! and Welcome to Darkside!!!
It's great to see someone have such good luck with Maternal Incubation, i think i'll try it wiht my Female Ball Python too if i ever find her a lovely man friend lol !!
There some beautiful snakes you have there!! And good Luck with all of your future projects!
Joe.

[illbeyoursoldier]

That third photo down is pretty amazing. I bet that had to be an incredible sight to see. Very very cool. I've never been into maternal incubation, mainly for Mom... I want her to be eating again, as soon as possible, only because I feel that's what's best for her. Then again, artificial incubation has been working out great for me so far this season. Last season I did loose an entire ball clutch, and had lost 3/5 from another. I've also never tried carpet eggs, so your one up on me, LoL.

[Quiet Tempest]

That third photo down is pretty amazing. I bet that had to be an incredible sight to see. Very very cool. I've never been into maternal incubation, mainly for Mom... I want her to be eating again, as soon as possible, only because I feel that's what's best for her. Then again, artificial incubation has been working out great for me so far this season. Last season I did loose an entire ball clutch, and had lost 3/5 from another. I've also never tried carpet eggs, so your one up on me, LoL.

The way I see it, the main reason most breeders want to beef the mom back up is so that they can breed her all over again and start the whole process more quickly. I think that's more harmful than letting her brood her clutch. Some females do eat while maternally incubating. In the wild, they leave their eggs to bask, feed and drink. They do this in captivity as well, but mine just wasn't interested in the meal I offered her last year. The only difference is that meals offered to a brooding mom are usually significantly smaller than what they're usually given and more infrequently if/when they do feed. They wouldn't be able to hold their eggs comfortably if they had a big meal digesting in their bellies and might abandon them as a result.

I read Bob Clark's article on maternal incubation as well as anything/everything else I could get my hands on that covered the subject before jumping in. I also stumbled across several scientific journal articles that explained in more detail how the mother's behavior and the eggs changed over time through their brooding period. Allowing the female to do what she's programmed to do seems to be in the best interest for her eggs and herself -- the hatch rate of maternally incubating clutches seems to be higher than that of artificially incubated clutches and females who maternally incubate their clutches are more likely to start feeding more readily than a female whose clutch was taken from her.

That being said, I'm not anti-artificial incubation. I have a mini fridge incubator set up and it has been running for several weeks just in case any of the females abandoned their eggs or if something was wrong. Neither female has shown any inclination of neglecting their clutch, though, and I've been candling the eggs periodically just to make sure the babies are developing well (I posted videos in the video section).