what happened?!

[jaredm3624]

Today was day 53 for my egg in the incubator. It collapsed and I decided to pip it because the clutchmate's egg collapsed about 10 days ago and never hatched even though there was a gecko in it. Well, sad to say that this one didn't make it either. It was a fully developed what seemed to be a MS het RAPTOR. The female of the eggs has had two clutches now and all four eggs have had problems (2 were not fertile). This is her first year to breed, but if the gecko grows in the egg, it should be some other problem than it being the female's first year right? Please help.

 

[fallen_angel]

How do you incubate your eggs? Do you use an incubator, what substrate, are their air holes, what temp., etc?? How do you keep the temp. stabilized?

Fully or somewhat fully developed babies that do not hatch can be caused by sudden temperature fluctuation or sudden humidity fluctuation. Do you add water during the incubation process?

 

[MSMD]

Fully or somewhat fully developed babies that do not hatch can be caused by sudden temperature fluctuation or sudden humidity fluctuation. Do you add water during the incubation process?

:yes: Humidity is often a factor in this situation. There are also some that just aren't meant to be.....

 

[Gecko Euphoria]

Hey bud when I first started breeding I ran into this problem alot. Your humidity would be my first guess to, if its to wet they drown and get moldy, or to dry they dry out and collapse, I've found that with the new hatchrite if you do not plug all the holes but one on youre cup you loose to much moisture and they collapse and die. The best way I have found to do it is get some vermiculite spray it with a mister get it wet enough it forms then squeeze the water out of it and put it back in the cup, this way has been 95% success full for me, there is ocasions where I have to take a medicine siringe and sprayed the sides of the cups being careful to not hit the eggs with water and this is not very often this is need ed and only takes a little water it all distributes evenly through the medium, If thats not it the female laying may have something going on with her makeing the babies not strong enough to emerge thats not likely though I'd say humidity or temps is the cullprit. hope this helps good luck,

Adam

Today was day 53 for my egg in the incubator. It collapsed and I decided to pip it because the clutchmate's egg collapsed about 10 days ago and never hatched even though there was a gecko in it. Well, sad to say that this one didn't make it either. It was a fully developed what seemed to be a MS het RAPTOR. The female of the eggs has had two clutches now and all four eggs have had problems (2 were not fertile). This is her first year to breed, but if the gecko grows in the egg, it should be some other problem than it being the female's first year right? Please help.

 

[jaredm3624]

might be the humidity I guess. I use vermiculate and I do have holes in my hatch box. I use 1:1 for the vermiculate when I put it in. Never added water or anything and kept tempe at 83-84 range. It's been successful for me before. Just not this time.

 

[lamarr]

Bad news

Sorry to hear about these hatchlings J. Sounds like a humidity issue to me also. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you! You should be just about fed up with water vapor in it's many forms after your hurricane evacuation and now this! How about a nice road trip into west Texas for banded geckos and miles of dry scrub?

BTW
The Patternless trio that just beat the hurricane are doing great!

 

[Gregg M]

Best easiest way to incubate eggs... If you put 100 grams of perlite in an air tight glad or ziploc container, add 80 to 85 grams of water to it... Make thumb print in substrate to place egg... Put one pin hole in an air tight lid, put the lid on, Make sure you have atleast 1/3 of an inch between the lid and the eggs, put the container in the incubator and do not touch the container until you see hatchlings... By doing it this way, you will hatch many leos with almost no issues to speak of...

 

[fallen_angel]

Best easiest way to incubate eggs... If you put 100 grams of perlite in an air tight glad or ziploc container, add 80 to 85 grams of water to it... Make thumb print in substrate to place egg... Put one pin hole in an air tight lid, put the lid on, Make sure you have atleast 1/3 of an inch between the lid and the eggs [....] By doing it this way, you will hatch many leos with almost no issues to speak of...

Although we've never put a pinhole in our containers, that's exactly what we do. If your containers are completely closed, you just need to make sure you open them for weekly air exchange.

put the container in the incubator and do not touch the container until you see hatchlings...

The least amount of human contact, the better :main_yes: :main_thumbsup: I am pretty sure that one of our eggs didn't make it because we were opening the container and candling it far too much

 

[Sturt]

From what I've heard, its very rare that a manually pipped egg will survive. If this is not the case please correct me

During incubation when my eggs collapse all of a sudden, the first thing to do is moisten the medium a touch, and place a damp paper towel over the top until it returns to normal, at which point to towel should be removed.

Stuart

 

[Gregg M]

From what I've heard, its very rare that a manually pipped egg will survive. If this is not the case please correct me

During incubation when my eggs collapse all of a sudden, the first thing to do is moisten the medium a touch, and place a damp paper towel over the top until it returns to normal, at which point to towel should be removed.

Stuart

A wet paper towel should never be placed on an egg... Also, more water should not be added to the substrate... If the incubation containers and substrate are set up properly from the start, there should be no issues at all during incubation... Although I do not like to pip eggs, in some cases it is needed... When an eggs is pipped properly, it will be fine... I had a yellow ackie egg colapse so It got maually pipped... It stayed like that for 8 days and hatched fine...

 

[Sturt]

A wet paper towel should never be placed on an egg...

When my eggs collapsed slightly during incubation this sorted them within hours, then the paper towels were removed. I agree they should never be left there but they help to rectify a problem. All eggs hatched perfectly.

Also, more water should not be added to the substrate... If the incubation containers and substrate are set up properly from the start, there should be no issues at all during incubation...

I agree. However, if it is not set up properly, this has to be done in order to correct the mistake and prevent the eggs drying out. If the set up is incorrect and the medium has dried slightly we have no choice but to add water.

 

[fallen_angel]

I agree that sometimes pipping an egg is necessary and in fact can save the gecko's life at times. A very good friend of ours had a gecko that just wouldn't hatch, but once he pipped the egg, it literally jolted right out of it. Sometimes geckos have problems hatching and need some assistance. Whenever we have an egg that sweats for far too long (4 hours or more), we pip it to see if the baby is still alive inside.

Just be careful when adding water as sudden humidity changes can negatively affect the leo as well.

 

[Sturt]

Ah ok, I wasn't sure on the whole pipping thing its not something I've had to deal with.

Maybe I should clarify that by wet paper towel, I meant damp lol

Chalk me up for one lesson learned :main_thumbsup: