Letting the snake do it

[Oliverian]

Do any of you just leave the snake eggs in with the snakes, so the mother can incubate them? I havn't heard of it before, but have any of you tried it with any success?

[gonesnakee]

Usually all the eggs are removed & incubated away from the snake. Only pythons really will incubate their own anyway. A fellow here in Calgary let an IJ or a Jungle Carpet (not sure which) incubate her own eggs successfully & I've heard rumours of people letting large pythons "do their own thing" also. Mark I.

[mykee]

Yes, I've heard that maternal instinct does actually work, it's called NATURE!

[Oliverian]

No need to get snippy. I figured you would understand that I meant captive snakes. Yea, I figured most people would use incubators because it seems to be the best method. (IMO)

[snkmn]

would this work with a kingsnake or cornsnake. i read that you guys said that pythons can do it. i was wondering f a ball python could do it, and how old douse a ball python have to be to reach sexual maturaty.

[Jeff_Favelle]

No, colubrids (kings and corns etc etc) do not incubate their eggs. Proof is that they can lay 2nd and 3rd clutches before the 1st clutch even hatches!! It would be impossible for them to do that if they maternally incubated them

Only Pythons do it.

Minimum age for a female BP to reach sexual maturity is 18 months. Some take longer. Its more a matter of size, rather than age.

[sapphire_moon]

Can bp's incubate their own eggs? I'm thinking of breeding and I think (personaly) that it would be easier to let her do her own thing......

[Mardy]

Keeping the nesting area at the correct heat/hum.
can be hard. As well as the basking/cool areas in the rest of the cage. Not to mention the night time cooling as well.

It's harder than you would think. Karel did it as was said above in Alberta, he did a paper on it.

All the power if you want to try, I look forward someday
to try.

MArdy

[reptilez]

Then how do u get the eggs out of there if you dont want to keep them in there? Do u have to move her out of the wy or anything? Are they usually very snappy after they lay the eggs??

[Zoe]

Think about it - in the wild, a mother snake is provided with countless areas of different temps and humidity, different soil etc. Unless you are willing to provide that in captivity, or make her nesting area PERFECT, it would just be much easier to incubate the eggs in an incubator.

[Invictus]

Generally speaking, nature has evolved certain creatures to have large clutches of babies for one reason alone: high mortality rates, be it prior to birth or in infancy. This is how nature controls the population of a species. (Look at spiders for instance. Thousands of babies, only a couple hundred of which will survive to adulthood.)

It's the same with snakes. Yes, pythons will incubate their eggs in the wild, but many of those eggs will not survive. The whole purpose of incubating eggs is to maximize the potential of all of the babies surviving. There is really no point in letting the mother do it herself. You'll run into too many variables that will lead to lower hatch rates.

[sapphire_moon]

I see...can you make an incubator yourself....with like a cooler and UTH???? Don't want to try and be mcgyver and rig something up....lol...Because I'm sure that an incubator would cost lots...

[gonesnakee]

You can make an incubator out of anything you want, so long as you have a steady temp within the desired range & the desired level of humidity is kept within the "egg container". Kyle incubated our Eastern Indigo eggs in an old dresser with a "medical" type heatimg pad & everything worked just fine. "Fishboxes" or stryofoam coolers work great too. Mark I.