Incubate your own eggs!

[OSMDEATHOWNER]

just wondering, has anyone ever let a mother Ball python incubate her own eggs?? What do you think the hatch probability would be in captivity if you did???

[mykee]

100% without a doubt. Far better than artificial incubation.

[Nobodyspecial]

Actually this was brought up when I was talking to the breeder I got my youngest female normal from. They where kind of experimenting and let the mother incubate the clutch instead of artificially incubating them like all the others. The neonates from her clutch all hatched out larger than the others, and they all ate more readily than the artificially incubated clutches.

Naturally this could just be a coincidence, my girl's mom could of just had a really good clutch of eggs. I'd be curious to see if anyone actually experimented with this with just more than one or two clutches to get more accurate numbers between the two methods.

Mykee I've gotta say, I think its awesome you do maternal incubation. It may be just the emotional side of me, but taking mom's eggs always seemed like an unnecessary stress to put on an already stressed out animal.

[OSMDEATHOWNER]

Well how often would you clean a tub or substrate in all if the mother was incubating her own eggs, and would you still offer food regularly?? Just wondering if I should go buy an incubator for when I finally decide to try my first days at breeding, or should I let the mother incubate nd how will I go about it if so

[rmfsnakes32]

This is very interesting. Does this affect the viability of the eggs and how much weight does mom lose incubating her own eggs

[Nobodyspecial]

I suppose you'd spot clean like normal if it was necessary. Feeding, I've read that a lot of females will still take an occasional meal even while incubating their eggs, and the people who did see this didn't have any damage to the female's eggs. No reason to starve the girls if they're willing to eat right?