Has anyone ever successfully captively owned or bred, wc rough earth snakes

[Hobbyherpmom]

Hi, I'm new to hobby collecting. But in april my friend and I went out and caught 3 wild rough earth snakes. We caught 2 females and 1 male. The first female was 11 inches, the second was a whopping 12.4 inches long, and our male was about 9-10 inches. Vent to tip tail length for both girls was roughly 1 1/2 inches and for the boy it was a little over 2 inches. The females had been with me for about 1 to 2 weeks before we got our male. So, I did as much research as I could find, for about 3 years, before collecting them. They live in a small terrarium together. I was wanting to find out how these snakes live, so I have their home set up as close to the environment they came from as possible and have mostly left them alone. I have spent time documenting sizes and eating and burrowing habits. Over the last couple months I've discovered some interesting things about them as a species and some of their habits. When my females were put into their new tank home, they relaxed withing a couple hours. They ate within the first 2 days and have been healthy ever since.

Once I had both females collected i went to a snake breeding friend of mine to have them sexed and looked over. Then, within about 2 weeks after my male was introduced to the tank, the females stopped eating. Both began to behave more excitedly when handled and started becoming even more reclusive. Where they were usually spotted once or twice a day, we now only saw them once or twice a week! And even tho the girls weren't eating, they started to get bigger and rounder. Well fast forward, they lived through a move and everything. Then earlier this week about 1 week after both girls shed their skin, both females became stressed out over something in the tank, I dont really know. I just know they came to the surface out of the organic soil and grass compost mixture, and began circling the tank vigorously as if searching for something. About 1 hour later I realized my largest female had given birth early to a single translucent fetus completely intact and I'm guessing about 3-4weeks early based on the seasons when this species typically mates and gives birth.

Anyhow, I promptly and very gently removed all 3 snakes, cleaned the tank and put them back. Everyone seemed to calm down right away. However, 2 hours later I came outside to check on them mama snake had crawled to the surface and died. After further research on live-bearers and some discussion with my buddy, I realized she mostly likely gave birth early from stress and then we think the next baby must've been stuck. A dissection was performed on mama and it was found she had 5 more perfectly developing fetuses left inside. But no reason could be found for her sudden freakout, birthing of 1 baby too early or her death. As of now the other female and her companion are healthy and I'm not allowing anyone to disturb the tank or touch them. Because our other female has been showing the same signs of pregnancy that mama did.

I'm basically looking to see if anyone has any experience with keeping and breeding rough earth snakes. Or if anyone knows someone who has. I cant seem to find any info about keeping or breeding them, and I cant find anyone who has done so themselves. It would be great to have someone else to compare notes and exchange information.