anyone use perilite for incubation?

[anders_240sx]

Just wondering if anyone uses perilite for incubation ..I use it for leopard geckos at a 1:.8 ratio of perilite to water .... what would the ratio be for cresteds?... maybe 1:1?

thanks
Anders

[HeatherRose]

I use vermiculite...I soak it and wring it out. Not sure on the ratio, but its just fine.

[AnthonyC]

I use perlite.

I use about a 1:0.75-1.0 ratio of perlite to water. The eggs do surprisingly well under dry(ish) conditions.

[Stockwell]

I've used it straight and combined with vermiculite.
I prefer vermiculite because its easier to see if the moisture level is OK..
Perlite works fine, but its quite difficult to tell if its soaked or dried right out, as it looks the same either way.
Adding some vermiculite to it gives you a more visible means of checking when it dries out, as the vermiculite looks whiter when its dry...
I've played aroudn with all incubation media over the years, and I like vermiculite best, although for years I used Sphagnum moss, which is almost never used these days but works great.

The current trend is to incubate parchment shell eggs with no media. You simply put them in a dry container with tiny holes, then sit that container in a sealed one that contains water. This provides a saturated atmosphere, and the eggs get 100% humidity with no direct contact to wet substrate...

[AnthonyC]

Very interesting. I'm currently using the no-substrate method with my carpet python eggs, but I haven't talked to anyone who has tried this with cresteds. Have you done this?

[Stockwell]

No I haven't tried it yet with anything... I'm an old school vermiculite ,geezer, but I will give it a shot this year.. It makes good sense to me , and should hatch most parchment shell eggs including those of geckos. It will however require a bit more room in the incubators, since its a container within a container.
Incubating eggs is always fun, and experimental. Its good to keep an open mind and try new things.
I hatched some Leo eggs on a pile of marbles in water once, just to prove a point.
I also successfully hatched my first corn snake eggs on an ordinary kitchen sponge suspended by screen over water in the bottom of a bread pan.
That was in the 70's when nobody was hatching much of anything yet.

[AnthonyC]

Well, Roy...actually, it sounds like your cornsnake eggs were basically incubated with the no substrate method.

The only concern I have with the gecko eggs is that if the egg isn't buried in something, I have a gut feeling that the gecko won't have leverage to push through the shell. With snake eggs, they're in a huge clump, so it's not like the egg can really roll around, but I'd think with gecko eggs, they would end up dying in the egg if there isn't something to keep the egg from moving when the gecko pushes on the inside. I don't know...it might be a stupid theory, but that's why I haven't tried it.

[DragnDrop]

My choice is ceramic soil, (kiln fired clay particles like kitty litter). It's got millions of microscopic pores to hold water for humidity, the irregular shape allows great oxiygen exchange all over the egg. It's sold in garden centres as aquatic soil, or soil conditioner. There's a distinct colour change as it dries so you can see if it needs more water.

Originally posted by AnthonyC
The only concern I have with the gecko eggs is that if the egg isn't buried in something, I have a gut feeling that the gecko won't have leverage to push through the shell.

I used to hatch pictus eggs that just sat on small lids in a delicup of moist peat moss. I'd put just a bit of peat in the lid to keep them from rolling if they needed it (sometimes they were big enough to be lightly wedged in place). Day gecko eggs are usually glued together, but once in a while I'd get a single egg. My dad has a hearing aid, and I'd get the plastic disc that the batteries were packed in. The 'bubbles' over the batteries were perfect for holding a single gold dust egg without rolling. Both the pictus and day gecko eggs hatched without problems, even though the eggs could jiggle a bit. Around hatching time, you could see them 'dance' possibly fro the embryo working on the shell.