Goanna Ranch

[Steeve B]

I am sorry to have confused you Jody, I am sure you know I really like you and don’t wish to offend you in any way. However I maintain my opinion! As Jeff clearly explained, it’s physically impossible for a jungle carpet to double clutches. Add to Jeff’s comment the need for the snake to feed and regain its fat bodies and you have a again more time, full cycle in half a year! (possible?)

DK I don’t see him as the aggressor anymore! Call it a matter of perception or whatever you wish, it doesn’t matter to me either way. Personally I don’t need Frank’s friendship, but I like him a lot for many reasons. He’s shown me how real man stand up! Its way more then anyone has shown me on the net.

I also like you mark and Sam but I don’t feel the need to be friendly to any of you guys, in fact I much prefer things the way they are, it’s a situation I created remember.

Have a safe trip

[mbayless]

HI Jeff,
When a monitor deposits her eggs, it is usually at the beginning of the rainy/wet seasons, so the eggs will hatch at the end of the rainly season - at least in Africa anyways - in the Pacific, the monitors deposit small clutches year-round, but are they affected by their wet/rainy seasons too? To double-clutch soon after depositing one clutch, as seen with African monitors would seem the survival rate for the hatchlings would be OK - but what about for other monitors that multi-clutch months - 2-3-4 after - which would place these babies to hatch right in the middle of the dry season when food resources at limited and mortality rate climb?

It seems to me it is related to food intake, calcium levels, ovum sizes, and 'perhaps' courtship duration, sperm retention, etc.... the eggs from a second multi-clutch seem smaller - and would be expected to be so - so would incubation be shorter then, as the eggs are smaller?

As for the MS's vs AS's 'discussion' I am and continue to stay out of it, and will ignore the latter for the most part for the afore-mentioned reasons that DK and Bob M have stated...and will continue to do so - it is not worth my time, interest or energy.

Thanks Jeff,
markb

[Jeff_Favelle]

Great explanation!

[SHvar]

You wont get it, they are not scientists, or authers, but many times they post pics with dates, and other info every time they lay, how is that not good enough for proof of it? Dated pictures, eggs hatching, pics of the same female laying eggs etc seem to me like proof enough. Why also would someone who shows monitor multiclutching who also has those hatchlings available to the public be not proving it?
Not to seem arguementative but FR, RSG and many others do just that.
What better proof of it than actual live baby monitors? I havent bred monitors, but I had masses of masses of eggs from a female bearded dragon that drove me crazy yet bearded dragon people said I was gonna kill my beardies by keeping them like my monitors (with some differences). My female layed 21 eggs every 3-4 weeks, of course she took a 1.5 month break 2 times a year, after which she layed 23-25 eggs right away. This had purely to due with constant food available daily, consistant as possible temps all year, no UV bulbs, no sunlight, and the pressence of a male that she paired better than I could ever imagine with.
Ive seen turtles multiclutch in captivity, and continue to do so after being brought in during winter. Ive seen some snakes do it also all year, indoor animals again. Seems common sense that it has to do with consistant favorable conditions and a healthy female and male that are capable of doing so with those conditions.
It would be neat to see a good study showing exactly how it works and happens, but then you would have to study captive monitors indoors.

[mbayless]

Hi Shvar,
As you and I know, you don't have to be a 'scientist' or anything like that to keep notes and records...as you will soon see, I have collected quite a few breeding records for African monitors, and it has shown a particular cycle which surprised me - you never know what kind of information is important, or meaningless - but to have as much as you can get - all the better. Is it so hard to do? You were very kind enough to share some of your information with me, and I have included in my files and other stuff where applicable - it is all good info - and I always appreciate it when people share it with me....but when I see a pic of a V. dumerilii and the date says 5.24.05 - that only tells me it is a pic of a V. dumerillii on that day = what about the mating details, incubation details, No. eggs, Temp, humidity, medium used, ratios used, no. days incubated, any anomalies noted, - there are not difficult things to keep. I am NOT saying everyone should do this for my or anyone but themselves benefit - but like I said before, when you get alot of these records together, you begin to see patterns, where patterns were not seen before, and that is learning more about the animals than we new before....and its fun too! That is all I am saying...

For captive scenarios, one must keep in mind they are 'captive' scenarios, and these conditions can alter an animals, or Mans, natural behaviors = not everything seen in a captive scenario may be reflective of a natural behavior - studies on prisoners tell you that...and this applies to animals in cages, zoos, captivity as well - so one must be cautious to report what they see in captivity also always happens in the wild too! I found this out when I wrote my tick grooming paper with fellow keeper Rodney Williams - we were not entirely sure this was not an isolated case, 1) until Rodney tested with several of his animals over many trials and they acted the same throughout = then it was consistant; 2)does it occur in wild animals? With some research into ticks, speaking with specialist who know more about tick grooming than we did (= 0), the behaviors we reported were consistant with natural tick grooming behavior, and we wrote about it in CHS Bulletin. It is a first for Monitors - but not reptiles!

How many observations have you made of your animals, and wondered "is that natural or normal?" I saw mine do alot of those things, and wrote about it - its easy to do. What many people take for granted, is usually not as common a thing as they believe - but to sit down and write a short article for local herp society, a forum article, etc may be helpful to others later...and all I have been saying is I would like to see more people do this - is that so wrong? For those who say they have much success, lets see some proof. I have seen hundreds of proofs, but from some, none who claim it = I really do not care if they have or have not - but when one refutes it on every single blasted post they make - one gets a headache... and I suspect all is not as they claim it to be - i.e.: a 'man' who boasts, "I am a Man" over and over - usually has many faults, and to themselves needs to reinforce this image of themselves - its a common enough defense mechanism for (lack of) self esteem or even mental capacity - but this same "I am a Man" fellow who boasts and claims as much is not one as his own actions clearly show - he is the reverse - meek, lowly, cowardly, maybe even stupid?....see the pattern? One of my neighbors is just such a fellow - and its sad to observe - he is a dupe - and its just the way things are...its not bad, not good, just an observation, nothing more - and he is still my neighbor and I treat him with every common courtesy, a beer sometimes, I treat 99% of all the people I encounter....

But I will not treat anyone in kind who is rude, spiteful, disingenuous, etc....would you? Of course not, and I do not expect anyone too treat such personages in-kind = maybe a priest or a pope would, but I am not that kind of person, and few are. Enough spent energy on this latter personality trait topic/crap - its tiring, boring...

You really should sit down and write up your bearded dragon stuff and send it to Reptiles for a article - its fun to see your name in print...and really not as hard to do as one thinks...
markb

[mbayless]

PS Shvar,

"Science" = Latin for 'Knowledge'.... we all like 'Science' where monitors are concerned don't we? I do.
markb

[crocdoc]

Originally posted by rsg
Doc, if you want to continue this discussion further please e mail me. I'd like to hear if you've had anymore experience hatching dented eggs...

Safe travels Doc.

Thanks for the post and the well wishes. I'm back, now.

I'll let you know about the eggs fairly soon, as I have a clutch starting to dent that is due to hatch in a month or so. Last year's clutches all hatched and most got very very dented.

[mbayless]

Hi Dk,
Have there been some posts deleted from this thread??
markb

[crocdoc]

I don't know, Mark. I've only been half following it as I was overseas for most of it and only had access to another computer on a couple of occasions.

[mbayless]

Hi Dk,
It seems to me your V.varius posts have disappeared....and did I just overlook them?
markb

[infernalis]

I found this back in our archives....

It's a fun read.

[crocdoc]

Originally Posted by crocdoc

Spike, you're welcome to go ask him. He's on the kingsnake.com monitor forum and the varanus.net forums. I'm sure he'll just come right out and answer all your questions in a straightforward manner, without being the tiniest bit demeaning or bagging scientists in the process.

Hahaha, I'd forgotten about this thread. At least I can say that am consistent - I haven't changed any of my views, about FR, SHvar and SteeveB, in the seven years since this thread.

I miss Mark B on the forums. It was sad when he passed away.

[infernalis]

Originally Posted by crocdoc

I miss Mark B on the forums. It was sad when he passed away.

What Happened?

[crocdoc]

He'd been extremely ill for a long time. I can't recall the details, but from memory he was running on one operational lung, and barely operational at that. On top of that he was also a diabetic and had a really compromised immune system.

[infernalis]

Originally Posted by crocdoc

He'd been extremely ill for a long time. I can't recall the details, but from memory he was running on one operational lung, and barely operational at that. On top of that he was also a diabetic and had a really compromised immune system.

Oh, sad.

I was reading his posts just now, He was a wise soul.