Another candling picture

[Sdaji]

The last one was quite popular, so here's another one, still not wonderful, but the quality is slightly better than the last. All the eggs in this picture are fertile. No poll this time, sorry.

[krusty]

well done looks great...

[Glimmerman]

Thats awesome - Thanks for the pics and update. I have never been shown or instructed on candling. I had heard of the method once or twice. I will give it a go when I get eggs this year. If I had known this method 2 months ago it would of saved me incubationing non ferile eggs fo 6 weeks. Such is Life.

[The Rock]

Glimmerman,- You should of been be able to tell if they were fertile very easily without candling. It is quite obvious.

[foxysnake]

What sort of snake eggs are they?

[Glimmerman]

Yes quite obvious to the experieced and people who know the difference. As with myself I had never (one my own) bred before. I have never been shown the difference between Fertile / Non Fertile eggs. The candling pics from Sdaji are the closest intel I have received in this area and for I say Thank You.

As an experienced herp like yourself Rock (This is my own asumption as I look forward to reading yours, Pilbara's, Brown's, Sdaji etc threads for their input) I'm sure you CAN tell quite easily. I am new to the breeding field and hopefully with your and other exepienced breeders intel and guidance, other keen and interested newbies will also be able to adopt techniques to tell just as easily.

Regards Damian

[Magpie]

Damian, i would have incubated them anyway. Never say never when it comes to herps, it's low risk, low input to just bung them in the incubator anyway.

[Sdaji]

Thanks for the compliments and you're welcomes to the thanks

Glimmer: as Magpie said, stick 'em in the incubator anyway, it doesn't hurt. I put most of my slugs in the incubator, if nothing else I'm curious to see what colour the mould will be I never ever expect to hatch an infertile egg, but I find incubating them fun and interesting (Okay, perhaps it's a bit weird, but I'm sure you're all used to me being a little quirky ) By the way, green mould means Penicilium, brown mean Aspergilus It seems to be chance which dictates which will grow on your infertile eggs (okay okay, shutting up about it now!)

The Rock: I'm surprised to hear you say that, unless you know something I don't (which is entirely possible). I'm now kicking myself for not photographing one of the eggs in this clutch before discarding it. There were four obvious slugs and one which looked absolutely perfect and identical to the others until candled. I have pictures from a clutch of water python eggs which has two infertile eggs which at first looked perfect, I'm considering publishing them but might post one of the early pictures, I'm sure you couldn't pick which two they are... but having said that, I'd be thrilled to be proven wrong and would love you to do so. If I get another one of these "perfect looking until candled" eggs this season, I'll post pictures. I'm expecting snake eggs this weekend, let's hope I don't have an infertile one to demonstrate with, but everyone may get lucky You obviously have a lot more experience than I do in this area, can you tell me how to work it out without candling?

Foxysnake: these are Children's python eggs.

[Morelia_Hunter]

Have not seen you post this much for a while Sdaji. Are you bored?

[Sdaji]

Have not seen you post this much for a while Sdaji. Are you bored?

It seems to be a seasonal thing, a bit of warm weather, I come out of hibernation, I'm still a bit sleepy and get confused, cranky and excitable! Expect the same thing next year Never bored! I dream of having so little to do that I'm bored!

[The Rock]

Sorry,- didnt mean to offend anyone, but I have found over the years that a combination of their look, feel, and surface texture will almost always let you know whether the egg is fertile or not. There is of course the odd exception to every rule, but buy using those 3 factors I seem to always be 99.99 percent correct. 100 percent most years as its honestly been a few years since Ive seen any of my snakes drop any slugs.? Most years Im lucky enough to have 100 percent fertility rate in all clutches and 100 percent hatch rate in all clutches. In fact my only real loss has been with extra large clutches of bredli hatching at the same time and smothering one or two juvs that are at the bottom of the heap.

[Sdaji]

No offence taken here, Rob.

Your fertility rate sounds brilliant! Perhaps your unusally high rate of good eggs is correlated to your ability to be able to spot the infertile ones. Obviously your eggs aren't usual if you can breed many snakes for a few years without getting a slug, but I've certainly had eggs which I couldn't imagine diagnosing as infertile without either candling, cutting them open or using magic super powers

I actually emptied and dried the infertile egg, I'd have sent it to you along with an emptied and dried egg from the same clutch, except that I sent it to QLD last week. Hopefully if I breed my bredli this season most of the eggs will be infertile, that way I'll have a heap to photograph and compare with the bad (fertile) ones.

Doesn't it suck when you have so many snakes they start smothering each other! Oh well, at least they were of a horrible species. Bredli. Blech!

[The Rock]

I must admit to achieve these results the animals are given a supplement at a certain time of the year every second year or so and it seems to work wonders. Yeah I have one female bredli that has just too many eggs. Bloody things.

[congo_python]

What time of the year is this rob and do you use uv afterwards?
and is it added to rodent or water?
Congo

[The Rock]

No uv used. Just a special supplyment given, normally with the 2nd or 3rd feed after laying every second or third year.