Peculiar Egg Laying?!

[Chameleon Company]

You said...."Each egg within a clutch, and each clutch, will be affected by the health, and more specifically, the vitamin and mineral stores of the female"...can't disagree with that!

You said..."A female in tip-top shape will invariably produce a clutch with both a high-fertility rate, and then consequent, high hatch rate. When the female is less-prepared, both the fertility rate, and then the hatch rate of those fertile eggs, will drop. Possibly to zero."...so are you saying that any clutch that has infertile eggs in it is due to the female lacking nutrients rather than the egg being too far down the reproductive tract to have been fertilized?

That is correct. I do not believe that there is any significant correlation in distance within the track and fertilization for eggs laid. For instance, females fresh from the wild in the right time of year will have an exceedingly high fertility and hatch rate. There is no evidence of any significant factor involved except that they are fresh caught and pretty healthy. Most hobbyists do not come close to achieving those results. We can vary vitamins and nutrition here and see a very direct correlation with fertility and hatch. Unfortunately, a female chameleon can be raised with a seemingly healthy appearance, be bred, and then crash, or produce clutches not worth a hoot. This is primarily due to a lack of the proper vitamins and minerals. This is not to say that other factors can affect fertility and hatch rates, but the animals are wired for success if given the right vitamins, minerals, nutrition, and husbandry.

You said..."Of course, it is more common that a female with less-than-desired husbandry will produce a marginally successful first clutch, and then crash worse on the second, as the husbandry has remained the same, and the first clutch depleted her too much to produce an equal, much less better, second clutch"....but this doesn't account for the first clutch having some fertile and some infertile eggs followed by a clutch of all fertile eggs like the scenario I was asking about. This has been reported many times without there being any improvement to the husbandry being involved as you were suggesting. You're saying that the second clutch would be worse.

What I am saying is is that the fertility and success results that you see are far more influenced by the health of the female, especially its vitamin and mineral stores (let's assume that "nutrition" means everything, vitamins, minerals, nutrition, water, proper UVB, etc) than any other factor. That proper nutrition will produce high yield results for intial, then a second sperm-retained clutch, and even third clutches. When the animal is coming up short on nutrition, you will get progressive failure at a rate correlating directly to the extent of the shortcomings.

Add-in: As for reports that a first clutch can be marginal, but then the next much improved, but with no apparent change in husbandry, I cannot relate to that. It is not our experience here that such happens that way. What I use as a starting point here is that a female, on her first clutch, with the proper nutrition, will have a high fertility / high hatch clutch. The gold-standard here would be animals as close to wild and healthy as possible. They do not start off marginal. They are good from the get-go. If my experience is that females with the proper nutrition start well, and then stay well, then I am essentially unable to replicate the results you note, unless I manipulate nutrition.

 

[kinyonga]

So, Jim, then all your first clutches from females are totally fertile because your husbandry is good? You never have first clutches that contain more infertile eggs than the following clutches?

So how do you explain that when a female that can produce eggs without mating, mates after the follicle/egg production has started disposes of the eggs that were already shelled at the time of mating?

 

[Ethen44]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the help...or should I say the assurance. I was a little worried there for a bit. She is currently burried in her nest, laying the rest of her clutch presumably I'll update you with the final count when I know.

P.S. how is the incubator from LLL Reptiles? I just bought it, so there's no going back. But has anyone used this incubator before?

 

[sdheli420]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the help...or should I say the assurance. I was a little worried there for a bit. She is currently burried in her nest, laying the rest of her clutch presumably I'll update you with the final count when I know.

P.S. how is the incubator from LLL Reptiles? I just bought it, so there's no going back. But has anyone used this incubator before?

what version did you get.??

i just had my exo-terra digi fail (good thing i plugged it in a few months in advance to settle the system, and figure out how much monitoring of the medium i needed to do moisture wise)..just get it set up and running..and monitor the crap out of it..also add a humidty gause to the inside as well as a temp gauge ..the more the better so you can adjust properly..


as for the other topic on here..

regarding "whats normal" well after 10 years of consistant "hobbying" ive come to the conclusion that.."a female become restless when getting close to laying eggs", or when they are aggrivated they puff up , flare, lunge ect"

Normal DOES have a basis here..we havent been watching our beloved pets for one day now, but collectivly for many many years now..not just one of us are right, but all in general..good information is weeded out from the ego driven bad or mis-information given on the internet..

when we mean normal..we really do...we watch our chameleons soo much to the point that we know what they are saying( suprisingly enough..after spending so much time with various species, working with them, owning them..i know when they are hungry, i know when they will accept water..i know when they are preparing for bed...they really arent that alien if you understand what they need..

kinyonga..i stand by your statements...

 

[suzi]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the help...or should I say the assurance. I was a little worried there for a bit. She is currently burried in her nest, laying the rest of her clutch presumably I'll update you with the final count when I know.

P.S. how is the incubator from LLL Reptiles? I just bought it, so there's no going back. But has anyone used this incubator before?

I am so glad she is in the hole that's good news please keep us posted! As for the incubator, I have an exo-terra that the fan blew on after only a few months of use good news is that they have a 2 year warranty bad news is that I have heard it is a common problem. Good luck with your's

 

[kinyonga]

Ethen44...so glad to hear that your chameleon is in the hole! Hopefully all will go well for her!

sdheli420...thanks!

 

[sdheli420]

Ethen44...so glad to hear that your chameleon is in the hole! Hopefully all will go well for her!

sdheli420...thanks!

no prob,I always give respect to those that have personally helped me ....your advice(as well as others..need not to be named since it will just just give them a bigger head..LOL) hase always put me at ease..even if its somthing i know its reassuring to hear someone with knowledge answer and give, with no bias, a solid answer i can work from(even if its somthing i know, its like beeing told "dont worry, just keep doing what you are doing"...

 

[suzi]

no prob,I always give respect to those that have personally helped me ....your advice(as well as others..need not to be named since it will just just give them a bigger head..LOL) hase always put me at ease..even if its somthing i know its reassuring to hear someone with knowledge answer and give, with no bias, a solid answer i can work from(even if its somthing i know, its like beeing told "dont worry, just keep doing what you are doing"...

Agreed! Linda, Aka kingyonga, I have all kinds of respect for you as well and stand by you 100% you and your 20+ years of experience I appreciate all that you contribute to this forum very much! Which is a lot btw

 

[kinyonga]

Thanks again...I'm still learning after over 20 years of keeping chameleons. There is always something more to learn.

 

[Ethen44]

After 18 hours of labor, little Skittles has emerged from her hole She has been eating and drinking very well (thank goodness) since she ascended from the depths of her nest. She laid 23 eggs with no noticeable impediments. For now I have them in some vermiculite, although the 1 part water 1 part vermiculite ratio was seemingly far too moist, and almost soupy? So I mixed it with about 1 part water; 5 part vermiculite...my medium now seems to be about right, not too moist, just damp. As far as Incubating, I know some of you are very against it...but I am from Oregon, and also I will be moving here shortly to a new home. So to compensate for the change in climate, I assumed that an incubator was the best option. Here it is, from LLL Reptiles http://lllreptile.com/store/catalog...ors/-/lllreptile-pro-mr148-incubator-special/
Hope it's not too over the top for those of you whom are skeptical All it needs is a humidostat and that should cover it Thank you everyone once again for all your help!

 

[Chameleon Company]

After 18 hours of labor, little Skittles has emerged from her hole She has been eating and drinking very well (thank goodness) since she ascended from the depths of her nest. She laid 23 eggs with no noticeable impediments. For now I have them in some vermiculite, although the 1 part water 1 part vermiculite ratio was seemingly far too moist, and almost soupy? So I mixed it with about 1 part water; 5 part vermiculite...my medium now seems to be about right, not too moist, just damp. As far as Incubating, I know some of you are very against it...but I am from Oregon, and also I will be moving here shortly to a new home. So to compensate for the change in climate, I assumed that an incubator was the best option. Here it is, from LLL Reptiles http://lllreptile.com/store/catalog...ors/-/lllreptile-pro-mr148-incubator-special/
Hope it's not too over the top for those of you whom are skeptical All it needs is a humidostat and that should cover it Thank you everyone once again for all your help!

Ethen, not sure where you got the vermiculite/water ratio, but 1:1 is a by weight ratio, not volume. By volume, it will vary based on the grade of vermiculite, but can usually be in the 6:1 to 9:1 vermiculite to water volume ratio.

Good luck with all.

 

[suzi]

After 18 hours of labor, little Skittles has emerged from her hole She has been eating and drinking very well (thank goodness) since she ascended from the depths of her nest. She laid 23 eggs with no noticeable impediments. For now I have them in some vermiculite, although the 1 part water 1 part vermiculite ratio was seemingly far too moist, and almost soupy? So I mixed it with about 1 part water; 5 part vermiculite...my medium now seems to be about right, not too moist, just damp. As far as Incubating, I know some of you are very against it...but I am from Oregon, and also I will be moving here shortly to a new home. So to compensate for the change in climate, I assumed that an incubator was the best option. Here it is, from LLL Reptiles http://lllreptile.com/store/catalog...ors/-/lllreptile-pro-mr148-incubator-special/
Hope it's not too over the top for those of you whom are skeptical All it needs is a humidostat and that should cover it Thank you everyone once again for all your help!

Congratulations on your eggs! I am so glad she is doing well now for the hard part!
























The wait!!!!!!

 

[Ethen44]

Ethen, not sure where you got the vermiculite/water ratio, but 1:1 is a by weight ratio, not volume. By volume, it will vary based on the grade of vermiculite, but can usually be in the 6:1 to 9:1 vermiculite to water volume ratio.

Good luck with all.

Well that would explain it, I went by volume initially. I ended up just eye balling it, adding water in small increments until I could pinch a drop or two of water out of the mixture. Thank you for the clarification

 

[Ethen44]

Congratulations on your eggs! I am so glad she is doing well now for the hard part!
The wait!!!!!!

Thank you very much, I appreciated all of the advice You are so right about the wait. I've been anticipating little neonates for farrr too long