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think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 17th, 2015, 4:56 pm
by Kent VanSooy
I was about ready to give up on it, the end was slimy and not well-formed. But then it dried out and almost scabbed over. The rest of the egg looks, feels, and smells great. I've never seen one like this. It's about 6 weeks along.

Image

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 17th, 2015, 5:25 pm
by VICtort
Wow, gnarly indeed... I have seen similar. In an indigo egg, it looked the same, and I treated the "moldy" end with Desenex foot powder and painted it with liquid bandage. Whether this helped or not is uncertain, as when it did hatch, it seemed to have "walled" itself off, the neonate was healthy but small, as part of the egg was unavailable to it, it had formed a sort of hard barrier. Fertile eggs can be amazingly resilient, and some overcome obvious issues such as your photo shows. Let us know if it hatches...I am wishing it the best of luck. BTW, what species of snake laid that egg?

As you describe it, the egg is "scabbed" over and may not need any attention. If you should see fungi/mold attacking it, consider the Desenex/liquid bandage regime, I have seen some bad looking eggs possibly saved with it.

Good luck, Vic

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 17th, 2015, 5:34 pm
by Kent VanSooy
Thanks Vic! The fungi have entirely disappeared, and that end is dry and hard. Maybe it will hatch into a young and hungry Senticolis.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 25th, 2015, 8:14 pm
by zwhitman
The short answer - You never can tell for sure. Let us now if it hatches and try to get pics!

The long answer...
I have seen perfect hatchlings crawl out of eggs covered in thick bright blue fuzz. I have also seen eggs get a barely visible grey film over them and have the whole clutch be sequentially infected and destroyed. I don't throw anything away until it smells gross, but I do separate eggs to avoid contaminating neighboring eggs if possible. With that said, if the clutch is stuck together, healthy eggs will usually not be affected by a dead / moldy neighbor. Most fungi are opportunistic, meaning there was likely something wrong with the egg (or the incubation conditions) to begin with. But every once in a while you can see more aggressive fungi that seem to be able to actually kill eggs. Unfortunately, to my knowledge there has been very little in the way of good research on the relationship between fungi and reptile eggs.

Some fungi seem to respond to treatment with over the counter powders for athletes foot. I have personally used Lotrimin powder with varying success. Powders are best applied with a make-up brush. Thin layers applied regularly for a few weeks. Be careful when handling eggs regularly to avoid sudden temperature changes etc. As I mentioned, most of these eggs are likely dead or compromised before the fungus, so it would be difficult to know if these medications cause any harm.

In terms of your egg... that top portion looks pretty good. I wouldn't do anything other than watch it at this point. What species is it? Have you tried candling it?

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 26th, 2015, 4:41 am
by Kfen
zwhitman wrote: Have you tried candling it?
That's a good question. What does the candling look like?

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 12:50 am
by Kelly Mc
Has anyone ever used methylene blue?

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 6:26 am
by jayder85
I had a nearly identical egg hatch this season. In fact, the little Corn pipped right out of the nasty looking end. This is the very reason that I will never discard an egg until I am 110% sure that it is bad.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 8:29 am
by Kelly Mc
In a shipment Ghana balls a female laid eggs all shriveled but one, so we put moss in a little tank and covered it with a towel
When it looked like it wasnt going to hatch we decided to look inside at least to check it out. The baby was in there Pale, Cute and Alive .. for a minute. Me and the other reptile guy took turns hitting each other with an empty pizza box.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 1:10 pm
by Kent VanSooy
Thanks for all the input folks! I'm hoping a Green Rat snake (Santa Rita AZ stock) will hatch from this strange egg. I haven't candled it...that's something I never got in the habit of doing. I think it would be a total mess right now if it wasn't fertile (and the rest of the clutch was not, which was very obvious several weeks back). I also separate eggs to avoid contaminating the good ones - I have a dedicated container for the bad ones, and I watch them there until I'm darn sure they're dead. The egg in the picture is the first one that has ever received a reprieve from that special container. It was laid with the messed-up end, which was slimy and quick to grow fungus. I wiped the fungus off a couple times (just water and a paper towel), then the end dried out and the fungus stopped growing. I've used anti-fungal foot powder in the past, but it wasn't necessary here. I'm feeling fairly confident it will hatch at this point! I'll snap a few pics when that long green nose is poking through!

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 1:23 pm
by mwentz
Kent, while your egg is certainly worse off than mine, it is a testament to how tough colubrid eggs can be.

I did ambient temps for incubation for my knobs, and because of the cool weather this summer, I know the eggs got down into the 50s a few times. Still hatched though.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 6:00 pm
by Kfen
Kelly Mc wrote:Has anyone ever used methylene blue?
Not on eggs, but for fish, and directly on turtles.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 28th, 2015, 6:23 pm
by Kelly Mc
Well, Ive wiped some fuzz away using a slightly damp swath of paper towel before, had it return and had it not return, with changes and with not time to make prompt changes (ie make fresh verm box, etc) but once I decided instead of just wiping it off, I would use an antisepsis agent and I was choosing between methylene blue, and betadine. I chose the methylene blue as I had used it for other applications and its shown to be tolerable in many delicate system. So I used it as a light wipe and it worked.

Just wiping the eggs and repositioning them perhaps could have resolved it also, but that's why I was wondering if anyone had also used it.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 29th, 2015, 7:55 am
by Kent VanSooy
I've never used methylene blue, and only rarely any kind of antifungal. I'm not sure, but it seems as if viable eggs produce some kind of anti-fungal agent (or perhaps dead ones are better food for fungus) - a bad egg in a container will have fungus all over it, but the viable ones remain unaffected.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: July 29th, 2015, 8:41 am
by Kelly Mc
Yes I only had the opportunity to use it that one time, on a mild fuzz on the bottom, the use of coarse grade verm and seating the eggs very lightly stop that from happening. Which it would have been interesting to explore more when I was producing more eggs but I was and am reluctant to experiment on eggs. The SIM method is a more effective way of creating the dynamic of the eggs being suspended in a cradle of RH but I like vermiculite and preparing it and looking in on the eggs.

Edt add , I think sometimes mycology in the egg box is just environmental, and fostered by the damp muted low air exchange conditions of situ and that bad eggs are utopia for it and that's an interesting point you bring up about good eggs having some mechanism of protection Kent.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: October 5th, 2015, 1:22 pm
by mrhoyo
So did it?

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: October 5th, 2015, 3:53 pm
by Jimi
Mrhoyo - you may be the only one here not hearing the awkward silence your question generates.

The OP is no longer with us:
http://www.fieldherpforum.com/forum/vie ... =6&t=22565

Sorry if this catches you off. To your question - we may never know.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: October 17th, 2015, 1:07 pm
by mrhoyo
Ah, I see. That's very sad, I was unaware.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: October 18th, 2015, 8:25 pm
by Joseph S.
I hope arrangements were made to get his collection loving homes.

I will miss Kent on these forums. Im glad I was able to meet him a few years back-stand up guy in all respects.

Re: think this one will hatch?

Posted: October 20th, 2015, 2:12 pm
by Jimi
Me too, I will miss his presence and contributions. I never met him, nor did we correspond, but he really seemed reasonable and courteous. It was nice. Plus he seemed to know what he was talking about. Also nice.