First hatchling died, please check my setup...

[SamsonizeMe]

Greetings all. I am having a rough start to my season - no, my entire breeding experience. I was beyond excited when I woke up Monday morning and found my first ever baby had hatched. Unfortunately, a few hours later her clutchmate didn't make it out of the egg - she got it open, but then got turned around inside, and that was that. That in and of itself was upsetting for a new breeder. However, Tuesday morning when I checked on the successful baby, I found her to be dead in the rack.

I know some babies just don't make it, and this is natural. Yet, she was my first hatchling ever. This has hit hard and I do not have prior experience enough to say "All my other hatchlings lived fine, this one must have just been too weak". To avoid a repeat episode, I want to discern whether there was anything extra I could have done or did not do for the one that made it, but then didn't make it. I thought I had everything right for my upcoming babies, and if I don't then I need to rectify that immediately. My next clutch (from a different pairing) is due 7/3-10.

Let me start off with the rack. It is a DIY-job I fashioned myself out of a 3-drawer Sterilite tub system, heat cable and a rheostat. Each tub's footprint is roughly equivalent to the floor area of a 15 gallon long vivarium. As I hatch more I will separate each tub into 3 partitions for a total of 9 compartments. Paper towels as substrate. There was a small plastic hide in there with her. (I plan to have at least one hide per baby in each tub/partition.) The system is in my closet and the lights were off during the night. I do not think this was stress-related death. There was very little in the way of stressors that could be to blame.

The back half of each tub has the heat tape attached to the underside, and the temperature over this section is 89-90*F. The front half measures 82-83*F. I have the rheostat on a low setting, the ambient temperature in the room is about 80*F. Ambient humidity is 40%.

Things that I have brainstormed about the rack and my husbandry being inadequate and/or to blame:

• I did not wash and wipe the plastic. It could have chemicals on it from the manufacturing process. The baby could have licked or absorbed them in toxic amounts from the tub she was in.
• Water and humidity could have been too low. I misted one side of the low-temperature area, but didn't have a water dish in there yet as she was still absorbing her yolk sac. The baby looked to be dried up post-mortem. However, this could just be an after-effect of having expired, as moisture is lost when homeostatic functions have ceased.
  Counterargument: The baby appeared well-hydrated as late as 10 hours before she was discovered to be dead. Exact time of death is not known. It could have happened any time between 12am-10am.
• The low-temperature side is not low enough in temperature. (82.5*F)
• The high-temperature side is not high enough in temperature. Some people have theirs at 95*F. Mine is 90*F. I did not want to cook the baby.
• I had not yet introduced a dish of calcium and vitamins.
  Counterargument: Correctable mineral deficiency would not cause direct death within a period of 24 hours post-hatching.
• Baby was not fed and did not have enough nutrition to sustain life.
  Counterargument: Baby was less than 30 hours old at time of death. Neonates do not feed until 3-7 days after hatching.

Reasons the baby could have been "simply unfit for survival":

• The egg came from a mother that was severely underweight and underage. She may not have provided all the nutrients that the baby needed to sustain life outside the egg.
  Supporting argument: Newer eggs from the same mother went bad, though fertile. They caved in even though humidity was adequate.
  Counterargument: The egg went to term and hatched without assistance. The baby appeared strong and healthy.
• The egg was subject to a number of environmental factors that reduced the baby's chance of survival - Mold grew on both eggs. They were not in a proper incubator for the first two weeks after being laid. They were candled "too often".
  Counterargument: The mold stopped growing without any intervention (e.g. antifungal powder application), likely killed off by the immune system of the fetus. There were no signs of deformity in either baby - no tail tip kinks, perfectly formed skeletal structures. The ambient temperature of the room in which they were candled was always between 77*F and 82*F.
• The baby had the Enigma trait.
  Counterargument: The baby showed no signs of Enigma syndrome - she even walked strong and straight. She was active as late as midnight, logically no more than 8 hours before death. Furthermore, the Enigma trait would not directly cause death.
• The sibling died in the egg, possibly unfit for survival.
  Counterargument: This baby made it out of the egg unassisted.
• The yolk sac was still attached and was a pathway for infection. She did not chew it off and it had not yet fallen off - it was still attached postmortem.

Can anyone help me out? Your thoughts are welcomed. Is my setup appropriate or have I overlooked something?

 

[Wild West Reptile]

I'm sorry for your loss (s)... I wish I could help you but I will leave it to the more experienced breeders. Again, I'm sorry, and I hope your next clutch produces healthy, long living geckos.

 

[acpart]

I don't think you did anything wrong. The plastic shouldn't be a problem and husbandry sounds OK. I think the issue has more to do with your last few points. The combination of underweight mother, incubation problems and also that the baby hatched with the yolk sac (which is not necessarily a problem in and of itself) could very well result in a baby that doesn't make it even if it seems OK when it hatches. In general, geckos don't show that they are ill until they are very ill. I have hatched a number of geckos with yolk sacs and most of them have been fine. However, last month I hatched a baby with a large yolk sac attached that was also a bit small for dates. It seemed active and alert and dropped the yolk sac pretty soon but 2 days later it was dead. I think it was just too small and undernourished because of the yolk sac not being absorbed.
I hope the next ones are OK.

Aliza

 

[LedgysLizards]

Sorry for your loss, and good luck on your next clutch

 

[fl_orchidslave]

"The egg came from a mother that was severely underweight and underage. She may not have provided all the nutrients that the baby needed to sustain life outside the egg.
Supporting argument: Newer eggs from the same mother went bad, though fertile. They caved in even though humidity was adequate."

This, in itself, is most likely suspect IMO. While she may be able to produce viable eggs, she may not have enough to give them to survive. Any living thing that comes from a less than adequate parental source has a reduced risk of being a healthy offspring. Be sure to offer the mother as much nutritious and dusted food as she will possibly eat, laying eggs is robbing her still developing body.

As a side note, sterlite drawer systems are not secure to prevent geckos escaping. They can and do squeeze thru that tiny gap at the top, after somehow climbing the sides. Unless it's 12" deep.

I keep my babies at 95.

 

[TokayKeeper]

as a side not, yolk sacs that are typically still attached and not fully absorbed are usually a sign of too low of a humidity level during incubation.

 

[Pinky81]

Sorry for your loss, remember some babies just don't survive, and breeding is not for the faint at heart! This is your first loss, but probably not your last!

Agreed on the under sized female and also agree on the fact that you can bring your hot side temps up to 95.

Try not to over analyze it will drive your crazy, good luck with your next clutch!

 

[SamsonizeMe]

Thank you all for the kind words and help.

I will wash and wipe the tub surfaces anyway. Nebula is offered dusted food twice daily and so far, does not appear to be developing a third set of eggs - thankfully. I know she still could. (She was fertilized in early April.) The tubs are 8" high, hopefully that will at least stop hatchlings from performing escape artistry.

I will test-bump my rheostat up to 95 on the hot side and see what the cool side rises to as well. Will report back on that. What is the highest temperature acceptable for the cool side? I think I read it's 85? And 80% is the optimal humidity for eggs yes?

 

[Pinky81]

what size bins are you using for the hatchlings? i used 6qt sterlite bins with heat on one side at roughly 95 and never bothered with worrying about cool side.as long as you don't have the full bottom of the bin as heat your fine.

as for egg humidity I don't know how many people actually measure this. I used albeys method of prepping my vermiculite and only opened the egg containers one a week for air exchange. never had a egg dent!

http://www.albeysreptiles.com/incubate-eggs.htm

Here is a picture of how I have a egg container set up. Vermic was used as I didn't like the perlite. And the temp probe was left in and the cover completely snapped onto the container. the wire ran out of the incubator with the digital display.
http://i813.photobucket.com/albums/zz53/melissaborden/Leos 2011/eggsize.jpg

Here is a picture of good eggs and bad eggs. The bad eggs were laid that way...they were the last eggs mom laid in the season.
http://i813.photobucket.com/albums/zz53/melissaborden/Leos 2011/badegg.jpg

Hope this helps! Remember sometimes you cant control who lives or dies. your doing everything right...just be patient!

 

[SamsonizeMe]

Melissa:

The bins are approximately 20"L x 11"W x7"H. As stated earlier I have some dividers ready to partition them up (1/2ths or 1/3rds) if I get more hatchlings than drawers (I currently only have four good eggs; I "had" 8). I won't put the youngest babies together so as to avoid tail-nipping. No more than 1/2 the bottom of each level has the heat cable, which runs lengthwise along the back bottom, so that will work nicely with the partitions.

I have the wafer thermometer on the wire bottom in the Hovabator, and I've got a thermometer-hygrometer that I can stick into any of the deli cups to get a read. I am incubating them in 2s as they were laid, with parental/laydate/ETA information written on the top - don't want any early hatchlings knocking over later eggs.

All four of Pumpkin's fertile eggs have done really well so far. They've not caved in, grown mold, turned colors or anything. Nebula's second clutch that I tossed out the other day looked even worse than your example of bad eggs. They even had what I assume was fruit fly larvae wiggling on top of them. Blegh. I am not too broken up about those eggs. If an egg doesn't develop that's fine; it's just when the egg goes to term, I get a beautiful baby, but then it dies a day later that I flip out.

The most important thing though is that I've been able to provide Nebula with enough care that she is surviving and getting back to thriving.

I am getting more excited for Pumpkin's first clutch, due starting July 3rd...

 

[Pinky81]

Sounds like your on the right track, just look forward at the eggs you still have and try not to worry! tough I know! Sometimes Nature knows more then we do. From what you have described your set ups are all good with the exception of the temp. Bump that up a little more you wont cook you bebe!

Good luck keep us updated!

 

[SamsonizeMe]

I'm updating and it's not with good news. On Saturday I removed an egg that had gone moldy and was sweating green slime from the incubator. I cut this egg and it had a partly formed fetus inside, which had apparently died weeks prior. Today, I noticed that the other egg from this clutch had gone soft and transparent. I checked the egg and it had been pipped. Once again a baby hadn't had the strength to get out of the egg unassisted. I cut the egg anyway and put the fully-formed baby on a wet paper towel, and back into the incubator in the (cleared of moss) egg cup. She hadn't absorbed all of the yolk, from what I could tell. She did not revive.

She appears to have been healthy, ready to come out of the egg and start living. There are no apparent deformities. The clutch was laid May 22, and she tried to hatch today. I incubated at 81.5*F mean temperature. The baby is 3" long in total; 2" for the body and 1" for the tail. The tail is a little thin, probably as a result of not absorbing all of the yolk.

I fear I may have exposed this clutch to too much temperature fluctuation due to excitedness and impatience. My enthusiasm for their arrival was expressed in candling them to see the movement inside. I have since learned that this is a possibly dangerous irritant for the developing fetus. Also, that even a 2* flux can make a good egg go bad. But still, this baby came to term and tried to hatch. I am incubating in moss, is this a possible problem? The humidity in my deli cup was around 85%.

She looks like she would have grown up to be a pretty SHTCTB like her mom, Pumpkin.

The next eggs from this mom are being left alone as much as possible. I will only check on them from the incubator, to see if they are denting and need sprayed and such. They are my last eggs for now... Nebula is in the process of making two more but I know I can't count her babies before they hatch. Pumpkin seems to be done laying for the season. (She laid three clutches, the first was infertile.)

 

[acpart]

There are a number of possibilities about what happened:
--too much messing around with the egg, as you said (I have not had significant problems with 2 degree temp fluctuations)
--problems with the female, the male or the pairing either in terms of supplementation or just some kind of inability to produce viable offspring
--problems with the incubation process
--luck of the draw.

I'm not saying you did things incorrectly. There's a good chance that there may be things going on that you have no control over. Think about ways to control for each of the variables above and you may be able to figure out what the problem is, either this season or next season.

Aliza

 

[SamsonizeMe]

Would the fact that Pumpkin only laid three clutches and seems to be done laying for this season have anything to do with this? She laid them when she was about 50g. She is pushing 60g now, she is visually very very healthy.

Valentine on the other hand used to be 80g+ but is 60g right now, the breeding seems to have really stressed him out. He is quarantined in a spare tub on my hatchling rack and being fed slurry. I fear though he may have parasites. This is an odd possibility though, considering the two lived together until last week and Pumpkin would have been exposed to whatever Valentine was; like I said Pumpkin is the very picture of a healthy gecko. But Val won't even eat food on his own.

 

[fl_orchidslave]

Males go off food during season. They have one thing on their mind........... As long as he was healthy prior, it won't hurt him to be off food for a prolonged time. It does worry us tho. Mine do this as well. Then one day, they snap up a super and are back on track. If you suspect parasites tho, get a fecal done, to at least ease that stress from you.

 

[SamsonizeMe]

Is it really okay for him to be off food this long (5-7 weeks)? His weight loss has been pretty drastic as of late; it was slow at first and he was eating every now and then, but now nothing. I just weighed him at 58g and his spine is showing through his back. =( He used to be soooo fat! He wasn't trying to mate with Pumpkin anymore (likely she is done ovulating and this is why). But when he would see Honeybell (the Super Giant girl that also won't eat) in the next cage over, he would buzz his tail at her. So you're right about that, he still has ladies on the brain.

Thank you for the reassurances, I quite need them right now.

 

[fl_orchidslave]

It's not helping that he can see a girl. Can you put up some paper or something, anything, between them to block the view? The ideal thing would be to move him away from them until he gets back to eating. The boys are just as bad as ovulating females when it comes to going off food during season. It's not really okay to be a couple months off food, but if he was fat before, at least he has a good reserve.

 

[acpart]

In the "don't worry too much" department, my super snow male, Oskar, who doesn't breed anymore, pretty much doesn't eat from about Nov. to May. Each Sept. he's gotten up to 80-90 grams, stops eating for the winter, and by May is down to about 60 grams. Same story this season. He started eating in May again and is now up to 71 grams. Oskar's story is featured in my "through the year with leoapard geckos" article in Gecko Time: http://www.geckotime.com/the-yearly-cycle-with-geckos/

Aliza

 

[SamsonizeMe]

It's not helping that he can see a girl. Can you put up some paper or something, anything, between them to block the view? The ideal thing would be to move him away from them until he gets back to eating. The boys are just as bad as ovulating females when it comes to going off food during season. It's not really okay to be a couple months off food, but if he was fat before, at least he has a good reserve.

Oh he is in my closet on the bottom shelf of the hatchling rack now in quarantine, he can't see anything but feet and laundry! He's been in there the last four days now. He will be living the life of a monk until he is fat and happy again.

Aliza, I think I remember reading about Oskar a few months back. Remembering his story has made me worry a little less!

 

[Gliven]

sorry wrong thread...