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(most recent on top - read from bottom to top for chronological order)

November 22, 2007

Well, none of the eggs in Incubator I were viable.  Ended up tossing every single one.  Last night, however, Incubator II gave me five hatchlings.  They look healthy.  Every year we learn a bit more. 

September 4, 2007

Angel, once again, has given birth.  I just added 28 more eggs to the incubator and will be expecting some hatchlings from this clutch around the December time frame, I'm guessing.  Last year, with temperature changes and the whole learning curve thing, we had hatchlings at the 88, 91 and 98 -day marks from two clutches.  88 and 91 from clutch one and 98 from clutch two. 

August 6, 2007

Well, we have eggs again.  22 eggs, all from one of the smaller females, maybe even one who did not lay eggs last year.  If I were a gambling man I would wager it was Big Boy, Daisy or Frankie.   Maybe next year we'll get some donations and put cameras all around the pond.  Anyway, come November we should have hatchlings available for sale, again.

November 14, 2006

For various reasons only three hatchlings survived from the first clutch.  The second clutch began hatching out today and for a variety of reasons we have 16 live hatchlings.

October 24, 2006

Number 3 hatched out this morning.  Chipper, noisy and active.  He was added to the other two.  And the wait continues.

October 21st, 2006

The first of the hatchlings started breaking through their shells today.  One shell cracked and a preemie that didn't live came out.  A few of the eggs did not produce offspring.  The first of the live hatchlings also broke through their shells and have been moved to a small tank for observation. 

We believe that the various temperature changes and moisture levels are causing some to mature earlier than the others, so we expect that those eggs that have viable hatchlings in them will probably hatch over the course of the next few days or so.

I suppose, like with other reptiles, a slight drop in the temperature which can cause the eggs to mature at different intervals is the reason that they did not all hatch at the same time and may not fall within the "book norm" for incubation periods.

We gave birth again!

Wow.  When it rains, it pours!  On August 6th, 2006, we noticed Angel continuing the same behavior we witnessed earlier, along with one of the other two females, either Daisy or Big Boy.  We watched closely and saw just what we hoped.  Angel started laying eggs, too.  We watched as the contractions began; as she pushed; as the eggs dropped; as she kicked dirt over them to cover them; as she started her next contraction.

We saw her turn once and begin in another spot and when she was done we watched her walk away, very sluggishly, devoid of eggs.

It took a little while for her to get far enough away for us to raid the nest, but once we felt a little safer, we took a few pieces of plywood, as a shield, and went to the nest.

We found a bunch of eggs.  We packed them in two tubs, we took them inside, we set up a second incubator that we bought that morning and we placed them inside.

Another 60-80 day wait begins today.

We gave birth!

On or about July 23rd, 2006, we noticed that either Big Boy or Daisy# had built a huge mound in the corner of the croc pond. About the 29th we decided to check and see what they were up to.  We found that there were eggs in the mound.  The mound was about a foot and a half high, about 3 feet around and was off in the far corner.

On Monday the 31st, we talked to our friends Daniel and Aaron at Zookeepers and spent some time pondering our next step.

We decided to go out and buy a Little Giant chicken incubator from a local tractor supply store.  We also picked up Forest Bed substrate bedding from Zookeepers and Sphagnum Moss from a local do it yourself home repair store.

Following all the experience that came before us (Aaron and Daniel have had numerous successful breedings) and everything that our own experience with reptiles told us and the information we plucked from the interweb, we set up the incubator.  I soaked an entire brick of Forest Bed for 30 minutes in the croc feeder bowl and added it to the bottom.  Next time we can use half a brick.  It was like a damn chia pet!

Next we took the moss and filled the feeder bowl and then poured warm water over it and left it for a few hours.

We went out to the croc pond and had to persuade some movement, but ended up finding 25 eggs.  One looked cracked, but we could see a visible band on all the rest of them.  We carefully took them out and placed them on a bed of hay in the same position as they were in the nest in a plastic tupperware tub. All the while we had the stare and gaze of onlookers! 

We brought them back to the incubator and placed them on top of the Forest Bed.  Then we filled in all around the eggs, 4 rows of 6-7 eggs per row, with the moss.  We only packed the moss finger-push tight, not truly packed down hard.  Once that was done we covered them all, lightly, with a layer of moss.

We added a hydrometer from my cigar case and a thermometer that came with the incubator and covered it.  We made a few adjustments during the night to the thermostat, but we seem to have a good 87 degrees and a humidity level of 90 percent in the packed-to-the-gills incubator.

Just need to wait 60-80 days, now!

Pictures from our first two nests can be found here.

Pictures from our first two clutches can be found here.

# We're not sure which one because they had both been very protective of the area.  At first we thought it was Angel, but as you read further you'll see why that couldn't be.

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