Hatching season is virtually over

The last 2 clutched hatched last week. Now, there is only one egg left, which is the only good one from the only snake to lay a 2nd clutch, N'omi. This only should hatch near the end of September or in early October.

The last 2 clutches were from our 2 new girls, D'vorah and Y'hudit. D'vorah's clutch was about half normals and half amelanistics, since she is amelanistic and her mate, Gavnoni, is heterozygous for amelanism. He is also het for anerythrism (we know this only because we know his parents), but apparently she is not, since we got no anerythristics or snows (amelanistic AND anerythristic) from her. We got 12 babies from D'vorah, out of 15 eggs that she laid.

Y'hudit's clutch is about half normals and half hypomelanistics. This proves that she is het for hypomelanism, something which we did not previously know. Her mate was Yeled, who is an amber corn snake (both caramel and hypomelanistic). We got 19 babies from Y'hudit, out of 23 eggs that she laid.

All of these new babies will be fed for the 1st time next Sunday. Only then will we have some idea of how many will eat and how many will steadfastly refuse to eat.

More hatching!

Yesterday evening (Monday evening), the first eggs in the 4th clutch began pipping. None of them have crawled out of their eggs yet. This clutch is from a male corn snake, Gavnoni, who is normal (although he has had a lot of weird bumps since he himself hatched, 4 years ago!) but heterozygous for amelanism and anerythrism, and a female amelanistic corn snake (D'vorah), whom we got from our friend, Golan, in trade for the snakes that we gave him. If D'vorah is het (heterozygous) for anerythrism, we should get some anerythristics and some snows (amelanistic AND anerythristic) from this clutch. If not, we'll get about half normals and half amelanistics. In another day, we should know.

One egg in the 5th clutched also pipped, and, in fact, the snakeling has already crawled out of that one. This clutch was laid 3 days after the 4th one by Y'hudit, an anerythristic corn snake that we also got from Golan in the same trade. The father is Yeled, our amber (hypomelanistic caramel) corn snake. Barring any unexpected hidden genes on either side, this clutch will be entirely normal, but they will ALL be het for hypomelanism, caramel, and anerythrism. So, when they are later bred to each other, it will be possible to get normals, normal hypos, caramels, anerythristics, ambers, and ghosts (hypomelanistic anerythristics).

Hatching update

Sure enough, the 2nd clutch began pipping before all of the 1st clutch babies were even out of their eggs! All 19 of the 1st clutch eggs are now hatched, and all of the babies are safely in the Hovabator. So far, 2 babies from the 2nd clutch have crawled out of their eggs, and at least 3 more have pipped but not emerged yet.

The 2nd clutch babies are from a pair of our "project" snakes from last year's project. We have only 2 clutches (the 2nd and 3rd ones) from "project" snakes this year. Last year, we had 5 "project" clutches, I think, but some of the parents have died since then. The project parents are actually all brothers and sisters from a single clutch that we produced in 2004, while we were still in California, which we brought with us. They were the result of us breeding a male amelanistic Emory rat snake to a female lavender corn snake. The first generation is uninteresting in itself, but when we mated them last year, we got normals, amelanistics, lavenders, and "opals" (both amelanistic AND lavender). Besides that, we got a 2 or 3 individuals who were totally unique and unlike any of the others. This indicates that some other genes are involved that we did not know about but which must have been hidden in the original pair. We're hoping to get some more interesting ones this year, but the 2 who have hatched so far are, I think, just regular normals. Of course, ALL of these are, like their parents, half Emory rat snake and half corn snake (really 2 different subspecies of the same species, which, however, apparently do NOT mate in the wild even though their ranges overlap).

Hatching season has begun!

Hatching season at our house has begun! Yesterday, before going to bed, I took 6 snakelings who had already crawled out of their eggs down to the Hovabator (incubator) in the basement. I had turned it on earlier. This morning, there were 3 more out of their eggs, and just a few minutes ago I checked, and there were still 2 more. Also, all 19 of the eggs in this first clutch have at least pipped (the snakelings have cut the initial slit with their "egg tooth"). So, by tomorrow if not tonight, we should have 19 new babies!

We have a little surprise, however, and it's not such a good one. Apparently, when we kept N'omi, the snake who laid this 1st clutch, we got a little confused about which parents she was from. I say this because we had believed that she was heterozygous (carrying one copy of the recessive gene) for both amelanism (snakes with no melanin and therefore no black or brown color in them) and anerythrism (snakes with only black and white coloration). We mated her to Gur, an amelanistic snake who is het (short for "heterozygous") for anerythrism. However, we have gotten not a single amelanistic or snow (amelanistic AND anerythristic, and therefore nearly all white) baby, so now it's almost certain that she, in fact, is NOT het for amelanism. We have, however, gotten several anerythristic babies, so this definitely proves that both she and Gur are indeed het for anerythrism.

The second clutch we have was laid 5 days after this 1st one, so it won't be long until those start hatching, too. And the 3rd clutch was laid 5 days after the 2nd... :-)