# Longest egg incubation period...ever?



## RedfootsRule (Aug 24, 2012)

One of my adult red foots layed eggs back on March 10th. Well, come today, the last of the eggs have hatched...6 months and over 2 weeks later. Is this normal? I have never heard of an incubation period this long. But here is where it gets weirder. These eggs WILL NOT hatch on their own. I let my eggs incubate by themselves outside, where the females lay them. After a little over 5 months, I finally decided to try and dig them up (VERY CAREFULLY) to see what was going on. I didn't immediately take them out of the hole, but dug around them to see what the eggs looked like. (I know this sounds like a very bad idea and dangerous for the potential hatchlings, but curiosity got the better of me)They were healthy-looking eggs, some with small cracks in them.
Eventually, one egg hatched, and no others for a whole week. Any other eggs I have had hatch within two days of each other, so I was extremely confused. Eventually, I accidentally broke a piece of eggshell off of one egg, as it was very brittle. This made a small hole in the egg. From the tiny whole I could see a turtle inside. A few days later, I dug this egg up and let it hatch inside. It is now a completely healthy turtle. Well, there were a few more eggs, but now, almost 4 weeks since the first egg hatched, I still have one egg. A week ago I dug this egg up when it still didn't have any cracks. I finally manually broke a small hole in the egg, as this seemed to induce the other babies to hatch. There was still a mucus sac around it and I could see blood veins, so I left it. Well, today it started smelling like it was rotting so I peeled off more of the eggshell to see if it was alive. I got to a leg, and it moved. An hour later the baby poked its head out of the egg, and has started to hatch. I literally MADE it hatch...I am so confused, and this single baby has been incubated for 6 months and 16 days. Any idea what has happened?

Please note, all the other babies I did this with are completely healthy and eating great. I had to do what I did because I was worried they would die in the eggs.


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