Advice with nesting sulcata

[SulcataPardalis]

Hi,

My female sulcata successfully laid earlier this year (March) in her nesting box that I have set up for her.

She seems to have decided it is time to lay again. She has started two nests outside - they are more like open cast mining, rather than nesting. The problem I have is that here in the UK the weather is really cold. She seems to keep going back to the same two 'nests', digs a while, and it's as though she gets too cold and runs out of energy and just seems to go to sleep.

I have tried placing a heat lamp over her, but when she has decided she has had enough, that's it, she just gives up.

I have tried her in the hot nesting box, but she just isn't interested in it for some reason.

Any suggestions as to what I can do, as I don't want her to become egg bound.

Thanks

Stuart

 

[Tom]

They often dig test holes and that may be what is going on outside. She may also be stopping because you keep fussing over her. I hear stories of people catching the eggs as they drop and whatnot. My sulcata females stop all nesting activity if I get within 100 feet of them. They stop and watch me until I walk away then they resume. There is no way I could walk up and stick my hand under them with out causing them to stop. Mine lay in January here with temps often in the 30s or 40s F. I don't think temps are your issue, but it's possible.

I think you should contact other UK breeders and ask them what they do.

 

[SulcataPardalis]

It's hovering around 45 degrees here today.

She will dig, then sit in the hole, with her head in, for hours. I am more than happy to just leave her and let her get on with it, but come 7pm it is pitch black here with the temps falling. I have assumed this last week that once it gets to this time of the evening she isn't going to do anything, so have taken her to her shed.

 

[Tom]

If she's digging with her front feet, she's just burrowing. Its when she turns around and starts digging with her back legs that she's nesting. I don't know how it works over there, but over here mine usually stop nesting over the hot summer. Their last clutches are usually laid in early to mid June and they don't start again until late December or January, in the middle of winter here. Anything is possible, but it seems unlikely that she'd be digging a nest right now.

 

[SulcataPardalis]

She's definitely nesting. She digs a large hole with her front feet, then turns around and starts digging with her back feet. It looks like she starts to dig a jug shaped hole like my leopards do, but gives up at that point. In eight years she has never just burrowed, so I am 99% certain she is nesting.

All my leopards and this sulcata have nested between October and March - right through winter.

I'll just let her get on with it.

 

[murdocjunior]

dont worry mine does the same, she nest than goes to sleep in the hole.