Greek Tortoise Surprise Eggs - HELP ME QUICK!!

[farber2028]

HELP!!! My greek tortoise that we've had for about a month has laid two eggs so far. I have no idea what to do or if they are fertile. Laying on a paper towel they do seem to have a pinkish hue to them. The eggs are pretty hard. One was laid in water the other was laid on the substrate. I want to know if there is any way we can tell if they are fertile or not right now. Because if they are I need to go make an incubator. Otherwise there's no point

HELP!!!!!!

 

[shellfreak]

It's hard to tell this early on. My advice is make an incubator ASAP. They should be turning a chalky color in the next week. After about 3 weeks you can candle them to see if you see any veins. If you do. You're gonna have babies.

 

[farber2028]

already got the make shift incubator set up. I decided I was going to do it regardless if they are fertile or not. I've got a cooler with about 4 inches of water. An aquarium heater. a ziploc plastic bin full of shagnum moss with a thermometer and humidity gauge set up in there. Rafiki laying the eggs this morning is one of the coolest things I've witnessed. I attached a picture of the eggs from this morning

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I've been thinking about it and there's a good possibility they are fertile. We have had her for 3-4 weeks-ish and before that at petco she was with a male that was almost as big as she is. KEEPING MY FINGERS CROSSED!

 

[GBtortoises]

What is the humidity percentage and temperature?What that much water being heated you might have a concern of the humidity level becoming too high. That set up works well for aquatic and terrestrial turtle eggs.

 

[farber2028]

temp is around 85 and the humidity is about 80ish

 

[farber2028]

One other concern. Rafiki didn't bury the eggs at all. One she laid in her water bowl, the other she climbed on top of her log and laid it right on the substrate. Is this a problem at all? I wasn't expecting her to lay eggs so I didn't provide a spot for her to lay them. A lot of what I've read is if they don't try to bury the eggs they are usually just discarding them. Is that true? I just feel like it isn't a case because she probably couldn't find a good spot to lay them. A few days prior to her laying the eggs, I did notice she started digging with her hind legs, which she had never done before. Also from what I've been reading, they don't appear to be infertile. I just bought a hovabator and having it shipped next day. Any further help or insight is greatly appreciated!

 

[GBtortoises]

85 degrees is about as low as you would want to incubate them. Theoretically that temperature will produce predominately male offspring. Most incubate tortoises eggs between 87-89 degrees which will produce a mixture of male/female to predominately female offspring.
As far as humidity, 80% is about as high as you'd want Middle Eastern Greek eggs to be. Around 65-70% will ensure less of a chance or mold or embryo suffocation.

Yes, in most cases, eggs that are deposited on top of the ground are infertile. But this is not always true. It could be a case of the female not having a suitable nesting spot. There could be a number of reasons (or combination of reasons) that she did not nest including: Too much activity going on around her, ground temperature at nesting sites not being suitable, choices of nesting sites being too dry, too moist, not protected, etc...

It could even come down to the individual. Some females will nest just about anywhere and even in some very unlikely places, while others seem to need a "perfect" spot. I've never seen any difference among species, but definitely have among individuals of various species!

The fact that she was with a male at PetCo is probably irrelevant, chances of them sucessfully copulating in those conditions and/or the ones they were in prior to that are doubtful. More likely, being place in a new, less crowded, more stable environment with correct lighting and temperatures caused your tortoise to develop and produce eggs. Also just because she may not have been bred recently still doesn't mean that the eggs aren't fertile since they can retain sperm for many years after last being bred.

The fact that she made an attempt to begin to nest by digging can be a good sign. I always treat all eggs, whether nested or deposited on the ground, as if they are fertile and incubate them. Sometimes you can be pleasantly suprised by the outcome!

 

[farber2028]

do greeks usually lay more than once clutch?

 

[GBtortoises]

do greeks usually lay more than once clutch?

Generally yes, but the number of clutches and the number of eggs per clutch are often determined by subspecies and often environmental conditions.

 

[farber2028]

It will be interesting to see if she lays more. It sucks I can't make her a spot to lay them though.

 

[farber2028]

Day #3. Took them out of the high humidity homemade incubator. Place them in a HovaBator on vermiculite. Temp's hovering around 90 and humidity is 60-70%. Took a couple of pics of the eggs just to show. This coming Thursday I am going to candle the eggs to see what they look like. I will continue to post pics and keep everyone updated. Thanks everybody for all their help!!

 

[sibi]

Cool!

 

[farber2028]

I found two more eggs in buried deep in Rafiki's substrate today! I decided I was going to move her enclosure around and that's what I found!! So cool!

 

[lvstorts]

Day #3. Took them out of the high humidity homemade incubator. Place them in a HovaBator on vermiculite. Temp's hovering around 90 and humidity is 60-70%. Took a couple of pics of the eggs just to show. This coming Thursday I am going to candle the eggs to see what they look like. I will continue to post pics and keep everyone updated. Thanks everybody for all their help!!

Don't expect to see anything candling at 3 days. Too early for blood vessels.

 

[farber2028]

Yeah I've come to learn that. If you were to candle them right now though, if they're fertile how should they appear?

 

[lvstorts]

First phase is chaulking, where the embryo attaches to the side of the egg. The opaque color will change to white. May several days to 15 days...everything depends on environmental and the embryo, there is no hard and fast rule.

Did you ever determine what subspecies she is?

 

[farber2028]

I reached out to a guy earlier today from a website I found. He says that she is a testudo graeca terrestris (Jordanian Greek Tortoise) which is all petco is getting right now.

 

[farber2028]

Update: Two of the eggs have started to "band" one looks like it's forming and the other one I can't so much of anything going on. Next update will be when I candle them in two weeks! Thanks for the help again everyone!

 

[farber2028]

one of the eggs has veins!

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/thread-71965.html