MEE eggs 6/17/21

Yvonne G

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This is the fourth year my young Manouria emys emys has fooled with nesting and laying eggs. The first year she just picked a spot out in the yard and started scraping the dirt to make a nest. There wasn't any loose dirt to scrape, so after she had scraped what she figured was long enough, she pooped out the eggs, then started scraping again to cover them up. By the time I realized this was going on all the eggs were broken and mixed in the dirt.

I'm missing one of her nestings from my memory banks, but the one I DO remember , I think it was last year, she deposited all the eggs in the waterer. By the time I found them they were all water logged and no good.

All three of those last 'nestings' were in July, so I was sort of caught off guard when she started nest building a couple three weeks ago. This time she did it right. There were quite a few left over leaves in their yard and she scraped up quite a nice 'hill' inside the shelter. She sat on the hill for a couple weeks, so I figured she had laid the eggs. Yesterday when she was off the nest I got my trusty garden fork and started scraping away the dirt. I got down to the level of the ground and found no eggs. I didn't put the dirt back.

So tonight I'm sitting there n my recliner, watching TV and I kept hearing bumping and banging (the Manouria yard is just outside my window and my recliner is right next to the window). It finally reached the part of my brain that told me I should probably go out there and make sure no one was cast in their stall, so to speak.

The female Manouria was inside the shelter and had a few broken and squashed eggs behind her and she was scraping with her back feet to cover her nest. I probed around behind her and she was actually digging the eggs up as she covered them. I rescued all that weren't broken and came up with forty something.

I cleaned them off and set up the ones I thought weren't too damaged, and I have 35 in the incubator. This year I'm using Hatchrite as the medium. Fingers crossed I can treat them right and in 3 months there will be many cute little Manouria babies running around!

I had a tray of potting soil right next to the shelter, so I set all the eggs in that:

MEE eggs 6-17-21 a.jpg

The ones worth salvaging:

MEE 6-17-21 c.jpg

The rejects:

MEE eggs 6-17-21 b.jpg
 

MEEJogja

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Really exciting stuff Yvonne! I have my fingers crossed :)
 

2monte

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Very cool! I felt bad when I found one broken hermann's break egg after all her hard work of digging in the sand. Must not feel good to find the whole cluch ends up broken. Especially considering how big those clutches are.
 

Markw84

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Great news, @Yvonne G . Hope all goes well.

I do have a question, though... What are the thoughts on Hatchrite? It is basically a gel medium to hold moisture mixed with perlite. I certainly don't like perlite.

Thoughts?
 

Yvonne G

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This is the first time I'm using it. I talked to Carol S because of her success hatching Russians (I also have a bunch of Russian eggs from three tortoises), and she suggests the Hatchrite for the Russians, so I figured to try it for the Manouria too. I'll take the hatchlings out before they have a chance to eat the perlite.
 

Tom

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I'll take the hatchlings out before they have a chance to eat the perlite.
My hatchlings stick their head out and eat while they are still in the shell. Be careful. It would be a shame to lose hatchlings after trying so hard to get them going. If you are able to monitor and get them off the perlite at the first sign of a pip on every egg, it should be okay, but personally, I would not risk it.
 

wellington

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Just wondering, couldn't a piece of say cheese cloth be put between the eggs and perlite to ensure none was eaten? The moisture would not be blocked but the substrate would be.
 

Yvonne G

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I have one empty Vision cage that needs Will to screw in the stoopud neon light. It's an aptitude test that's beyond my capabilities. So until Will gets that one set up, I'm going to put any of the Mee that hatch into a dish pan with substrate, etc. and set the dishpan inside that Vision cage. I'm going to go check on them now. . .
 

Yvonne G

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So far only two, which is a good thing because that first one has a really, REALLY large yolk sack still attached. It's been my experience that they've hatched after about three months, so these guys at only two months is a little concerning to me.

Manouria emys emys hatch 8-19-21 b.jpg
 

Yvonne G

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Well, six of the eggs pipped all around the same time. I put them into the Vision cage to finish hatching. Three of them died and three are up and about. I'll be adding more plants and leaves, but I wanted to get a picture while you can still see them.

Manouria emys emys hatch 8-26-21 a.jpgManouria emys emys hatch 8-26-21 b.jpg
 

Cathie G

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Well, six of the eggs pipped all around the same time. I put them into the Vision cage to finish hatching. Three of them died and three are up and about. I'll be adding more plants and leaves, but I wanted to get a picture while you can still see them.

View attachment 331723View attachment 331724
Something I've always wondered about is if they are actually blue as hatchlings and growing ? I read they are called Russian blue ?
 

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