To cut or not to cut??

Hey, everyone!! Have not been on here in awhile. I currently have a clutch of gray-band eggs incubating. It has been 58 days and so far out of 10, 3 have hatched. 3 eggs have slits or are starting to get slits. The other ones look like they have these black lines starting to show up, as if the little guy might be tryng to slit the shell but can't. My question is, should I cut open the eggs that have not slit?? One egg looks like it might be starting to cave a bit and another is starting to get a bit darker, but is still nice and leathery. Do these sound bad?? Would you cut these or just wait?? This is my first batch of snake eggs ever, so I am new to this. I have done a lot of research, but there is only so much you can find. Looking forward to your responses!!

This sounds totally normal. I would just leave them.

Ok, awesome!! That is good to hear. :-)

Just out of curiosity, would slitting them at this point do any damage??

No, I think it would be fine to slit them. Just be careful not to go in too deep. I'm sure you know that. You can cut a little half circle, lift the flap and poke the snake to see if it moves. Just don't pull it out and always let them come completely out on their own. Even when they are sticking their heads out, if you force them out, they can die. I've made that mistake before.

Ok, so I poked them and they are not moving. Should they be? It still looks like there is quite a bit of yolk in the eggs. I hope they aren't goners.

Yeah, I think they are dead, but let me inform my friend DMong about this thread and see what he says. Leave them alone for the time being.

Well, I usually wait until after the second day after the first pips out to do any slicing. If you were VERY careful about just following the very surface of the shell when slitting and there is no movement in the snake when you gently poke them with a blunt object, they likely went close to full-term and died. This can happen for many different unknown reasons. I am betting that there are others that will be fine and hatch out on their own by tomorrow morning since some others are already out. After tomorrow, I might carefully slice the others open. But as Ross mentioned, only put a slice in them that they can poke their heads out, then rest and absorb the rest of their yolk, they will do the rest within another day or so and come all the way out on their own. Do not attempt to get them out of the egg at all, they can bleed to death very easily this way by rupturing delicate blood vessels that are still attached to their belly.

good luck with it....


~Doug

OH!,....almost forgot!........leave the ones alone in the box that you didn't notice move. If they are alive, they will stick their heads out by the morning too. If you keep spooking hatchlings when they are wanting to pip and stick their heads out, all they will keep doing is ducking back and hiding because they don't think it is safe to venture out. I have even known of some to go so far back into the egg, they got disoriented in the tight coils of the egg and actually drowned. So in other words, if by the morning all of them haven't at least pipped the egg and you don't see leaking slits and/or bubbles from them breathing, just carefully cut their surface about an inch long and leave them alone for another day or so. Then you should see more heads.


~Doug

I forgot to add. Some of these eggs where the snake wasn't moving inside already had slits in them. Maybe they are alive?? I am just gonna wait it out and see what happens. I read that gray-band eggs can take up to 70 days to hatch!! Thanks for the info by the way!!