Any pygmy experts out there?

In June, I purchased 2 pygmy chams (brev's). They both looked alike to me in tail length and width, and both were really round. Females, right?

Day 5: One lays 3 eggs.
Day 12: the other (I assume) lays 3 eggs.
Day 31: One of them lays 5 eggs.
Today: I see them in an unmistakable copulating position.

So, is it more likely that one female laid 11 eggs in 4 weeks (and the other is male), or that 2 females are imitating mating behavior?

BTW, all eggs, so far, are expanding and looking fertile.

Noelle

I was always told you could tell sex by tail length with the pygs. I cant remember which sex has the short tail though. Im no brev expert. I just remember reading that somewhere. If they both have same length tails I'd say both were femeale if not then you got a pr!

Got my answer today. Both laid today, 9 eggs total. The first 11 eggs are growing and looking good, which means these little guys (girls) must have amazing sperm retention! As cool as it is, it's not healthy. Other than adding extra calcium, I'm not quite sure how to get them to stop. They're already kept at room temp (low 70's), so I'm afraid to cool them any more. How come this never happens to my rare and expensive animals????

Noelle

If those eggs hatch, I want to buy your babies!! Dying to start a breeding colony and I only have one lonely male brev who is dying for some ladies! Please let me know if/when you have babies to sell! Thanks so much!!
-Jessica

Pygmy Cham imports often come in with gravid females all the time. Supposedly they breed like rats in captivity if kept properly.

They've laid 6 more eggs between them since I started this thread. Four have hatched, 2 died shortly thereafter, the other two are going strong. The hatchlings that died, I believe, drowned in the egg. After they pip, they might take another 6-7 hours to get their head out. On the second one, I tried tearing the egg a bit further so the head could emerge, and it was extremely hard to tear. I'm wondering if feeding them dusted insects perhaps made the eggshell too strong. Sounds crazy, but I've helped a lot of hatchlings over the years, and have never seen eggs this tough.

Noelle

I believe the eggs in this species is extremely tough because these chameleons lay eggs under leaf litter on the ground (they dont bury their eggs too far down in the ground), this is so that they cannot be broken by things that my fall on the leaf litter and would otherwise crush the eggs if not for the harder shell layer.