aliceinwl
New member
When this season started, I had to euthanise my first two hatchlings due to lack of eyelids. I also had a fair number hatch out with very minor eyelid defects. At this point, I did a couple of things. I remember breeders in the past blaming this kind of defect on vitamin A deficiency so I started using herptivite at every feeding. I had also heard people claiming that it was due to temperature fluctuations during incubation so I hooked my hovabator up to a thermostat.
Because it was so widespread, I didn't feel that it was likely to be genetic. I had it crop up in my stock x crestedgecko, dragon's den x sf geckos, groundgecko freak x vms, my stock x sf gecko... All the parents are defect free, the majority of these pairings were also done last year without any incidence of deformity.
After making the above adjustments, the defects stopped. But which adjustment fixed the problem?
I decided to incubate my last 8 eggs in one of my empty boxes in my rack. The temperatures fluctuated a lot with highs in the low to high 80's and lows in the mid 70's to low 80's. I lost one egg a few weeks into incubation. The embryo looked perfect. The remaining 7 all hatched. All were flawless and had completely absorbed their yolk sacs.
I realize that there were likely a lot of variables I didn't take into account. But, at this point I'm inclined to blame the defects on some nutritional deficiency in the parents. Last year I had a couple eyelid defects, but no where near as many as this year. Last year I also made the switch from crickets to mealworms and this year was my first mealworm only year. So for next year, I'm definitely going to have to change my gutload up.
If anyone has had any other experiences with this type of thing, I'd love to hear about it. Even though I suspect that the defects are due to a nutritional deficiency, the guys with them are "pet only".
-Alice
Because it was so widespread, I didn't feel that it was likely to be genetic. I had it crop up in my stock x crestedgecko, dragon's den x sf geckos, groundgecko freak x vms, my stock x sf gecko... All the parents are defect free, the majority of these pairings were also done last year without any incidence of deformity.
After making the above adjustments, the defects stopped. But which adjustment fixed the problem?
I decided to incubate my last 8 eggs in one of my empty boxes in my rack. The temperatures fluctuated a lot with highs in the low to high 80's and lows in the mid 70's to low 80's. I lost one egg a few weeks into incubation. The embryo looked perfect. The remaining 7 all hatched. All were flawless and had completely absorbed their yolk sacs.
I realize that there were likely a lot of variables I didn't take into account. But, at this point I'm inclined to blame the defects on some nutritional deficiency in the parents. Last year I had a couple eyelid defects, but no where near as many as this year. Last year I also made the switch from crickets to mealworms and this year was my first mealworm only year. So for next year, I'm definitely going to have to change my gutload up.
If anyone has had any other experiences with this type of thing, I'd love to hear about it. Even though I suspect that the defects are due to a nutritional deficiency, the guys with them are "pet only".
-Alice