1derfool
New member
I haven't posted much here, but read the forum regularly. (Hi Monte, it's me again 
)
Anyhoo, I've got a few pictures that I thought might be interesting to some of you with stronger stomachs.
A clutch of leopard gecko eggs from Jan 21 died a few weeks ago. I normally leave them until it's obvious they're dead, so the last month I've been watching them, and noticed they're drying out, getting a bit mummified. The first clue I had about them being in trouble was mid-February, they didn't look 'just right'. By late February/early March, they weren't growing as one would expect, but I still left them. A few days ago I decided they were write-offs, there was a distinct odour coming from the deli-cup.
So, out of curiosity, I opened the eggs.
Some of the details could be in better focus, but it's hard to do with something that small. There's a Q-tip in some of the pictures for scale.
One egg was just a mess of 'pink cream cheese' looking paste, with a small body-like mass, nothing very discernible, so I didn't take any pictures (the smell was a bit too much). The second egg had dried out to some extent, somewhat like a geode, leaving an almost mummified body. The features of the embryo are already visible. If you look really hard at the pictures, you can see, or at least
make out, the muscles, vertebrae, and even ribs.
I find it's amazing how fast the body develops. Those eggs were in trouble at about 4 weeks, for all I know, they could have already been dead earlier, but I just didn't notice the problem.
It would be interesting to be able to take time-lapse photos, say every couple of hours to see how much it's grown and developed. I guess if you're going to be ready to hatch and tackle the world in 2 months, you have to grow fast.
His parents are Urban Gecko SHTB tangerine carrot-tails.
*sigh*
)Anyhoo, I've got a few pictures that I thought might be interesting to some of you with stronger stomachs.
A clutch of leopard gecko eggs from Jan 21 died a few weeks ago. I normally leave them until it's obvious they're dead, so the last month I've been watching them, and noticed they're drying out, getting a bit mummified. The first clue I had about them being in trouble was mid-February, they didn't look 'just right'. By late February/early March, they weren't growing as one would expect, but I still left them. A few days ago I decided they were write-offs, there was a distinct odour coming from the deli-cup.
So, out of curiosity, I opened the eggs.
Some of the details could be in better focus, but it's hard to do with something that small. There's a Q-tip in some of the pictures for scale.
One egg was just a mess of 'pink cream cheese' looking paste, with a small body-like mass, nothing very discernible, so I didn't take any pictures (the smell was a bit too much). The second egg had dried out to some extent, somewhat like a geode, leaving an almost mummified body. The features of the embryo are already visible. If you look really hard at the pictures, you can see, or at least
make out, the muscles, vertebrae, and even ribs.
I find it's amazing how fast the body develops. Those eggs were in trouble at about 4 weeks, for all I know, they could have already been dead earlier, but I just didn't notice the problem.
It would be interesting to be able to take time-lapse photos, say every couple of hours to see how much it's grown and developed. I guess if you're going to be ready to hatch and tackle the world in 2 months, you have to grow fast.
His parents are Urban Gecko SHTB tangerine carrot-tails.
*sigh*
