Yesterday evening, two of my Anoles mated for the first time. I'm just posting this because I have SO many questions, and I really hope for them to be answered. I'm going to organize them into a list. 1. Should I keep the gravid one in a separate tank? 2. How to incubate the eggs? 3. Should I incubate all of the eggs? 4. How to provide extra calcium in her diet? 5. Any helpful fruits to put in her food bowl? 6. When gravid, Mealworms or crickets recommended? 7. Ways to keep crickets from munching on the eggs (If they even do that?)?
1. Should I keep the gravid one in a separate tank? It isn't necessary. In fact, switching her enclosure may stress her more than it might help. As long as she was not injured during mating and is not displaying any signs of distress, she should be fine left in the cage with the male. Obviously just make sure she has a suitable amount of laying substrate. Over the course of the next few weeks, the pair will probably mate multiple times, and she should lay 1-2 eggs each time afterwards. 2. How to incubate the eggs? There are a lot of options. Some people have even hatched them in the setup, but I don't recommend this as the female may injure the egg when she goes to bury the next one. One method is as follows: Set up a covered container with air holes poked on the top and sides. Line the bottom with a 1:1 water:vermiculite mix. You can use sand, soil, or peat moss (or even a mixture of substrates) instead, but vermiculate has a very successful hatch rate when incubating herps due to its ability to stay moist without molding. The container should be around 85*F. Make sure you keep the substrate moist, but don't over-wet it. Use your finger to make an indent in the substrate that you can set the egg in. The egg should only be about halfway buried. It must remain in the same level position it was laid. (Don't roll/flip it.) They also need to be spaced apart far enough so that they will not touch each other when they grow, otherwise they will end up sticking together. Keep the eggs like this until they hatch, which should be in about a month to a month and a half (30-45 days). 3. Should I incubate all of the eggs? You only need to incubate the fertile ones. You can candle the eggs after a week or two to see if they are viable or not. Hold the egg up to a candler in a dark room. Fertile eggs will have blood vessels branching out throughout them from a center point where the embryo is growing. If you don't have a candler, you should probably incubate them all. 4. How to provide extra calcium in her diet? Just make sure you are dusting her food regularly and she has access to a UVB light. Some people dust their food more frequently than usual. If you're going to do this, I'd get a vitamin d3 free supplement such as that made by Rep Cal. Too much vitamin d3 can actually be toxic, which is why I recommend this. Once breeding season is over and she has stopped laying eggs, make sure you go back to normal supplementation frequency. Over-supplementing calcium long-term can lead to health issues such as kidney stones. 5. Any helpful fruits to put in her food bowl? Anoles are insectivorous, so they don't need fruit in their diet. 6. When gravid, Mealworms or crickets recommended? Gut-loaded crickets. Mealworms have very little meat, are high in phosphorous, and their thick shell can be difficult to digest. Only use these as a rare treat, or (preferably, IMO) not at all. 7. Ways to keep crickets from munching on the eggs (If they even do that?)? Never leave uneaten insects in the enclosure (regardless of whether your reptiles are breeding or not). --------- I hope I covered everything...I had to do a little research for refreshers on the temps and incubation period...And I'm sorry if this is not well written or is too blunt at some points. I'm not in the mood to review it, lol. Also, as is usually the case, this is only based on a lot of random reading I've done. I don't have any experience breeding anoles... Um, good luck.
