A few years back one of my female cherry head red-footed tortoises produced four neonates that possessed nuchal scutes. As nuchal scutes are not known in the South American genus of Chelonoidis this was somewhat noteworthy.
An article about this odd phenomenon was was written up in the German turtle journal, Schildkroten im Fokus. Here is a link to the abstract.
http://www.schildkroeten-im-fokus.de/sifarchiv/2010_2may.html
Since that time the female that produced those odd hatchlings has produced numerous other neonates but none has possessed nuchal scutes. This ended today. While checking the incubator this morning I spotted this little guy...
At first I wasn't sure what I was seeing and during the day the hatchling went through the usual actions a neonate does while breaking out of their egg so I couldn't get a great view...
But I did manage to get a couple of photos...
Sure enough, this hatchling does in fact have a nuchal scute just like the others did a few years ago. This is the first of four from this clutch to pip so it will be interesting to see if the others also have this trait. In the previous experience there was one hatchling per clutch with a nuchal scute.
An article about this odd phenomenon was was written up in the German turtle journal, Schildkroten im Fokus. Here is a link to the abstract.
http://www.schildkroeten-im-fokus.de/sifarchiv/2010_2may.html
Since that time the female that produced those odd hatchlings has produced numerous other neonates but none has possessed nuchal scutes. This ended today. While checking the incubator this morning I spotted this little guy...
At first I wasn't sure what I was seeing and during the day the hatchling went through the usual actions a neonate does while breaking out of their egg so I couldn't get a great view...
But I did manage to get a couple of photos...
Sure enough, this hatchling does in fact have a nuchal scute just like the others did a few years ago. This is the first of four from this clutch to pip so it will be interesting to see if the others also have this trait. In the previous experience there was one hatchling per clutch with a nuchal scute.