Sulcata Nesting

Iamlights

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So for about a week or so my 8 year old sulcata has been cranky and digging random holes with her back legs. Yesterday she was digging with her back legs for hours in the same hole, but no eggs even though she covered the hole back up. Is this normal?
 

Ray--Opo

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Don't have any answers for you but Rhino is a beautiful sully!
 

Lunaqua

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I would have her x-rayed to make sure she isn’t full of eggs that she cannot pass. Good luck!
 

Tom

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Test holes are normal. Covering it back up without laying is unusual.

Will this be her first time laying? Do you have a male with her?

I would start soaking her for an hour every other day for a while.
 

Markw84

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I agree with Tom. I have never seen one cover an empty nest. They just abandon it.

The picture show a nest that is very far along and almost, if not ready to start laying eggs. Are you sure there are not eggs there? If she took the time to cover the nest, I bet there are eggs there. They would be 10"-13" deep to the top egg - so you have to dig down to get to them.
 

Iamlights

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Test holes are normal. Covering it back up without laying is unusual.

Will this be her first time laying? Do you have a male with her?

I would start soaking her for an hour every other day for a while.
This will be her first time and yes I have a male sulcata which I separated a few months ago when I found out he was a male . I have not soaked her since but I will try.
 

Iamlights

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I agree with Tom. I have never seen one cover an empty nest. They just abandon it.

The picture show a nest that is very far along and almost, if not ready to start laying eggs. Are you sure there are not eggs there? If she took the time to cover the nest, I bet there are eggs there. They would be 10"-13" deep to the top egg - so you have to dig down to get to them.


She dug other holes and left those but this one she covered up and I've never seen her do this or act this way. I did dig up that hole but didn't not find anything. Maybe I didn't look very well. I will look again.
 

Iamlights

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So for about a week or so my 8 year old sulcata has been cranky and digging random holes with her back legs. Yesterday she was digging with her back legs for hours in the same hole, but no eggs even though she covered the hole back up. Is this normal?
Update: I dug further down where she had initially covered up her nest and guess what I found! I was only able to save 11 unfortunately. 20190330_153930.jpeg
 

Iamlights

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We built this incubator last night based on a YouTube video after doing some research. It uses an aquarium heater and pump with just enough water to cover the equipment, which keeps the humidity at or near 100% and the temperature at, from what I can tell so far, 90°. The eggs themselves are not getting water directly on them - just the humidity and a bit of fresh air from a few holes we drilled in the cooler and container. 20190331_094911.jpeg
 

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