A pyrrhogaster egg!

[Molch]

Just one. One single egg. In the hornwort. It's got a light-colored side and a dark side, like the half moon. I'm not getting excited. I'm calm and composed. I'm very Zen and am succesfully divorcing my emotional involvement from the outcome. It's probably a dud. Or a delusion. It might be the red wine. The female is at least 15 years old, and she doesn't even look gravid. Maybe she just dropped this one accidentally on the way to the grocery store.

Still, to have pyrrhogaster babies again.....wish me luck for more!

 

[RobM]

Good luck!

 

[evut]

Good luck, hope you get more!

(If you are hoping to raise a little pyrrho out of it, remove at ASAP if you haven't done it already. If your adults are anything like mine the poor eggs and larvae will have no chance...)

 

[Molch]

already done - I know these knuckleheads are expert egg eaters

 

[Molch]

Oh the villainy!!

Oh the villainy!

Nefarious doings in the pyrrhogaster tank! Caught in flagranti:

I came home tonight and checked the pyrrh tank for any more eggs. And what do I see? A suspicious newt knot in the java fern. Upon close inspection, there's the female, trying to squeeze off an egg, and BOTH males are hanging in attendance right around her butt to see what delicacies she will produce. :evil:One of them - and I swear I am not making this up - has her foot in his mouth, while the other is aggressively nosing the leaf right around her cloaca, making nasty little snapping movements. :angry:

Can you believe such a thing?! Who knows how many eggs got napped in this manner? I knew these guys were champion egg eaters, but this is in a whole new category.

The evil-doers were immediately arrested, charged with aggravated egg-napping and imprisoned in a separate aquarium. I now hope that the one egg I managed to find yesterday wasn't the only one that has escaped their attention.

And yes, these characters are well fed. They get earthworms at least twice a week, plus Daphnia and blood worms. They are fat! But egg salad has apparently been missing on their menu....irate:

 

[Azhael]

I´ve seen it happen too, but my personal impression is that the males are "tasting" the pheromones and other products that the female is producing during the laying process. Hence the "snapping" movements. I say this because at least when i observed it, once the female was done, the males pursued her with their snouts close to the female´s cloaca, ignoring the freshly laid egg.

Not that they don´t eat many of them, of course. Both males and females do, but they miss plenty of them xD

 

[Molch]

happy to report that I'm finding more eggs now that the egg-thieving males have been removed. I'm up to 6 eggs

Still, I saw the female herself actively nosing vegetation, presumably in search of eggs. This makes me wonder if an appetite for your own eggs wouldn't be a quick evolutionary slide towards extinction. What prevents her from simply turning around and eating them right out of her own butt? It appears that temporary amnesia right after laying would be a necessary evolutionary strategy.

 

[RobM]

I don't imagine, anyone would fancy eating after child birth.

 

[Azhael]

Over the years i´ve developed theories about the egg-eating behaviour xD One of them was that they were selective and only ate certain types of eggs. Over a breeding season, i witnessed my H.orientalis predating on eggs several times and all of them were duds. However, next season i saw predation on what looke like a fertile egg (although being fresh, you never know).
So far i have yet to see either C.pyrrhogaster or H.orientalis predate on an advanced egg where the larvae was already formed, which makes me wonder. This hypothesis may well proof to be rubbish in the future xDDD But, hey, so far it stands in my case, in front of me they only eat obvious duds or freshly laid eggs.

 

[Molch]

there would be an advantage to eating other females' eggs - considering how crowded larvae get in ponds, this would give an advantage to your own larvae. However, what strategy exists to prevent you from eating your own eggs? I seriously wonder if there's a temporary egg-eating inhibition (maybe a general feeding inhibition) immediately after laying....then, after the female has moved away from the laying site, any egg she finds later has a high probability of being someone else's, not her own.

I could test this hypothesis by offering her an earthworm while she is laying an egg. If she hoovers it up, there goes that hypothesis.

 

[Molch]

also, these pyrrh eggs are all dark-colored on the side facing the light and white beneath. I assume the pigment protects agains DNA damage from UV light - and it also camouflages them quite effectively.

But why then do my alpine newts' eggs not look like that? Those are just plain white. Is this the reason alpines fold leaves around their eggs then, to achieve the same protection?

 

[Molch]

hmm...I think they may be duds...one egg clouded over and I took it out; the others are still clear, but after 4 days I see no obvious development.

She's not laying that many, maybe only 1 or 2 per day.

In my apuanus, it took a good week or so before the embryos started looking more like little commas and before I knew for sure they were developing. How long does this take in pyrrhogaster (at 60 F)?

sigh....I'm impatient. I really really would like these to be fertile.

 

[Molch]

One! Just One!

well, she laid 12 eggs, and one by one I watched them cloud over and die. Duds all - except for one!! One single egg is developing. :shocked: There's already a little comma-shaped newt person inside. She hasn't laid any more in the last 3 days.

Oh the unfairness! Am I gonna have just One. Single. Baby?

I evicted the males from the tank because they are such expert egg nappers. I'm hoping for more good eggs.:blob:

The fertile one is among the last she laid - she must have picked up some sperm obviously, but why would most be duds? Do the eggs get fertilized on the way out and maybe there's a problem with her sperm storage facility which doesn't reliably deliver sperm? Or are either her eggs or the sperm mostly defective? Both parents are at least 15 years old.....

 

[Azhael]

Old animals may see their fertility diminished. Also, in one season the first eggs might be duds while later eggs are fertile and develop normally. It varies between individuals. If there is one good egg so far, i´m willing to bet there will be more, just be patient!

 

[Molch]

there hasn't been any courtship for about two weeks now; am I right in taking the males out? I think they are done mating, and those two boys have been going after the eggs like little villains.

Also, is it typical that she would lay a few, then take a break, and lay more later?

Lastly, she doesn't look super-duper gravid, just mildly so. I assume that means fewer eggs, eh?

Of course, I can just be patient and wait and I'll get all the answers, but asking on the forum is so much more fun!

 

[Azhael]

xD
Males can be in a state of "readiness" for a long time. They may not court for a while only to go on a rampage a few days later. They are deceiving little buggers xD

It´s perfectly normal and typical for females to lay intermitently. And yes, fatter females tend to produce more eggs, but since these girls can lay for months on end, not being huge doesn´t mean there will be very few eggs.

 

[NachoMom]

Hahaha Molch you definitely have a flair with words! Reading your account of the egg-munching villainy you witnessed had me nearly in tears - not for the act itself of course, but you weave a delightful tale. I hope you have some more luck and get a least a few more fertile eggs, but if not remember one baby is better then no baby! I'm sure everyone here is wishing you the best in raising the little guy or girl to healthy maturity without any nasty surprises. Cheers!