Eggs!

[moinkable]

So, I haven't posted in a while and alot has happened!

My two adopted little efts both developed "shine", stopped eating, and passed away last week, after months of good health and steady growth. I tried moving them from their container into a set-up with paper towels in case their enclosure (naturalistic with moss) was causing the illness....i was gonna do a full re-boot of their tank but they died before I could.

In happier news, my adults started displaying courting behaviour last week, and last night I caught the female laying eggs. Poor thing, her enclosure doesn't have many good laying plants, so she was upside down underneath the water lettuce...She also tried a small lotus plant, and was writhing around on the bottom of the tank on her back for a while before she finally uprooted it and dragged it around with her for a few hours. Awkward gal.

So, not sure if I am ready for the travails of baby newts again after what just happened. My questions here are:

1) When/how can I tell if the eggs are viable?
2) When/how do i transfer them out of the adult tank? After hatching? Before?


I would like to offer the eggs for local adoption but am not sure how to get them to people, or if they would just die the minute I took them out of the tank. I was thinking maybe if I turkey bastered them out or removed the plant leaves they are on and then stored them in small plastic containers. Or should I wait for hatchlings?

 

[Yevgeniy matsay]

You can wait until the eggs hatch and let nature take its course or put them in a cycled tank. It would prefer the cycled tank. The. Eggs are not going to die right away just take the eggs gently and put them in a cycled tank. They will hatch as larvae and you will have your happy life cycle! Good luck. Keep us updated!

 

[stanleyc]

I just snap the part of the plant the egg was laid on right off and put in a cycled tank usually. As for whether they're viable or not. If they are, you should see noticeable development after several days. Here's a great example of an H. cyanurus egg developing.

Caudata Culture Photo Series - Cynops cyanurus development

 

[stanleyc]

Also, small plastic containers would work fine, but try to get them cycled first. Taking the plant the eggs were laid on with them would help I think, as they should have some bacterial growth on their surface that is conductive to the process.