Female Marmoratus Crushing Eggs When Laying????

[Lee31]

Hi

One of my marmoratus females has begun laying eggs....Only problem is she seems to be Crushing the yolks of the eggs as she binds them between leaves...out of 25 eggs at present she has only manged to produce 5 with perfectly formed round yolks, the rest are mashed...Is this normal? or is she just heavy-handed, any ideas please???

Lee

 

[Azhael]

Are they mashed and torn apart or simply compacted? If they are just laterally compressed, they might still be perfectly ok.
Anyway, they are probably duds, which is normal specially if the female is young. Young breeders have a low percentage of viable eggs (in the case of the genus Triturus, it´s even lower due to the 50% mortality rate), it´s perfectly normal. The quality of the larvae might also be low, you might or might not see some deformities or possibly sudden deaths. Diet is also an important factor. It affects quality and quantity of the eggs.

 

[Lee31]

Hi

They are definitely crushed
the perfect round yolk is flattened and torn apart within the clear egg layer?

Lee

 

[Azhael]

Well then, they are duds...
As i said if the female is young, it´s perfectly normal that most of the eggs are duds. If she is not young or has bred before there might be dietary reasons behind it...