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Hello, my res is gravid, up till a week ago I thought she was a he but not so.

I checked her out at the vet and the x-ray indicates she has 8 unfertilized eggs in her.

She lives with a snake neck turt who is male, I think, but Im sure that any attempt at babies with these two would fail.
However i was hoping for some kind of hybrid beast.

So Ive got her walking round the house alot because the weather outside is a bit iffy.
But Ive let her have ago not long ago at making a nest In my garden for lack of a better place (im thinking of getting some silt from the river nearby).
But it took her about 2 hrs to dig a small hole about 1.5'' deep despite me digging the dirt up for her 1st.

So my questions are; on average how long does the whole process take?
And how deep do they like their holes to be?

Cheers,
Richard

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Thanks,

Im just a bit concerned because those holes look alot different to mine.

I suppose they like their substrate relatively firm so it keeps its shape. Whenever she would swop legs to dig alot of dirt would keep slipping back in.

It really bucketed down two nights ago so her turtle senses will be tingling i suspect.

The place where she likes digging (and she gone to exactly the same place twice now) is quite loose and some is in clumps.

Should i try a place where the ground is a bit firmer?

Cheers,
Richard

Wa hey,

shes off and away with a wizz bang I tell ya, those eggs will be out in no time, then its time for breakfast lol, just kidding now.

Any way she didnt go for my finely dug hole and decided for a better option -the edge of the lawn, so i hope she knows what she doing. Its very moist where she is but shes definatley taking her time.

Cheers,
Richard

So she's out there digging a hole in the dark? My goodness they never do the predictable thing do they.

No no its still day time here in New Zealand but its getting a bit dark.

I just checked and there is definately an egg there so I must wait for the rest of the 8 which i hope dosnt take too long as im worried about the temperature.

Im real excited and surprised how well shes done I never expected her to do it today.

I dont suppose it take long to pop them out once the holes dug?

How exciting!

Did you read the other treads in the comment up above? The time can be variable.

I forgot that you are in New Zealand. I'm in Texas and it's the middle of the night here.

Yeah,

Actually I've been pouring over those couple of posts for a couple of days trying to understand the process since it wasnt until a couple of days ago that I figured out she was Gravid.

Before that I thought she was male. It was her restless behaviour that I could not understand so I checked it up here and thats how I came to realise she is female.

Anyway Im very relieved now its over as there was a bad front coming through even tho it was great weather an hour or so ago.
She finished filling it up just as it was starting to drizzle.

She got all 8 eggs out, unfortunately I accidently damaged a few when I was getting them out but atleast they dont have an embyro inside so its no loss.

Its so amazing, isnt nature wonderful.

Wow, good for you! Glad she got the eggs out!

Congratulations to you both! I'll bet Mom is exhausted - 8 eggs is a lot of eggs! Is she eating like there's no tomorrow now? Be sure she gets lots of calcium to replace what she's lost.

Thanks,

Yeah she went striaght for the food in the tank when I put her in and ate a couple of bits after that.

I will put a calcium block in aswell.

Her legs kept on doing the digging motion for about an hr or so after I put her back in the tank which looked quite funky. Now shes basking in the sun.

Everythings back to the way it was and shes all chilled out like she was which is much more relaxing for us all, I forgot what it was like.

I just hope my snake neck is male, although he/shes about 3 its hard to tell with those turts and theres not as much information available as with RES. I wonder if they do the chicken egg laying thing like RES or if they have to be mated first?

Either way Im sure hes a hes because of the flat plastron and the "V" below the tail.

Instead of a calcium block, get some cuttlebone (found at the bird section of a pet store and remove the hard backing) and let your turtle eat it.

Ok I'll have a look at them,

I think we used to give them to our Canary ages ago. Never thought of them for turtles though. Theyre those hard white things aye? , oval in shape if I remember correctly.

How come theyre better than calcium blocks?

Whenever I put a calcium block in it only lasts a couple of nights if that. She simply hoes it down.