Desmognathus aeneus hatching

I can't claim a captive breeding, but at least the eggs have gone full term and are hatching.

These eggs were laid ~25 July 2008 from a wild female collected in June. They are hatching in approximately 30 days at 67F. VERY fast for a direct developing plethodontid. All 8 in the clutch are good. As you can see they are ridiculously small. The female that laid them was approximately 35-40mm total length

If anyone else has has experience with this species I'd love to hear it. The wild adults were not nearly as easy as I expected, and I lost several to an unknown cause. I submitted two for histopathology, so hopefully I'll get some useful info back. With luck the captive hatched offspring will be hardier than the wild adults.

These guys are at home, not at the zoo.
-Tim

Wowowow. Great job!

Wonder what the little guy needs to eat. Springtails, mites? etc. ?

Tim, you're my new idol.

I've got cultures of two different species of springtails and grindal worms going, so hopefully they'll work. The adults are eager feeders on just about anything they can fit in their mouths.

-Tim

Very cool Tim. Are you sure they can tackle a springtail? HA!

Phenomenal Tim. This would might be a case for an outdoor vivarium in order to provide tiny live food?

Unfortunately it seems that those hatching already are somewhat premature, and at least one has died. I added water for evaporation after about 18 days, and that may have been a mistake. The eggs visibly swelled in the following days and that may have been the cause of the premature hatches. I didn't think the perlite was wet enough to cause a problem, but I guess I was wrong. Should have learned more from Russ's experiences!

Juvenile springtails should be plenty small for these guys assuming a few make it. Another adult female looks gravid, which is at least twice the size of the female that laid these. With luck I'll have another larger clutch to experiment with.

I can't imagine an outdoor vivarium that would function on the scale necessary for these guys. I have a subadult that is hard to keep track of and takes quite a while to find in a 16 oz. deli cup with just a loose wad of moss (Thuidium). Regulating temp and moisture levels outside would be very tricky.

Well in my experience if you have a garden an outdoor vivarium can attract a lot of tiny animals. As for moisture, that might be tricky, I agree. Sorry to hear about your problems but I'm glad you have shared the story with us.

congrats! That is wonderful to see Good luck!

You could always do a large outdoor vivarium anhd swap in substrate/moss from it. I did this using a worm bin for some cynops morphs and they enjoyed the variety.

Another update, a second female laid a clutch which I left in with her, and they all successfully hatched out. No pics yet. It may have been from a breeding after I collected her, but I cant take credit because they were still relatively recent captures, had been in captivity for around 4 months.

-Tim

Dumb question, are we talking about greens? (aneides?) Did I miss a Genus reclassification? Doesn't desmognathus hatch in water?
(see what happens when you don't pay attention in class kids!)