Candled F. Campani egg reveals interesting implications

javadi

javadi

Chameleon Enthusiast
I just thought there might be some interest in this. I have a number of F. campani (Jeweled chameleon) eggs incubating, soon to hatch I hope. I candled some of them the other day with an iphone light to confirm development. I decided to take a picture of this example, as you can see what appears to be one eye (a second one was visible but not obvious in the photo), which is the black dot. The embryo moved during the candling a little bit as well, so it's definitely alive. Exciting-hope they will hatch soon!


candled f. campani egg.jpg




Now, here's an extra point of interest. Unfortunately some of my eggs were in a separate incubator for a cold diapause, and the incubator malfunctioned while I was away for the day-it heated to 113 degrees, and the total time the eggs were above 80 was around 45 minutes, ending with 113. I expected all of the eggs to be dead, but miraculously, this eggs and some others survived and managed to vascularize and develop afterwards. Perhaps the fact the eggs were pre-diapause/very early development when this happened made a difference. So this one is close to hatching even after being cooked. Surprising but an interesting data point.
 
salty dog said:
I would never do that to any of my eggs...thats just me
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Yeah... I do it for chicken/other bird eggs, as it's kind of necessary to keep track of development so you can remove infertile eggs or any that stop developing before they ferment and explode. But it seems chameleon eggs always show issues in development quickly (molding), which would make candling unnecessary. No matter the species, I try to limit handling as much as possible. @javadi or @kinyonga : have you seen any effects of candling on hatch percentages, or am I just paranoid?
 
TayloredExotics said:
Yeah... I do it for chicken/other bird eggs, as it's kind of necessary to keep track of development so you can remove infertile eggs or any that stop developing before they ferment and explode. But it seems chameleon eggs always show issues in development quickly (molding), which would make candling unnecessary. No matter the species, I try to limit handling as much as possible. @javadi or @kinyonga : have you seen any effects of candling on hatch percentages, or am I just paranoid?
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I've never seen any ill-effect whatsoever in chameleon eggs. I certainly wouldn't advocate for people to generally candle their eggs frequently though without good reason, as it's just an opportunity to turn the egg the wrong way or do some other damage, so I believe it can heighten the risk of problems. But, when done carefully, as kinyongia mentioned, I've never seen any kind of ill effect across various species of chameleons. For the purposes of this post, I felt candling was essential to ascertain whether the embryo was developing or not post-113 degree temperature spike, and in case it didn't make it, to at least know it made it to x stage of development.

You mention that chameleon eggs show issues in development quickly, and while I agree that can often be true, in my experience, this is not always the case for lesser known species that seem to require a diapause. For instance, I have had furcifer campani and calumma linotum eggs stay appearing perfectly intact and "healthy" looking for many months (6 in some cases), then when candled, there is no sign of development whatsoever and no indication they were even fertile to begin with. In cases like this, tracking development through candling can be helpful as it tells you whether they have responded to diapause or not etc. when trying to establish or tweak incubation parameters. You can of course use hatchling count and health as a readout of whether incubation worked or not, but this is another readout of development that I think can be helpful when executed carefully.
 
alot of people sell eggs... if these i experienced people get the idea that this is ok..they will start doing it....it does 2 things, disloges embryo.... and overheates the egg quickly....killing the embryo.......while in process of this might show healthy growth..only to have the process of candling killing it...and not showing the damage done because it wasn't damaged prior to candling......I've had eggs... whole clutches hatch healthy at 1 year 2 months incubtion....left alone
 
salty dog said:
alot of people sell eggs... if these i experienced people get the idea that this is ok..they will start doing it....it does 2 things, disloges embryo.... and overheates the egg quickly....killing the embryo.......while in process of this might show healthy growth..only to have the process of candling killing it...and not showing the damage done because it wasn't damaged prior to candling......I've had eggs... whole clutches hatch healthy at 1 year 2 months incubtion....left alone
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I didn't start this thread to get into a debate, but I appreciate your comments. My post was meant to demonstrate that development had proceeded in a visually interesting way in an uncommon species, despite being exposed to temperatures of 113 degrees due to an incubator accident. I think I addressed some of your points adequately above, by indicating my reasons for candling in this context and by articulating some of my own experiences that have never demonstrated ill-effect from candling, which others have corroborated. Then I explicitly indicated (in bold) that there is risk to candling and as such, I don't recommend people do it frequently and without good reason. I've had clutches hatch at around 1 year as well, I don't think this negates anything I said above. You are free to advocate that others never candle, that is fine by me and has merit, as I also stated above. I hope you have a pleasant day and thanks for sharing your input.
 
salty dog said:
alot of people sell eggs... if these i experienced people get the idea that this is ok..they will start doing it....it does 2 things, disloges embryo.... and overheates the egg quickly....killing the embryo.......while in process of this might show healthy growth..only to have the process of candling killing it...and not showing the damage done because it wasn't damaged prior to candling......I've had eggs... whole clutches hatch healthy at 1 year 2 months incubtion....left alone
Click to expand...
I agree with you to an extent. Of course, candling eggs is a delicate process. But I can tell you that when people candle eggs before shipping, it probably isn't the candling that is affecting the eggs. I do like the points you bring up as I have not considered overheating the eggs through touch alone. Like every tool out there, candling can be misused. Though I don't think we should blame the hammer, but the people who misuse it.

In Javadi's case, we learned a great deal about the temperature tolerance of campani eggs. I personally enjoyed this post, and never did it cross my mind to candle eggs myself. I think there is a clear line between endorsing the frequent use of candling vs. using it wisely and in a cautious matter.

Nice post @javadi, keep us updated.
 
Mendez said:
I agree with you to an extent. Of course, candling eggs is a delicate process. But I can tell you that when people candle eggs before shipping, it probably isn't the candling that is affecting the eggs. I do like the points you bring up as I have not considered overheating the eggs through touch alone. Like every tool out there, candling can be misused. Though I don't think we should blame the hammer, but the people who misuse it.

In Javadi's case, we learned a great deal about the temperature tolerance of campani eggs. I personally enjoyed this post, and never did it cross my mind to candle eggs myself. I think there is a clear line between endorsing the frequent use of candling vs. using it wisely and in a cautious matter.

Nice post @javadi, keep us updated.
Click to expand...
Said it much better than I did. I also agree the idea of raising temps through touching the eggs directly is interesting and worth noting. Glad you found some value in the post!
 
@javadi said..."You mention that chameleon eggs show issues in development quickly, and while I agree that can often be true, in my experience, this is not always the case for lesser known species that seem to require a diapause. For instance, I have had furcifer campani and calumma linotum eggs stay appearing perfectly intact and "healthy" looking for many months (6 in some cases), then when candled, there is no sign of development whatsoever and no indication they were even fertile to begin with. In cases like this, tracking development through candling can be helpful as it tells you whether they have responded to diapause or not etc. when trying to establish or tweak incubation parameters. You can of course use hatchling count and health as a readout of whether incubation worked or not, but this is another readout of development that I think can be helpful when executed carefully"...I believe this to be true too...development doesn't show if they are I diapause IMHO.

@Mendez said..." I think there is a clear line between endorsing the frequent use of candling vs. using it wisely and in a cautious matter"...I agree with this too.
 
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