reptile keepers ???

[GrahamL]

Hi

Today while turning the last bit of composted material we have been putting through a large belt spreader (nth nsw)I noticed something white amoungst the remnants , it was a large egg, about
70 mm x 90 mm , yep really big.


Is it a reptile egg ? I have no idea .. what it is or what to do with it as the material it was presumably burried in was all but gone when i found it

The large area nearby where i found it is very pristine and will always remain so , we have large moniters and pythons, whatever plopped this out its back end took the oportunity to use what was put briefly nearbye.

right now its in my managers office in a bucket with some compost around it , its quite hot , hope fully whatevers inside the egg isn't going to pop out overnight and surprise him in the morning:).

any advice most welcome

btw it can only of been where found since may this year

[Chillie]

Hi nightstalker,

It may be a monitor egg as Pythons usually coil around their eggs.

Best idea is to go to http://www.aussiepythons.com/ which is a site and forum dedicated to Australian snakes a lizards. It is based in Sydney.

I have a Children's Python myself and there the other members on IIS who own reptiles.

[gary]

I would guess it is less likely to be a monitor egg as they lay their eggs in termite nests.

Graham, do you get Brush Turkeys there? Your compost heap would look
just like a Brush Turkey mound. Now is also the right time of the year.

[GrahamL]

Thanks guys :thumbsup:

My wife just suggested the same thing Gary which is likely what it is ,I've never seen a scrub turkey in this area but i'm sure they would be there.

Strange it would come all the way out of the bush to lay one egg and leave it ?.. though perhaps a fox/ lizard raided the rest and the parent abbandoned the nest .

I've got it nestled up on the hot water system so we''ll see what dosn't happen ;)

[gary]

Hi Graham,

If it transpires that it was a Brush Turkey, nothing would surprise me.
They will sometimes walk many km over a period of weeks. The clutches
are often layed by several females over a period of time, so it may
be that only one female discovered the mound and deposited one egg.
Or as you mentioned, goannas and foxes can predate on them.

The biggest trick of all with the Brush Turkey is that once they lay an
egg, that is it, they leave it on its own. The male may now and then
check the temperature of the mound with its beak and add or remove material
if need be.

The young are remarkable and have to dig their own way out, find somewhere
to hide, learn friend from foe, learn to discover what is food and what is not
and find a tree to roost in for the night all on their own. They are not raised
by their parents. They scurry out of the mound very quickly and that is why they
are rarely seen. This has been the topic of research for animal behaviorists
out of institutions such as Macquarie University here in Sydney. I spent some
time one afternoon with a NPWS Ranger with a radio locating device, trudging
through the bush trying to find a turkey with a radio collar I had spotted.
Turns out there is still a lot of remarkable things that nobody understands about them.
The ranger told me about one they had tracked with a radio collar that had walked
all the way from the Kuring-Gai Chase National Park to the busy Sydney suburb
of Thornleigh. In doing so, it had crossed a railway, a four lane busy freeway, the
Pacific Highway, traversed the downtown shopping center of Hornsby and then through
the streets of suburbia, managing not to get hit by cars, trucks, trains
or injured by domestic animals or humans.

If it is a Brush Turkey egg, they incubate in a very narrow temperature
band. 34C is the normal temperature with 32C at the low end and
36C at the high end.

At 34C, there is more female embryonic mortality and at 36C, more
male embryonic mortality. So temperature can determine whether more
males or females survive.

Apparently they can survive greater temperature excusions in the 20C to
40C range for periods of time.

Brush Turkey eggs are placed vertically in the mound small end down.
Whereas other birds have to turn their eggs in order to ensure
proper development of the embryo, remarkably Australian Brush Turkeys
don't. For comparison, farm chickens will turn their eggs dozens of times
per day.

In any case, it would be interesting to know what type of animal it
was.

[mozzie]

sounds like breakfast to me!!!! crack it open scramble it add a dozen raches of bacon done!!!! mmm mmm
:P:P only joking