Incubation temp variation

[cjpossum]

Hi all we are about to receive our first clutch of red beardie eggs

We have set up incubator in the coolest room of the house,
Set temp to 29.5deg C
and "test run"
Now in the day at the hottest outside temp, we are having trouble maintaining 29.5 Deg C, it goes up to 30.5deg C and then maintains 29.5 during the night.

Is 1deg C variation ok or should we try to maintain a "tighter" temp control.
Is 1deg C variation ok for snake eggs also.

Next year will be ok because it will be in a temp controled room with the snakes.

Thanks for your help

 

[The Devil]

I would suggest that 29.5C might be a bit low, but maybe beardies are different to snakes.
The temp I use for all my python eggs is 31.5C and I have a hatch rate of better than 95%

Keep in mind that Mother Nature designed eggs to hatch in a large range of conditions and temps.

Also I've seen incubation temps from 29.9C up to 32C

 

[The Devil]

Also if you are worried about the temp increase during the hot part of the day a simple way to solve that is to drape the incubator with damp towels or such.
Evaporation equals cooling.

 

[cjpossum]

Thanks for the reply, good info we will get it under control.

 

[ambah]

Hi all we are about to receive our first clutch of red beardie eggs

We have set up incubator in the coolest room of the house,
Set temp to 29.5deg C
and "test run"
Now in the day at the hottest outside temp, we are having trouble maintaining 29.5 Deg C, it goes up to 30.5deg C and then maintains 29.5 during the night.

Is 1deg C variation ok or should we try to maintain a "tighter" temp control.
Is 1deg C variation ok for snake eggs also.

Next year will be ok because it will be in a temp controled room with the snakes.

Thanks for your help

For the beardies, it depends on if you want males or females.. 29 deg will produce about half each, higher temp if you more females

 

[Wild~Touch]

Beardies are tough little critters.
I can remember when someone turned the incubator off to use the power and forgot to put in back on and
the beardie eggs got down to 12 and all eggs hatched perfectly. pphheeww was I worried

 

[cjpossum]

unreal they are tough little buggers thanks for sharing.

 

[JasonL]

For the beardies, it depends on if you want males or females.. 29 deg will produce about half each, higher temp if you more females

All temps will produced mix clutches untill you get to extreme temps of around 36+ when males turn into females, Water Dragons on the other hand produce females at cooler and warmer temps and males in between. Beardys will hatch fine at temps from 27 - 33+ deg, but won't die at vastly different temps for short periods, say from 10 - low 40s, no need to worry about variation though try to keep it from the extremes.