hi all i've been reading a bit about this lately and was wondering whether it's a good thing or not in captivity,is it easy to seperate the female and eggs or just let her get on with it pretty much as she would in the wild ? as you can probably tell i'm a complete novice when it comes to breeding snakes ,thanks Paul

Once the female has laid, she will be thin and not in the best condition. If you leave her to incubate the eggs herself then she will not feed while incubating the eggs which is obviously not a good thing as 1. you would like her to be looking her best again and recover and 2. You may want to breed her the coming season.
If you do want to breed the female the coming season then maternal incubation is not the way forward. Incubate the eggs yourself, you will get a much higher success rate as you will be able to control the temp and humidity to a much higher standard.
If you are worried about making an incubator, don't be. Its as easy as one, two, three.

1. Get a Poly box.

2. Add a Heat mat.

3 Connect to a thermostat

Obviously once the eggs come along you will need a tub for the eggs and perlite and a couple of temp probes but I won't go into all that at the moment. My advice to you would be NO do not let the female incubate the eggs, incubate them yourself.

Hope this helps.

Just found this, worth a read:

http://jaymartinreptiles.com/articles/maternal.pdf

ok thanks for that important info i will do some more reading before taking the plunge !

have just read that article thanks my mind is pretty much made up for artificial incubation now !

No worries. If you need advice on Incubation then let me know.

Not trying to pick on you as such, just shedding further light on the subject. I have incubated eggs, and allowed Mum to do so too with different python species.

Mo.

Can not quote what you typed But I will pick on one question

Yes, Humans can do a better job in captivity as we do not have the wild "Setting" as the ball pythons do in the wild, we don't have the exact temp drops and temp rises all the time as the wild would have or the same humidity or Substrate??

Anyways I am tired so My answers will be sloppy

First eggs of the season for me. :)

Maternally Incubating Clutch #2

Henna's Clutch

Here's some more information concerning actual experiences.

That's what I thought you were referring to hun, but needed to be sure. This I can understand, but with my different pythons, I gave them vivs that had around 6 different gradients in each, and this along with Mum's own ability to raise the temps up to the correct level, was all that was required. She can't do a lot about extra high heat other than to uncoil and move away, but she certainly knows how to pick a cooler than required area and then she can raise and lower to the exact requirement of the eggs.

I can also add what was missing in the area you linked too, and that is that Mum knows when a egg is infertile and if able will push the egg away from the main batch over time. On condition most of the eggs are fertile, which wil occur if the male is left with the female over the time required, there won't be a problem with any remaining decaying eggs, however if infertile out numbers fertile, then the gasses from the bad eggs can and will in many cases kill the good eggs/babies.

With plenty of space allowed for, I have always left the males with the females during incubation, and the males have doted on the females in all cases where this was allowed. the male would dampen the eggs and give the female water to drink and keep the huminity needed for the eggs. I did nothing but watch and ensure the water remained fresh and plenty of. Mum knows when the babes are due to hatch too, and gently nudges them all, and then moves right away from the site. Dads wraps round the eggs too, whilst Mum goes for a stretch and warm up.

Mo.