Finally! Kingsnakes are Hatching!

 This morning I was stoked when I checked the incubator, as I do about twice a day when something is due to hatch. I was greeted by two normal eastern kingsnakes pipping. While they are only about 6 days late, I have to admit I was starting to get nervous. I honestly expected them on the 5th or 6th of July. But as we know nature has her own clock and there is nothing we can do to speed it up or even slow it down. I am happy to see these two though. I'm looking for some albinos, but only normals so far. 

But there is quite a few eggs left to pip. These were from Apollo x Hestia. Mom and dad are both het albino so we should expect about 25% of the hatchlings to be albino. Nothing beats the excitement of seeing eggs hatch whether they are the target morph or normal animals. All of them are absolutely beautiful. Sure morphs are cool looking, but nature's paint jobs are gorgeous in their own right. 

If you have been following along, I was pretty worried about this clutch due to the small size of the eggs. She seemed to lay these guys a little early since they were still connected by a thread like material. There was like 4 eggs that either were bad from the jump or have went bad during the incubation process. But there is still a dozen or more that look good and will hopefully hatch out some gorgeous babies.

Breeding kingsnakes is not for the impatient. If you start with babies you have about three years of just caring for them until they get to breeding size. Then you have to pair them and hope they make a love connection. Then you have to wait for the female to lay. Once you make it to the laying you feel like you're pretty successful. But after collecting the eggs you still have another two months of just waiting and keeping temps within range.

Even after hatching, the work is not quite complete. Some baby kingsnakes can be slow to start eating. Eastern kingsnakes can be tough, but usually not too much trouble.And once you get them started, you're typically in the clear. So stay tuned as I will continue posting updates on the hatching as well as the hatchlings of this special clutch.  

Still Waiting for Hatclings

 My female eastern kingsnake laid eggs on May 2, 2025. She is het albino and was paired with my het albino male. I've been keeping an eye on the eggs and patiently awaiting them to pip. It has been 66 days so they should be coming out any day now. Some of these eggs have unfortunately went bad. But there is still a good number which appear to be doing just fine. The female I call Hestia, has been putting weight back on and is looking to be in great shape. I am planning on a repeat pairing of Hestia and Apollo in 2026.

She laid 18 eggs. Some I could tell were duds right out of the gate. A couple others have now molded and deflated so appear to have failed as well. But there is still over a dozen that look okay up to this point. I do feel like she laid this clutch a little early. The eggs were quite small, and still had the little filament connecting them similar to a string of pearls. The eggs were more round than I usually see with my Florida kings. For now, all I can do is keep the incubator temperatures consistent and wait. Breeding snakes is not for the impatient. There is a lot of waiting involved. But to say I am eager to see the hatchlings is an understatement. So much time and work has gone into this clutch of eastern kingsnakes. I simply can't wait to see if this clutch beats the odds. Hoping we end up with at least a couple albino eastern kingsnakes out of this one. 

There are two more clutches cooking as well. These two are from Florida kingsnakes. So far all the eggs in both Florida king clutches are looking good. Fingers crossed they all make it to term. Fingers crossed on both hands that we beat the odds and get some killer looking morphs from these. I didn't include any photos in this post because I have already posted photos of these clutches. This was just an update on how things are going so far. 

Putting Weight Back on Females for 2026

 As most of my females have laid their eggs for the 2025 season, I waste zero time in ensuring their body condition bounces back. Actually I aim to give them enough nutrition to bounce back, grow, and start putting on size for next year. Gals who have laid will get double fed for a few weeks, then down to just one large mouse weekly until winter sets in. 

Eastern Kingsnake Hungry After Laying Eggs

I feed aggressively just after laying to give them a little boost in putting weight back on. Once they're back to normal weight I go to more of a maintenance feeding schedule. I feel somewhat rushed in getting the initial weight back on, but I also know these animals are still growing a little each year so I want to make sure I don't stunt their growth. 

Florida kingsnake on her second mouse

The eastern kingsnake in the top photo gave up 18 eggs, so she was looking rather deflated a couple months ago. But as you can see she is already back to decent condition. I don't mind the females getting a tiny bit chunky this time of year either. I feel like their bodies have lost so much nutrition throughout the egg forming and egg laying process. It only seems natural they would go on a food binge if they had a choice anyway.

Florida kingsnake getting double fed

The Florida kingsnakes shown laid smaller clutches of larger eggs. They didn't lose as much weight as the Eastern kingsnake. Nonetheless, I still want to get a couple good meals in them quickly. This will ensure they put any lost weight back on while also preparing for the winter season. I don't brumate them at very low temperatures, but I do turn the heat in their enclosures off for a couple months. 

My room also gets a lot less sunlight during this time which I think helps them cycle. Also I don't withhold food, but I do offer it less frequently and see a lot of the snakes skip the meals I do offer on those warmer winter days. Some of course never skip a meal. I am still waiting on eggs from 2025 to hatch, but it's never too early to start planning for the 2026 season. Hopefully I will have some hatch updates soon so stay tuned. 

How I Incubate Kingsnake Eggs

Once I am certain the female is done laying, I will usually get her out of the laybox if she hasn't come out on her own. I will then gently palpate her to check there is in fact no more eggs. Once I'm confident she has emptied them out I gather the eggs from the laybox. Careful not to change the orientation I found them in. Sometimes I will try to separate them so they're not just a giant blob of eggs. However, sometimes that is not possible and I will just place the whole lump in an incubation box.

For incubation box I use small plastic tubs and use moist perlite for a substrate. I choose locking tubs, because in past years I have had the babies get out of the snap-on top incubation tub and found them just cruising around in the incubator. 

I am a just a small hobbyist breeder so my actual incubator is a very simple design. A cooler, some heat cable, and thermostat is all you really need. The temperatures you're trying to achieve are like 75-80 degrees F. The supplies I listed are very affordable and this setup has hatched hundreds of snakes for me over the years. Plus if I run out of room in one cooler I can just set up another one. This adds some failure domains to the operation so all your eggs aren't literally all in one basket. 

Cooler incubator

Heat cable and thermostat keep temps dialed in

Technically if your room or somewhere in your house is in the high 70's you can just put the incubation box on a shelf or on top of a fridge, etc. Most colubrid snakes are VERY simple to incubate. Granted I have no fans to circulate air or fancy stuff like that in my setup. But again, this is a hobby for me, I love checking on them during the process which allows for some air exchange almost daily. I candle them every couple weeks throughout the process to monitor them.

I have found using the temperature I mentioned above, the incubation time is a little bit shorter opposed to leaving it on a shelf somewhere. The cooler/heat tape combo keeps the temperature stable enough and warm enough for my eggs. If you look at kingsnakes in the wild and where they lay their eggs, you'll see it just needs to be warm enough, but not too warm. The mom just deposits them in a safe enough spot with decent enough temps, and bam they hatch. Another thing to keep in mind is the eggs need high humidity, but you do not want them getting wet or submerged. Believe it or not, but they need to breathe. This is why I use the moist perlite for substrate in the incubation box. The eggs just sit on this substrate. 

The cooler in the photos houses three clutches of kingsnake eggs. Some are getting very near their expected hatch date. This is one of the most exciting times of year for me as a keeper of kingsnakes. You work all year to see what comes out of these eggs. Usually you kind of know what to expect, but there can be a big surprise anytime!

Keeping and interacting with these kingsnakes is a fun and rewarding hobby in and of itself. I can't imagine not having at least one of these guys. But watching them reproduce is on another level altogether.