brain-hurting questions

[Animal34343]

ok so in most gecko species lower temps provide females and higher temps provide males. also, the higher the temps the shorter incubation time and the lower the temps the longer the incubation time. i believe all this has already been established. so is it possible to incubate for female for so many days and then turn up the temps to shorten incubation time? is there a point at which sex is determined and those organs begin to form? so say someone wanted a female, lets say leopard gecko, can you incubate it for female and then after like 20 or 30 days turn the temps up into the males range and shorten the time? i doubt anyone has any firm answers on this and obviously it would differ from species to species but i figured id ask anyways out of curiousity.

 

[clint545]

The rule of thumb with Leos(not 100% sure myself about others) is that the embryo is Temp sexed at around 21 days.
So after 3 weeks you could crank the heat, but remember that by doing so you're speeding up development and an early hatch date means weaker hatchlings. They don't have enough time to absorb all the yolk.
Better to be paitent, keep the temps consistant, and let nature take its course.

 

[Animal34343]

i wasnt going to try it, i was just bored and started thinking if anyone had.

 

[cliff_f]

I just keep my temps at a mid range and I get what I get but I always have healthy geckos.

 

[Animal34343]

i keep them at constant temps except when i open the incubator every couple days. i was just curious as to whether or not anyone had attempted this before or if it was even possible to determine when sex is determined in the egg, since its several months before a hatchlings sex can be verified.

 

[lodewijk]

When I was a participent in a breeding project of a phelsuma species (because of lack of males)I was told that the first 2/3 weeks of incubation are very important of the outcome.In my case it was the first 2 weeks 84.2F,and the rest of the time 80.6F for the best results of breeding males.
In 2 years 2 males and 3 females hatched!

 

[Brian]

so is it possible to incubate for female for so many days and then turn up the temps to shorten incubation time? is there a point at which sex is determined and those organs begin to form? so say someone wanted a female, lets say leopard gecko, can you incubate it for female and then after like 20 or 30 days turn the temps up into the males range and shorten the time?

1. yes

2. Yes, there is, but typically I thought most organisms have the precursors to both sets of sex organs or the tissue that has the potential either way. Could be wrong, but I think most things start out that way.

3. Yes you can after the sex has been determined.

 

[GeckoFiend]

leopardgecko.com has a tutorial on it...