Denizens of the Anole Annals – I need help with my breeding experiment! This summer I am conducting a common garden experiment with Anolis armouri and A. cybotes, two trunk-ground anoles from the Dominican Republic. Things were going pretty well with A. cybotes, but as of late both species have stopped laying. Anolis armouri didn’t lay very much at all in the past month. I have already finessed the dirt moisture in the laying pot and the temperature/humidity conditions are fine. In the interest of getting data, I would like to induce them to lay, perhaps with oxytocin? Does anyone out there have suggestions on what can be used to induce laying? Dosage? Timing? All your advice would be much appreciated!
Martha is a postdoctoral researcher in Sheila Patek's laboratory at Duke University. She received her Ph.D. at Harvard University, where she studyied the evolutionary ecology and thermal physiology of anoles, focusing on the cybotoid anoles from the Dominican Republic. Martha serves as Conference Editor for the Anole Annals.
Website: www.marthamunoz.weebly.com
Website: www.marthamunoz.weebly.com
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Bora Zivkovic
What is the photoperiod? Perhaps you should temporarily put them in short days, then again in long days?
Martha Munoz
I believe they are on a summer schedule of 12:12. Do you mean briefly winterize them, so as to re-summarize them?
Bora Zivkovic
Yes. I do not know the exact photoperiodic response of these particular species, e.g., their critical photoperiod, but it may be worth a try.
Martha Munoz
Thanks so much! If you have any suggestions about oxytocin, or other methods, that would also be appreciated. Thanks again.
Rich Glor
We do as Bora has suggested and cycle our animals through a period with short days and slightly lower temperatures. I don’t have any comparative evidence of the value of this approach because we only have one room and can’t rear lizards under alterate regimes. Lots of frog folks use hormones to get eggs, but they can just fertilize these externally with sperm from other captive males. I’m concerned that oxytocin alone won’t solve your problems because you might just end up with infertile eggs.
Carlos Infante
From back in the day there are reports of using FSH to induce breeding behavior and laying in carolinensis (see Licht 1970 and Conner and Crews 1980). I’ve thought about, but haven’t tried it yet. Are the females dropping infertile eggs, or is there nothing at all?
Martha Munoz
They are just not laying at all.
Daniel Scantlebury
Martha, do you have them in cages where they can find some degree of comfort and security, how hot are the temperatures, how often are you feeding them? You might also consider bumping the photoperiod up to 14 or 16 hrs.
Martha Munoz
Hi Dan,
By comfort do you mean a fully closed laying box, like your yogurt containers? They have tupperware pots with holes filled with moist dirt and a plant. This has worked quite well for Thom Sanger, who has been breeding anoles in our facility for years. If I bump the photoperiod without “winterizing” them first, do you know if it will still work?
Thanks,
Martha
Bora Zivkovic
Good question. May work. But these are not A.carolinensis so we don’t know. You may actually save time by going safe and winterizing them first…
Thomas Sanger
Here are a few more thoughts from someone with some inside knowledge of the situation. I figured that I would post these disjointed thoughts publicly in case other people have related thoughts or criticisms of these ideas.
As you have mentioned in the past Anolis armouri is a montane species. The protocols I have been successfully using work well for species occurring at warmer and more humid lower elevations (I presume). For example, based on my previous observations on wild-caught A. cybotes, females are typically in prime laying condition in mid-July and continue to lay through late August or early September. I typically just bring them in and BAM! eggs appear. However, based on observations from other high elevation lizard species (and your own) it is likely that A. armouri retain their eggs for longer and invest more into producing each egg than the species I am accustomed to. In other words, their reproductive needs and cycles may be different than what I am used to. Perhaps you shouldn’t expect them to lay as often as A. cybotes or in the same conditions, but it is peculiar that you are getting no eggs from them at all.
Here are some thoughts and questions:
1) Have you tried keeping them at a cooler temperature, similar to your climactic data?
2) You mentioned using hormones to induce laying, can you palpate eggs to verify that there is indeed an egg in there? Considering the uncertainties of using hormone injections on a new species it may be worth trying to dissect eggs from a few females and incubate those. Its a terminal exercise but at least you will get a few eggs and juveniles for your experiments.
3) In terms of caging, are any housed in larger cages or our mesh cages? Some of the species I have kept can be finicky to something even this simple.
4) I have only heard of adjusting light cycles as a means to induce breeding following an over-wintering period. I am uncertain if adjusting light cycles in mid-summer is the way to induce egg laying as the animals might already possess yolked follicles and eggs. I would like to hear comments about this. (The rooms are currently at 14:10 by the way)
5) Are you keeping the soil moist? Several species won’t even go near the pot if the soil is dry. Several times in the past I have also removed the pot and then “induced” laying by adding a plant with moist soil after about a week.
Veronika Holanova
Do they have UV-light and do you give them some vitamins or mineral supplements? How often? Do you keep them in pairs or groups?
Martha Munoz
Hi Veronika,
Yes, they have UV lamps. They get vitamin dusted crickets twice a week. They are housed in breeding cages (one male and one female).
Martha
Joe Burgess
Martha
Have you considered that they are just spent and need to recoup? They will not reproduce without resources. Check your nutritional intake and maybe offer additional food items and supplementation.
Or perhaps they are seasonal, many Lesser Ant. species only reproduce in summer (bulk of anyway), Cuba as well. I am not sure of the localities these animals are from, but it is only midsummer in DR and repro should still be in full swing there.
For what its worth…
Martha Munoz
Hi Joe,
Yes, the generally decline in even cybotes eggs was surprising to me. A whole bunch of those females are gravid, though, so I expect eggs soon. The armouri are the thorn in the side. What additional supplementation do you give? We vitamin dust, but is there a blend that is especially good for breeding females?
Thanks for the help!
Martha
Will Baugher
Our Anolis have to have pinkies (or pinky bits) with calcium gluconate suppliment to lay eggs. We have tested this theory by having some with and some without for extended periods of time and I am fully confident that this extra protein and calcium keeps them reproductive. We also use reptivite and repashy suppliments and have a widely varied diet.
I have only used oxytocin in an animal that is known to be gravid to induce her to lay the eggs she already had developed. I don’t think that it is a way to induce breeding itself. Veterinarians have cautioned that if an egg is not ready to come out or if the female has not laid because of some reproductive problem then the use of the hormone can cause permanent reproductive damage or death.
We, too, have found it beneficial to cycle their lighting and minimally adjusting their temperatures for the season. Adjusting cage furniture so that there are horizontal and verticle perches, as well as plant cover for security while on those perches has helped us in the past when we had problems with low reproduction.
I hope you get it figured out,
Will Baugher
Armando Pou
It has been my experience that breeding (laying) starts out strong early in the season, then lulls for several weeks and picks up again later in the season. A method I have used to successfully induce breeding is to remove the female from the enclosure for a week or so, increase her feedings in a separate cage where they cannot see each other. After a few days to a week place her back in the cage.
Armando Pou
Hi Martha,
A caveat to what I posted, I live in south Florida so my anoles are kept in outdoor screen enclosures and probably follow similar breeding cycles to what exists in the wild. This method has worked at various times for Anolis cybotes, sagrei, porcatus, garmani, carolinensis,allisoni, conspersus, cristatellus, and chlorocyanus. All of these species exhibit mating behaviors early in the spring followed by a lull which picks up again after a couple of months. (The exception is A. equestris, I always separate them after mating to avoid possible cannibalism.)
Best of luck with your experiments,
Armando
Martha Munoz
Hi Armando,
Do any of the lizards you work with come from higher elevations? Do you change any of your setup in those cases?
Thanks!!
Martha
Armando Pou
Hi Martha,
No, unfortunately I do not keep any anoles from high elevations; most of my lizards have been collected from established south Florida populations. After a suggestion from a friend I am keeping the more canopy dwelling species such as the garmani, distichus, and the carolinensis group in elevated cages (above eye level). It seems to promote more natural behavior (as opposed to slamming into the back of the cages when anything outside moved). This is especially true among the larger garmani.
I hope you are successful in getting them to lay,
Armando
David Heckard
I will second Will’s comments about not using Oxytocin. I have seen it used on several occasions on lizards with little or no success. The only time I would even consider it is when an animal is actively trying to lay an egg and having difficulty.
David Heckard