Authored by Ron Tremper Leopard Gecko
BREEDING LEOPARD GECKOS
In the 1970s, when the field of herpetoculture was just emerging, “collecting” was the focus and hot topic amongst herpers. Everyone was trying to obtain various reptiles and amphibians from anywhere and keep them alive. ‘Postage Stamp’ collections, consisting of one of every type of kingsnake, ratsnake or rattlesnake, were the norm. This was the first wave of herpetoculture, which focused on learning how to keep animals alive.
Today, you can’t fit into the vast ‘reptile community’ very easily unless you have graduated to the second wave, which focuses on captive breeding. Of the reptiles, probably the easiest species in the world with which to learn the basic steps of captive breeding is the leopard gecko. If your dream has been to successfully breed reptiles and witness the hatching of babies, then we are here to tell you that wish can be accomplished, sometimes whether you are trying or not.
Requirements for Successful Breeding of Leopard Geckos
The minimum requirement for successfully breeding leopard geckos is to have at least one male over 5 months of age and one female eight months or older.
See the photos if you need help determining the sexes. Equally important is the health and age of your geckos. You will not produce fertile eggs and/or healthy offspring if your breeders are sick, underweight, nutritionally deficient or too old. Keeping careful records on your geckos will be an essential step towards success, and one of your most valuable tools will be a Permanent Marker
Pre-breeding Conditioning
Assuming their breeding stock is in prime health, many herpetoculturists choose to give their adults a change in light cycle and/or temperature to trigger a breeding season. It is highly advised not to artificially stimulate reproduction in females experiencing their first winter since it is hard on their bodies to have needed growth interrupted by egg production.
Often keepers wishing to condition proven breeding geckos merely turn off the heat to their cage leaving them with a moist hide, fresh water and a background temperature of 65-75º F for 4-8 weeks. No food should be offered during this forced shutdown since the cooler temperatures will not allow for proper digestion. A fat and healthy gecko can go several months with only water at these temperatures with no sign of appreciable weight loss. If your leopards experience no change in light cycle or temperature then they will still cycle once a year on their own each season.
Breeding Diet
The need for a proper diet is the key factor for breeding success. Whether you use crickets or mealworms as the staple in your feeding regime, it is essential that the insects you offer have themselves been fed a proper balanced diet. This is accomplished by giving feeder insects chicken mash, hog mash, or one of the insect loading diets sold in the pet trade for 24-48 hours prior to use (see chapter on Feeding for more details).
The demands of egg-production are a huge energy and calcium expense for female geckos and it is important that you offer them extra amounts of calcium and vitamin D3.
The best way to make sure they are getting all they need is to provide these supplements in a jar lid (instead of “dusting”) so that the leopards can choose when and how much they wish to consume.
In addition to making their staple food available on a daily basis, you can improve the health of females and increase egg production by offering them up to two day-old mice every one to two weeks. But don’t go overboard; too much protein can lead to gout and obesity. Note that extremely obese females often do not produce any eggs.
When to Breed
Typically, females will not become reproductive until they reach 35-45 grams for the standard type leopards, and 55-75 grams for ‘Giant’ morphs. Sexual onset is a matter of size, not age.
If a female leopard gecko is healthy and has been raised properly from hatching, then she will start laying once exposed to a male at around 9-10 months of age. However, if you delay exposing a growing virgin female to a male, you can raise her to a larger size while postponing egg production, up to the age of fifteen months. By that time, physiological changes associated with body weight and age will naturally trigger egg production whether a male is present or not. The inverse is also true. If you raise male and female youngsters together, the mere presence of a male will often cause females to form their first set of eggs early, before they are up to adequate body weight. Early egg-production by these small females is stressful, can cause egg-binding, and greatly impair needed growth.
Breeding Part II will be presented in the next edition of Trempers Corner.
Respect,
Ron Tremper