Hey y’all. I’ve been lurking on the forums for a while and this year I decided to start building my collection for breeding in a couple of years. One of the females I bought was an adult super pastel from someone who was getting out of the hobby near me. I got her in late March and noticed she was curling around her water bowl, moving around a lot, but figured it was just normal. About a week and a half ago I noticed her laying a little inverted, and she’s now coiled constantly on heat and hasn’t touched food in over a month. I saw what looks like some potentially ovulation-related swelling, but it’s hard for me to tell because this is my first year and I’ve never caught one in person - and I did not pair her, so it was unexpected. I’m including a couple of pictures of her and am just wondering what I can be looking for in terms of determining whether this is an ovulation, or if it’s building, and/or what I should continue looking for. It’s definitely not as noticeable as some big ovys I’ve seen, but she has put on about 300g since I got her despite only eating twice in that time. The swelling is SUPER easy to see when I hold her up, but I don’t have a good picture of that. Any suggestions/welcome! Just trying to expand my knowledge here.
It certainly looks like a solid build going on, though it doesn’t quite look like an ovulation yet. I’d say it’s pretty close though.
I have a thread here documenting what I’ve observed in my first year of breeding, and have pictures showing females that are ovulating. Might help out a bit!
From a picture it is often hard to tell especially if it is toward the end of the ovulation, basically the mid section will be swollen like a football and very hard, the swelling than goes away.
Based on your description since you did notice cooling and now the animal migrated towards the warm side and is laying inverted I would say you may have witnessed an ovulation probably the end of it, if that is the case she should be ready to go in Prelay shed any day.
Some ovulations are easier to photograph than others. The belly will become round about 2 thirds down. Some can be subtle, but most are in your face easy to tell its an ovulation
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These are the pictures I took of her this evening. I did notice tail suck a few days ago when I first noticed, but not so much now. So I’m thinking I maybe caught the tail end of her ovulation. Either way, I’m keeping a close eye on her.
Looks like an ovulation in the 2nd picture.
Yeah, that second pic definitely looks more like an ovulation!