Keeping cornsnake sperm over night?

[camarogirl79]

Reason I'm asking is because about a year ago I got 2 male corns from a friend of mine on breeding loan, a ghost stripe and a ghost bloodred. Neither one were cooled last year and they are brothers, don't know where she bought them from, someone here I think. I had females (1st timers) paired up with them for 3-4 months last year and the one paired with the ghost blood never laid eggs or got swollen and the one paired with the ghost stripe laid 2 cluthes of slugs. She let me keep them longer so I cooled them last Nov-Feb and paired them back up with different females this time (proven breeders who've never laid sluggs before) to see what happened. The one paired up with the ghost stripe laid 15 eggs but 8 look like slugs and the one with the ghost blood still has yet to get swollen or anything. I'm wondering if they have a low sperm count or sperm that's even viable. I work at a vet clinic so I have access to a microscope if I wanted but I'd have to somehow collect sperm from the males and then keep it overnight. I thought about keeping it in the fridge but how long could I do this and would it give me an inaccurate reading the next day if I don't see the sperm moving (because of the cold?) I'm just really wondering whats going on with them

 

[cobained]

i think sperm have to be analyzed directly after collection unless you have a proper way to freeze/cool it. i imagine overnight in a fridge would kill the sperm, but that would only prevent you from checking motility. i would think you could still look at morphology/count. why not ask the vet where you work?

 

[bitsy]

With a human sperm sample, it needs to be kept at body temperature in order to check motility (don't ask...!). Don't know how that work with a cold-blooded animal, but I'm pretty sure a fridge overnight would cause a problem.

 

[camarogirl79]

Well the vet I work for is only a dog/cat vet so he is unsure of snake sperm. He says if I wnated I could borrow the microscope for one night but then comes the problem of thying to collect the sperm. Usually by the time I get home any semen on the floor of the cage is old. We do have a local reptile vet here I can call for some suggestions I guess or maybe I'll get lucky the night I take home the microscope lol. Thanks

 

[cobained]

if your corns are currently breeding, you can just keep the separate until you're able to "check" the semen. when mine were breeding they'd hook up pretty quickly and always leave a fresh sample behind (o: i actually have a microscope at home and was interested in looking myself, but didnt see anything (didn't have any truly clean slides, and the stuff is THICK!).

 

[Susan]

You can purchase your own microscope to keep handy at home. Try Toys R Us for some okay ones that are fairly inexpensive (as compared to $500+ for the hospital grade ones).

I do have a few questions...what is the age of the males, and have you actually witnessed the ghost bloodred mating the females? Some just mature later than others and it wouldn't be the first time a snake was mis-sexed.

 

[camarogirl79]

They're both appx 4 years, not witnessed a hook up yet but I'm not ever home much. Didn't get to see hook ups from any of my snakes this year except one and I have 5 clutches and 4 more on the way! He does chase her around jerking and such and try to wrap his tail around hers, so I'm assuming he's interested. I'll sex him again when I get home but I thought I sexed him when I got him.