Madagascan Hisser tried to lay an ootheca?

[iliosborn]

Hi!

Had to make an account specifically to post this because I'm a little confused... I'm really excited to say I'm (hopefully) going to have my first clutch of baby hissers!

However, I caught my pregnant female laying an ootheca earlier. I initially panicked that it was some sort of parasite, as I was sure hissers were live bearing, but after some searching found out it was definitely an egg sac. She'd picked a very high and precarious place to do all this, so I kept an eye on her throughout the process (around an hour? I wasn't keeping time), but after leaving briefly to do something I came back to find she was just...pulling it back in?! 

None of the care/breeding sheets I've found seem to address this at all. They mention an ootheca, but note that the female keeps this inside her in order to livebear. She looks perfectly normal again now, and is acting fine, I'm just perplexed about the whole situation and was wondering if anyone has similar experience or perhaps an explanation as to why she would "pretend" to lay an ootheca.

 

Thanks!

[BlattaAnglicana]

Yes this is completely normal - female hissers often push the ootheca out and retract it again, I think both when first making it and also at least once (not sure how many times) during the incubation. I've seen several of my female hissers (of several species - G. oblongonota, G. portentosa and E. javanica) doing this and it's perfectly normal. 

If she has just made the ootheca it will probably be several months before she has the babies, but if it's one of those cases where they push out and retract the ootheca part way through incubation you may not have to wait so long.

 

 

[Hisserdude]

She's rotating her oothecae, which they tend to do roughly halfway through incubation. She should pull it back in no problem, and hopefully you'll have babies pretty soon!