07/18/08

Completed the take down of the lizard garden in the back yard. In the process found another clutch of four eggs that was laid in the cage. All four were stuck together, but one broke when I dumped out the dirt and discovered the eggs. I incubated them all together. They don't look as old as the previous in-cage clutch. That particular cage hosted two different cohorts of females and the eggs could be from females #8470, #8471, or #8478 or from females #8539, #8540, #8538, #8535, or #8529. Hopefully I'll be able to back calculate from their date of hatch to determine from which cohort and from which dam they're originated. I hate loose ends and these clutches represent big loose ends as I can't very well use them foran experiment if they're not incubated properly or of known dam. Continuing to break down lab and have about half the stuff packed back into the storage locker. Still on schedule to make it to Eugene tomorrow night. Put another six females in the ovipositorium as part of the garden break down. A bit surprised that these clutches could be this late, but also a bit excited as I really want to see just how much of a disadvantage being this late is. Why bother laying a clutch of eggs in late July if you're offspring only have 6-8 weeks to grow and have only a small probability of surviving the winter. I guess the point is that the probability is small, not zero and that some years the investment can really pay off. I gave these females unlimited food, so perhaps resource availability plays a role in determining late seasonn reproductive attempts. I sense an experiment in there somewhere. Maybe repeat the lizard garden but put half of the females on high food ration and half on low ration. I would predict that since fat stores from the previous year are being used for the first clutch of eggs that early clutches won't be affected much, but that late clutches will be small if they occur at all. Hmm. Might be a good student project next year.