How many locks do you hope to see in breeding pairs?

[Spindown]

Just like the question says, how many locks do you hope to see as a breeder with your bluey pairs? I decided to breed both females, one later than the other due to qt but they are both locking up with my male, one with 3 successful locks and one with 4. My male has become breeding crazy and is getting out of control, so I may have to stop introducing his lady friends, hence the question.

Thanks in advance, sorry for typos, new to using a tablet

[Richard.C]

I have no set number,i just keep going until male loses interest,usually female ovulates or is in lead up to ovulation,or if they go over a long period,ive had a pr still going after 6 weeks,i normally just decide enoughs enough,especially if females getting knocked around a bit or is actually chomping males head whilst he continues copulating

[Jeff]

I like to get 6 or more if I can. It doesn’t always work that way though, and I don’t worry too much about it. A couple years ago I stopped at five for every female just to see if that made any difference. I had the smallest average litter size I have ever had. I obviously can’t say for sure that was the reason, but I have gone back to getting as many as I can since then. Every year someone says their female only had one or two copulations, and they end up with a litter of 15-16.

[Spindown]

Lol all I know is I had 4 locks with this male and my lone girl last year and got 10 slugs head chomping will likely be soon with my second female if he continues this nuttiness, they are way more patient with him then maybe they should be

He's becoming convinced that coming in like a freight train and knocking them around is his style, he bloodied up fem 2 pretty good today with how aggressive he was locked on her neck/shoulder area so we will see...not willing to sacrifice their safety if he can't calm down. I know skink breeding is rough stuff, poor girls...abrasions get treated with betadine wash followed by antibiotic ointment. Had 0 scarring of the pretty skink ladies from last year

[kl]

I try for between 6 to 8 spread out for at least a week. I also want matings to be split between mornings and early evenings. Sometimes it still does not matter. I have 1 female that mates about 8 times each yr and still never produces any babies and yet the same male will breed another female and that one will produce.

KL

[Richard.C]

Is that with blotchies kim?

With most of my blueys,there in groups so i dont have a sau on how many times ect,only the northerns im in control with,except for a trio that live together full time

When the blotchies kick in they mate numerous times a day,one afternoon last season i saw my dominant male vic alpine cover the one female 6 times in a 4 hour period in the late arvo,and i wasnt there watching the whole time,unlike northerns they dont seem to jostle as much,more chase and hold

That female did get roughed up quite a bit,so may have just been an odd occurance,but multi times per day is commonly seen outdoors with them over a one to 2 week period usually

[StaceyLeigh]

I got 4 good copulations between my male Northern and each (2) female this season. One of my females was becoming VERY uncooperative, and they were both getting really chewed up as the male was pretty rough this year. Last season I got 4 matings, only 3 seemed good and I got 11 live babies & 5 still born, so I felt confident 4 could get the job done. Time will tell. Good luck this season!

[Susann]

I have yet to get more than 4 matings per female. This year I'm sure Milo would've gone for Rosy till he died but because Rosy is only 1 1/2 years old (even though she is 24" long ...actually probably more than that now, she looks huge...) I voluntarily stopped putting them together after 4 lock-ups. I would've gone 4 times for Maddie last year (she was 2 but I thought she was a bit small) but JJ backed off after only 2 times.
But each time each female "only" produced 6 live. (Maddie had one stillborn that came a couple days after she pushed for 4 hours to get a set of twins out, one of which was folded in half sideways.)

Oh, wait, Xyla had 5 lock-ups the first year when I let both boys mate her.
This year Xyla mated 3 times, and Maddie 4, and then Rosie, but not until Jan, mated 4 times. So we'll see what, if anything, comes of that.

[kl]

Richard, that is with Blotched.


KL

[Spindown]

Thanks for all the great input! Just had #5 lock with fem 1, but I swear he romances her...fem 2 must be his knockout affair because he certainly doesn't romance that poor girl! Lol the drama of breeding season