There is a variety of methods for successfully incubating leopard gecko eggs. This is the method that I have been using.  I have had a lot of success with it and I hope you will too.

Checklist

The first thing we should do is go over all everything we will need for the incubaation process.  Here is the list of things that I use to incubate my Leopard Gecko eggs.

  • 4.5” Deli Cup and Lid-Holes Punched:  Fits two Leopard Gecko eggs nicely, I personally recommend you get them at TSK Supply. Click here for cup. (http://www.tsksupply.com/products/Pro-Kal-8-oz-CLEAR-PUNCHED.html)  Click here for lid. ( http://www.tsksupply.com/pro-kal-lid-50-count/) The link should take you right to it.  These are the cheapest I have been able to find them.
  • Water Mister/Sprayer: Can be found at Walmart or a local nursery.  MAKE SURE IT HAS NEVER BEEN USED BEFORE!! A used mister/sprayer might contain toxins that will kill or harm Leopard Gecko eggs.
  • Organic Perlite: NO MIRACLE GROW PERLITE!!! Make sure it’s organic with nothing added to it. If it is not organic, it could harm or kill your eggs.
  • Simple gram scale: Doesn’t have to be perfectly accurate.  You will have to round up to the nearest gram anyway.  You will also want your gram scale to have a tare or a zero out function.
  • Simple Calculator: One that will add, subtract, multiply, and divide will do.
  • Blue Painters’ Tape: For record keeping.  This will come in handy later in the process.
  • Thermal/Still Air Hova Bator Incubator 1602N: This is the best incubator for incubating Leopard Gecko eggs using this method.  You can get one here. (http://geckosgalore.ecrater.com/p/13212414/thermal-hova-bator-incubator-1602n)

Method

First, take your 4.5” Deli Cup and put it on the gram scale and tare it so that the weight of the deli cup is zero.  Once you have done that, fill the cup up about halfway with the organic perlite.  Do not cover the holes.  These will provide airflow throughout the incubation process. 

Next, weigh the perlite.

 Once you have weighed the cup with the perlite, take that weight and type it into your calculator.  Multiply that weight by .666.  So in this case, I would take 12 and multiply it by .666 which gives me 7.992 which rounds up to 8.  That is the amount of water (in grams) that you will add to the perlite.  In the example above you are going to add 8 to 12 to get 20.   Here you would fill the perlite with water until the total weight on your scale is 20 grams.

(Even if your calculation of how much water to add comes out to be something like 7.336 or something like that you ALWAYS want to round UP to the next gram.  The more humidity you have the better.)

Once you have done all of this, add your Leopard Gecko eggs.  Put the lid on and put a piece of blue painters’ tape on the lid.  Write the date the eggs were laid, the names of the parents, and the most important part, the weight of the perlite and water.
Date laid: (6/21/12)
Parents: (Striped Tremper Albino Male, Hybino Female)
Weight of water plus perlite: (20 grams)
Now put your eggs in the incubator.  The sex of the geckos will be based on the incubation temperature:

(The following are rough guesses of how long the eggs will have to incubate before hatching)

  • 81-83°, Mostly Females, roughly 65 days of incubation time.
  • 84-86°, Mix of males and females, roughly 55 days of incubation time.
  • 87-89°, Mostly Males, roughly 40 days of incubation time.

Do not incubate higher than 90 degrees!  The eggs will hatch but the babies will be  very aggressive females and MAY NOT breed!  Don’t incubate under 80 because the eggs will get too cold and die. 

VERY IMPORTANT!!!

Once your eggs are in the incubator, you should take the cup out of the incubator about every 4 days and weigh it again.  If the weight doesn’t equal the weight listed on the cup (20 grams in this case) then you should brng it up to that weight again by adding water to it.  Move the eggs to a different deli cup with perlite while you do this so you don’t accidentally get the eggs wet.  When you are finished bringing the weight back up put the eggs back in and put the cup into the incubator.  THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT STEP, SO DON’T SKIP IT!

Final notes

I have used this method very successfully.  Many of you might have read about other ways to incubate Leopard Gecko eggs, particularly recommending different water to perlite ratios.  I have tried those methods for about a year and I never had an egg hatch.  Of course, I am not saying that these  methods are always unsuccessful, and that there could have been things wrong with what I was doing, however I have had my best success with the method I describe above.

If anyone has any questions, please leave a comment below.

Brian MagnussonVisit Website

Brian is the owner of Gecko's Galore. His passion for reptiles started back when he was a kid living in Missouri. He and his friends would spend our summer days going around the neighbor hood catching lizards and snakes. One of his friends had a Leopard Gecko and from the moment he saw it he knew he had to have one. His passion has grown from there.

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