Bhubaneswar: Bengal monitor lizard babies have emerged out of 16 unknown eggs after seven months of artificial incubation by Snake Helpline, here. This is for first time that monitor lizards have been hatched through artificial incubation in Odisha.
The eggs were found in the farm house of Balabhadra Prasad Pati of Sathilo village under Balipatna block in Khurda district on September 5, 2021. Balabhadra found the eggs while digging the soil for a construction work, but no animal was guarding the eggs. He contacted Subhendu Mallik, general secretary of Snake Helpline to know about the eggs and sent a photo of the eggs to him.
At that time, the cobra eggs were hatching all over the state and under normal conditions, hatching of cobra eggs continue till September. Therefore, Subhendu was in dilemma as he could know that those eggs neither belonged to cobra nor rat snakes. He had hatched both the species and released the babies in wild. Biranchi Narayana Acharjya, a volunteer of Snake Helpline went to the spot and brought the eggs carefully to the office.
Subhendu kept the eggs in artificial incubation devised by himself and entrusted his 14-year-old son Ansuman Mallik to take care. Several months after incubation, they did not get any clue to identify the animals inside the eggs. One day on the request of Ansuman, Subhendu used a torch to candle the eggs, and observed blood vessels inside the eggs, indicating presence of embryo inside.
In March 2022, Subhendu could see the head of the developing embryo inside and guessed it to be a monitor lizard. On going through literature, he could know that monitor lizard eggs take 9 months to hatch.
On April 12, Ansuman first observed the first newly hatched baby monitor and informed Subhendu. The newly hatched baby was positively identified as Bengal monitor lizard (Varanus bengalensis). The rest of the eggs finished hatching in next 3 days. On April 13, Dr Indramani Nath, Professor, Surgery & Radiology department, College of Veterinary & Animal Husbandry, OUAT conducted X-ray examination to know the exact shape of the fully developed embryo inside the egg.
Female Bengal Monitor spends a long time in the nest to protect eggs from predators and ensure proper incubation conditions for hatching. Therefore, the eggs found in Balabhadra’s farmhouse would have been damaged without artificial incubation.
All 16 baby Bengal Monitor lizards were released in a suitable natural habitat in presence of Bhagaban Kisku, Forest Guard, Mancheswar Range, City Forest Division.
“This Bengal monitor egg hatching was very satisfying for us because it took long 223 days. But we are happy that we could return back 16 baby Bengal monitors to the nature,” said Subhendu.
