Mystery Eggs Turn Up During the Summer

Every summer wildlife experts, game wardens, and county agents get requests to identify mysterious eggs. These mystery eggs turn up while digging in the garden or compost pile, or maybe under a board or log. Maybe the evidence turns up where a raccoon or possum dug up and fed on the eggs.

What kind of creature might have laid these eggs? Was it a snake? Was it dangerous? Maybe it was a rattlesnake. If so, might it still be in the area, just waiting to bait some unsuspecting person? These are a few concerns we might have if we let our imagination get the best of us.

Lets look at the options. Maybe the eggs weren't laid by a snake. Maybe it was a turtle or lizard. There are clues we can use to make a good, educated guess as to the origin of the eggs. Turtle eggs can usually be distinguished from snake eggs by their stiffer shells. Snake eggs are more rubbery and tend to grow or swell as they take up water and develop.

If the eggs are round, it's not a snake. All snakes lay oval eggs. But then, so do most turtles - but a few - like the soft-shelled turtles and snapping turtles - lay eggs that are as round as a ping-pong ball, but a little smaller.

Lizard eggs are very difficult to tell from snake eggs. Like snake eggs, they are oval and soft-shelled, but tend to be smaller than snake eggs. But, if a snake egg and lizard egg were the same size, you probably couldn't tell the difference between the two.

I'd say if the eggs are oval, rubbery, and an inch long or more, they are snake eggs. There are a few clues that can help you identify the species of snake that laid the eggs - racers lay eggs with a granular surface texture - sort of like salt grains stuck to the shell. If eggs are stuck together in a glob, they may well be those of some kind of rat snake or a corn snake.

So how about the risk of a nest of rattlesnakes, cottonmouth, or copperheads hatching out and infesting the premises? It's not likely, because these species - and other pit vipers - all bear live young. They don't lay eggs.

Couldn't any snake eggs be those of a venomous species? Yes, there are cobras, mambas, and some other exotic species. Our only native American venomous egg laying snake is the coral snake. Their range is limited to the deep south - and even there they are very rare. So the chances of having such a clutch of snake eggs in your yard is, well, unlikely to say the least.

If you come upon a clutch of eggs on your property and do not want to destroy them all, you can sacrifice one egg. Open it. If it is sufficiently developed you can see the little critter inside.

For more information on snakes, check out the UGA Savannah River Ecology Lab Herpetology website at http://www.uga.edu/srelherp/

Billy Skaggs
Agricultural Agent Hall County Extension Coordinator
734 East Crescent Drive
Gainesville, GA 30501
Phone:(770)531-6988
Fax: (770)531-3994 Email: [email protected]