My Leopard Gecko doesnt seem to be eating

Question

My Geckos   First off, I would personally like to thank you for looking at my question and for your time. I have a total of four geckos, i have two geckos that are a male and female and are both leopard geckos. The other two geckos i have are female, one is a brown color with black spots, and one is yellow with a purple and black spotted tail. My male gecko was given to me after he was found in an office building. The story is that he got lose and was lost in the building for about a year. he is very small compared to the others and eats up to 10 medium to adult sized crickets every other day. Since i have had them all together in a 40 breeder, he has been mating with all the females. The yellow and the brown geckos do not seem to get out and "hunt" when the crickets run past them. They have been laying in the sand (under the sand where they sleep is an under-tank heater) outside of their shelters and it seems that they are very slow and wont chase food or even seem to have an interest in the crickets when they run right in front of them. They usually sleep in a different hideout from the male also.I have tried taking only the male out overnight and putting him in a different tank. Then i put about 15-20 crickets in the females cage to see if they might eat if the male wasn't there. This still didn't work to get them to eat much. The brown and the yellow gecko have had smaller tails since i got them along with the male. Could they be pregnant? What do you suggest? Here are also some pictures of them all.
         Thank you so very much for your time!
         Sincerely, Josef

Answer
Hi Josef,

Thank you for the photo. That is a nice looking group of leos. From what I can see they all look quite healthy. Those appear to be their original tails which are naturally thinner then regenerated tails. Your male has been very lucky to go from being lost in an office building to having regular meals and a whole harem to breed with!

You asked whether your females could be gravid and the timing sounds right for that possibility. They usually go off their food in the last week or two before laying which is about 4 to 6 weeks after mating.

If they are close to laying you should be able to see the eggs through the skin. This link has some good photos of what to look for. A flashlight can help.  

http://www.vmsherp.com/LCBreedingLeopards.htm

Some females become stressed out at breeding time by overly "attentive" males but that should not be a problem with the ratio of male to females that you have.

If they are gravid they will be looking for a suitable spot to lay. You will need to provide a container with a damp substrate if you intend to try to hatch the eggs. Without a laying chamber they will often lay the eggs in the water dish.

Each female can lay several eggs per season. You could end up with quite a little crop of leos if all three females produce fertile eggs. Good luck.