our new beardy

Hey guys new to the forum and would like to share our little story and ask a few questions.

We recently got,or what we like to consider rescued, our new beardy. We got him from a family that only ever fed him crickets and rarely anything else. He was in a tank way to small (20 gallon starter tank), to the point he had to curl himself around just to eat. We bought him a nice 40 gallon tank, a nice 150 watt heat lamp that keeps his temp just right and now slowly moved him eating greens and some fruits daily and live bait every now and then to keep him interested. He is eating very well, he is very active and very curious about everything going on around him.

My only concern...we believe him to be about a year old and the previous owner said he was rarely handled. He was mostly around young children which is why we think he tends to be ski-dish right now. We have held him a few times once to change his tank when we got the bigger one, once so we could clean his tank and set it up with new rock, and lastly to hold him just to try and get him used to it. Two out of the three times he flattened out puffed his beard up and tried to run and jump off of my chest. I would like to see if there is anything we can do to start him on a path where we will be able to hold and love him. Any suggestions i know it will take time jsut would like to get suggestions from you guys. Thanks!!!

Chaz

Hi. I've put a worn shirt in the tank so she could get use to my smell. Also do you have a uvb light for him?

Yes we do have a uvb florescent lite we keep on 24 7 and the heat light goes off when we go to bed

He needs complete darkness to sleep and to cool down at night. So you can turn off the light.

chaz117":20dd9x76 said:

Yes we do have a uvb florescent lite we keep on 24 7 and the heat light goes off when we go to bed

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An east way to hold him is take a towel or blanket hold him in it but dont cover there head and day after day cover less and less of him with the blanket/towel until he stops puffing up and make sure he knows your the one feeding him what i do with the lights is have 2; 60 watt lights in total 120 watts and i turn the uv light off and just one of the heat lamps so they dont get too cold

destiny1998":33um3la8 said:

Hi. I've put a worn shirt in the tank so she could get use to my smell. Also do you have a uvb light for him?

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I also would recommend getting a lower watt heat lamp because it doesnt need as much power would be less likely to cause a fire and most importantly with high watt heat lamps it can cause eye danage when your dragon is close to is at about 3 to 5 inchest sometimes depending on the brand

Princess had not been handled prior to joining my menagerie. I started out by just getting her used to my hands being around her. Every time I walked by her viv I just reached in an stroked her or touched her. I also hand fed her greens. I also fed her in a separate feeding tank so that she had to get picked up every day to get fed and put back. Any time I handled her I made sure that I was calm, cool, and collected, no matter what she did.

It's been four months and she's doing really well.

Keep calm and snuggle on...

Loiosh & Princess' Mom