Using sand

I understand sand is bad to use because they can injest it but in the wide they have sand. I have a food dish for them and was wondering if it still would be bad to do half of the tank sand and leave food and water on the other half

Hi. In the outback is mostly rock. I use ceremic tile. Way easier to clean and looks nice.

While it's true in the wild they are out on dirt, it's not the same as what you're thinking. The sand that is found in most viv's is more like a dessert/Sahara style, not the hard pack of the outback, as Destiny pointed out.

Honestly to me it's just not worth it. When Sarth was just little, I put flag stones (not symmetrical) in his viv and filled in the gaps with play sand. I kept his food dish on a couple stones I had stacked so it was up away from any of the sand. Despite that though I gave him a bath when I noticed he hadn't pooed in awhile, and when he pooed in the bath, a bunch of small stones and dirt came out with, and he nearly collapsed from the effort of passing that. After that, I got rid of the sand. When I got his 4x2x2 custom tank, I went to Home Depot and bough a half dozen beautiful flag stone tiles. They weren't expensive and they trimmed them for me for free. They look awesome, and so easy to clean.

Lonewolf627":2uoiaols said:

I understand sand is bad to use because they can injest it but in the wide they have sand. I have a food dish for them and was wondering if it still would be bad to do half of the tank sand and leave food and water on the other half

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Their substrate is much different than the sand you'll get at a reptile / pet store. Also, you have a captive beardie, just because they do this or that in the wild doesn't mean it's OK for them to do it in captivity under your watch.

Since you are the owner, do the right thing. Use non-adhesive shelf-linear, tile, paper towels etc.

They have an outside tank that has a dig box and love it