Apache, Nexus, and Cider's growth

He looks great! I'm glad to hear he's making such progress with you =)

Almost a month later and I'm realizing just how big he's gotten since getting Cider, my two month old baby.

He used to have this thing for jumping off my shoulder onto my keyboard when I'd have him hanging out with me. Now he's a little too big to sit on it..

This was him when he was smaller, obviously

And now

I'll just post here occasionally with small updates on how he's growing

Looks like a bunch more growth on the way too, with all that shedding coming on =)

He's constantly shedding, I can't even enjoy how pretty he is under all the white for more than a day or two. He measured and weighed in at 14 3/4 inches and 160.4 grams. Good news is he eats his bowl of greens willingly every day now without me having to bribe him with some BSL in it. He still gets his bug meals, obviously, but it's nice to see he won't give me too much of a problem as an adult if he stays this way.

It's great that he's getting a nice healthy variety in his diet. He's going to grow up to be a big healthy dragon =)

Wow he is such a pretty dragon! Looks like you’re doing great with him.

He's up to 16 1/2 inches and 224 grams. He still seems a bit behind in terms of growth compared to others his age, but he looks to be an okay weight.

As far as Cider.. No real issues with him anymore other than I feel like he's not growing enough. I got him at 8 3/4 inches and 16 grams, a month later he's 10 1/4 inches and 33 grams. His tail ended up fine, it shed recently. I did have to help it by soaking it and then rubbing it between my fingers, but at least he didn't lose any of his tail. I might have to do that every shed. He's been a very easy baby, Apache was a headache. He's very easy to handle, likes greens already, and he eats like a pig.

I think Apache has hit puberty. He's started bobbing at me. No aggression, just bobbing, black bearding, and doing that ground slapping thing they do. He had a small episode of not wanting to be handled at all last month that ended after about a week. He'd hiss, flatten, and try to bite, I assume that's part of it too.

He's kinda slowed down growing at 18 1/4 inches, and his weight has sort of leveled off at 360g. He hasn't grown much or put on more than 5g of weight in a few weeks.

Cider is still really small. He's active and alert, he's just small. He's 13 inches and 91 grams. I've been looking for a good herp vet to take him to, I want to make sure everything is okay with him. There's only one that I know about, and three people I've spoken to said they weren't really happy with the doctor, so I'm not going to bother with that place.

Took some pictures of them in their baths. I've spaced their baths out to every 2-3 weeks. I'm probably going to move that up to weekly again, because they always drink a ton in their bath. They both get misted greens, crickets, and BSL mixed in with the greens, I figured that would be enough water in their diets, but I guess not.

Cider, he drank a lot so he had a bit of a bulge in his throat. Hadn't swallowed it yet I guess.

And Apache. Every time I get my camera out, he tilts his head.

A regular customer that comes into my job has two bearded dragons she's looking for homes for. She can't afford them anymore. I was thinking about taking one in if she's parting with the tank too. I'm not 100% sure, these guys already cost me a ton in BSL and crickets.

He looks like he's a real livewire .... what ever you do , never let the two dragons meet each other .... two boys ==> bloodshed is guaranteed to result.

Apache looks like he's a brainy bugger .... he'll certainly keep you on your toes and it'll never be a dull moment with him , I predict he'll be wanting to explore and investigate everything he can see and will be continuously getting up to mischief (reminds me of boy Toothless who was much like him but died suddenly due to a birth defect (organ failure).

Yeah they're seperated, their tanks aren't in the same room. They've seen each other once two weeks ago when I had Cider on my shoulder while I got something from my room (Apache's tank is in my room), but that's it. Lots of head bobbing and black bearding from just that 10 seconds, I won't do that again.

I never take pictures with flash on so I'm thinking maybe it's the ultrasonic range finder then? Or maybe it's the sound of the camera focusing. He does tilt his head and give a bob when I look at him sometimes, but he does it consistently every time I take a picture.

They have vastly different personalities. Apache is very tolerant of my nonsense and touching. He's a good napping buddy. Cider isn't as calm, if he doesn't like something he'll just run up your arm and nestle somewhere he shouldn't be, no napping with him he's all energy all the time. Even when Apache was his age he'd still sleep if you had him out late enough, he's a good boy.

I haven't posted on this thread in a while. My boys are still growing really well. I haven't taken any recent pictures of Cider (he's the crazy child), but I do have these pictures of Apache that were taken last month.

This was at my job's reptile event. I came in on my day off with Apache like I usually do and they had me basically run the 3 hour event with him as our guest of honor and paid me for it. It was great educating people about bearded dragons and being able to show them just how big they get and how friendly and calm they can be. A lot of people pet him, I had a few kids hold him. He was well behaved in such an open, hectic setting. I was very proud of him.

Cider is the troublemaker now, big time. He's big enough that I trust him to go outside with me now. However, I had to buy him a harness because I don't trust his dumb butt to not try to run away from me soon as he sees something interesting. First outing with the harness, he tries to catapult himself off of my shoulder onto the ground in the parking lot. I managed to catch him with the harness leash and lower him on to the ground gently so he didn't hurt himself. I take him outside with me for walks all the time and he's good, but soon as he sees the parking lot to my job, he thinks he can fly. I've been taking him places more to try to get him used to it in hopes he'll calm down to Apache levels of chill.

I had gotten a third bearded dragon from work, turned out to be a boy. I named him Zephyr. I had adopted him because he had a bad foot. He was bitten by one of his tank mates and he was having a hard time with it. I took him to the vet, and she said it wasn't too severe, and barring infection, it will heal up just fine. He was improving for about a month, then he suddenly hit a hard decline and he passed the day before his scheduled vet visit. I asked his vet to examine him and she couldn't figure out the cause of death without a necropsy. I decided against doing a necropsy.

I took a break from the idea of a third bearded dragon. Just before my birthday we got a new shipment of beardies in, and my boyfriend offered to get me one of the babies I was interested in. He got me a little hypo female, I posted about her a bit ago in a separate thread asking for a little help sexing her and finding out what was wrong with some discoloration on her head (it turned out to be scarring). I've named her Nexus. She's doing really well, she was perfectly healthy and alert in the store. She eats like a champ, she's very active, and she doesn't mind being handled. I haven't taken any pictures of her, but this was a month ago when I got her. She hasn't grown too much, just in length.

I finally got some pictures of Cider. He's maturing into a gorgeous dragon.