Alucard's Journey

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I'll try not to make this introduction too upsetting.

After the sudden and tragic passing of my two year old, Simon, I had an empty enclosure and a beardie sized hole in my heart.
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Simon was buried in my front yard, and a red maple tree was planted on her grave site as a memorial. Richter came to show his respects. As time passes, this whole area will be converted into a beautiful garden in her honor. Rest in peace, Simon. You were truly loved.

I'm on day two now and am still grieving horribly, but if I could turn her empty enclosure into a great home for another dragon and give them a good life, why not start now.

Alucard has been introduced to the house. She will never replace Simon and she knows she has big shoes to fill. She was also taken out to pay her respects to Simon's memorial site. She is a normal morph little girl beardie, just like Simon, and has a lot of spunk and a big appetite.
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She's about two months old, 8.5", and 32g.
She will inevitably lose the very tip of her tail, but it looks like this is healing well and will not cause her any concern.

I look forward to the love and laughter she brings to me and appreciate her presence turning Simon's home into something positive again.
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
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Baby Richter
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Not so baby Richter


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Alucard as a baby
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Still a baby!

She appears to be getting chin coloring already as it does not appear to be shed
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fuchsiaSkies

Hatchling Member
Alucard is such a ham. :p Looks like she's gettin' some pretty yellow going on in the beard, and growing like a champ, too!

I love baby Richter's short little snoot! Crazy how much they change in so little time...

Alucard's got some work to do to catch up to that monster! Could not get Thomas brat-face to sit still, he was not feelin the close-ups today, but he has been doin a little upper body lately... :laughhard:

[ximg]89627 5367375556[/ximg]

Told him he needs to work on getting some more definition, since he seems to be done growing long-ways, and starting to grow wide-ways!
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
I love them so much.
I got home after my hair cut yesterday, and it was right before lights out and as soon as I entered the room, Alucard pressed up on the glass and started pawing, so I took her out and she hugged onto my wrist and fitbit and closed her eyes. I doubt she was wanting my attention and was likely being silly, but it made me feel loved anyway. She's so sweet.

And yes, Richter had a stubby baby face :lol: and maintained the same expression basically.
It's a pec-off! (shamelessly using same photo as before)
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traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
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Alucard had her first trip to petsmart with me! Stopped in to get some more supers for Richter and decided she'd earned her turn. She was such a good girl, super alert with the look of "Woah" on her face, but no signs of stress. She got pets and was told how cute she was from employees and shoppers, got home, and she's all tuckered out from her adventure.
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smackey2

Hatchling Member
Aw! You wore her out! But she looks absolutely adorable and ready for some cuddles! (She looks comfortable, but looking at her position backs my back hurt. Haha.)
 

SHBailey

Gray-bearded Member
They grow really fast when you're not looking, don't they?

And it never ceases to amaze me how much cuteness can get crammed into one thread. :laughing6:
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
They do grow so fast, it's funny to look back on the baby pictures and realize it has only been months with each one.
Alucard has gotten pretty dark again and is going through a tail and face shed, but it always makes me concerned she won't brighten up in color while she's still got soooooo much shed to do. I need to remember Simon was a dark baby, too, and regardless her final color will never change how much I love her, I just would really like that bright citrus like Simon had.

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Baby Simon <3 Love you, sweetheart.
 

SHBailey

Gray-bearded Member
You have some really cute pictures to remember her by. :)

It's hard to tell what color they're going to turn out, especially when they're shedding, or when they're in a bad mood because of the shedding or some other reason. Maybe that's just their way of keeping you guessing... :?
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
She's definitely keeping me guessing. I'm seeing a lot of orange highlights coming out that I'm super excited about, but she can turn so dark she's almost black when basking or outdoors. The only time I get to see her actual coloring is when she's asleep. I call her beautiful every day :) She could turn out mud brown and she'd still be beautiful, but I'm so impatient to see!

Her tail shed popped off cleanly yesterday and is all done, and I'm seeing the shed creep up her hands and her chin, so it will be extra difficult to tell now. Her tail just looks like a light grey after the shed.

It's funny, I collected Simon and Richter's shed skin and have begun collecting Alucard's (I put them in clear ornaments for personalized xmas tree bulbs) and while Simon and now Alucard's shed came with dark markings/stripes/patterens, Richter's is all purely white. I assume being hypo is the reason, but hey, I will always know which bulb is his right away.

Stay tuned later tonight for weigh in's!
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Alright so both dragons are up in weight.
Richter is up to 492g, up 10g from last week. Just a smidge over 19.5".

Little porky is super porky.
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Up 21g and another .5"
She is currently in limb shed and her little mouth is in shed. If her pattern is like last time, she'll shed everything but her tail in one go.

She is 3 1/2 months old
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
I think I found out why she was up 21g. I think she just took a poop as big as she is. She wasn't impacted at all, she's been pooping twice a day. No idea how that was all in her. Impressive.
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
Alright so I weighed her after that big poop and she only lost 1g.

She seemed pretty upset after pooping though, so I gave her her second bath since I've had her, and she really loved it! She even started trying to duck under and swim, so naturally I recorded it!
https://youtu.be/GOiYcMdkmWE

I made sure she was not in distress and trying to get out prior to recording, she was in fact having fun and displaying signs of wanting to swim. My bathroom countertop was a mess from her tail wriggles but it was worth it.
I'll need to get her a large, long pan to give her more room to play in. I tried a shallow bath right after but she would just run to the same edge and push her mouth against it and sit there.
 

SHBailey

Gray-bearded Member
Our beardie's sheds are beige. I usually keep the really interesting ones and admire them for a little while, then they go in the compost. Never thought of making Christmas ornaments out of them -- too cute! :lol:

Frustrating when you think they grew and it turns out to be poop. But she must be feeling pretty good if she has enough energy to do that splashfest in the bath.

We've got a couple of big shallow plastic storage bins that we use for bathing our reptiles. It works pretty well. I used to bathe our snake in the sink but he's been known to wrap his tail around the plug and let the water out. Tried it in the bathtub a couple of times too -- he can swim like an eel but he doesn't really like to do it -- heads for the nearest thing he can wrap himself around and tries to get out. As for the beardie, sometimes he likes the bath and sometime he hates it, and sometimes he just tolerates it. It just depends on what kind of a mood he's in.
 

traildrifterphalanx

Sub-Adult Member
Original Poster
She knows she's super cute, too, and uses it to her advantage.. sitting there... looking all cute...

I just wanted to rephrase, she was still 103g after she took the big poop, so her growth was not all poop related :lol:
She's growing remarkably fast. Richter was a .5"/week grower as well but he also ate like 2x as much as she does right now, though she is incredibly food motivated. I was about to hand feed her a roach the other day and then drew back because I thought it might be too big. She crept closer to me while I was looking it over, and I was like no, I think it's too big, and she snatched it out of my fingers and chomped it down. Ok, fine! She also gets super excited when she sees me take the lid off the feeder bin, implying food is coming. Her eyes get big and she tilts her head down at the bin and back at me like "you.... you gonna feed me? *eyes up the bin*"

She is definitely her own little unique personality and full of surprises. Her little swimming and tail whipping was the cutest. I'd love to encourage her to keep wanting to swim.
 
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