Bitten by the Dragon Bug!

[StarStitcher]

Hello, I'm Maggie, and with my 35 year old son and 5 year old daughter we became a proud family to Nessie, our baby BD this last Saturday. It all started when my daughter's passion for dinosaurs grew to include lizards. That's all i heard day and night... "I want a lizard"... "where is my lizard"... "I think I lost my lizard" to which I said,"Maybe someday"... "Go look outside for it"... "You never had a lizard so you can loose it"...

Finally my son and I decided to bring her to a pet store we knew of that had lots of lizards. I knew when we left home to go there that we would leave with a lizard and I was pretty sure it would be a BD but I had an open mind. Ha! I was right.

Nessie is supposedly about 2 months old and is 6 1/2 inches long. She is bright, sparkly, energetic, affectionate and eats like a pig! Until last night that is. That's when she started to molt. Thank you for calming my nerves oh great Dragon Site!

She's doing pretty good (my daughter decided she was a girl since we couldn't base it on any truth). I gave her a nice soak this afternoon and she really seemed to like it. She at better tonight. My little girl was petting her in my hand very gently and became very upset when a little bit of skin came off on her finger. She thought she broke her. We had a time trying to explain molting to her.

So, after spending probably... $180 on her so far, not counting her of course, I read this site and some others and am getting ready to spend at least #100 plus on a new tank (10 gal big enough for the next couple months my patoot!), a temp gun, new light, and a real basking rock not to mentions pretties. Oh, and I need a good multi-vitamin. Suggestions?

So, PetCo has a sale on tanks and I can get a 40 breeder for $40. Will that last her a while till I can get something built which I'm sure will take a while? I'm disabled and I do almost nothing easily. It is too painful. My son helps me with sooo much but he tends to be slow going at getting things done. It will happen but it may take longer than I want. But I want Nessie to be happy. She has definitely won over 3 hearts here in a big way. We are pet people anyway so what can I say?

Thanks for any input you have.

Maggie and the menagerie

 

[Malon3r]

First off, congrats on buying your beardie!
For your first question, repcal multivitamins will work, just remember to do this only 2x a week, and dust with calcium 5x a week.

With the tank, not sure the size but if it is a true 40gal breeder, the dimensions shoud be 36x18x1x and on this site is regarded as the minimum standard to house an adult bearded dragon, so yes it will last up until It grows to adulthood.

For lighting, make sure you have a reptisun 10.0 flourescent TUBE light or the arcadia(sp?) 12% tube. Pet stores often reccomend the coil/compact uvb's but they can damage the eyes of the beardie.

I am not sure how much research you have done so far on this site, but if you can provide some information it would useful for me and others to give advice if needed.

- What are the temps in your tank, cool side/hot side/basking spot. Are you using a temp probe thermometer or one of those dial stick ons(they can be wrong by up to 20 degrees)

- what substrate are you using? Newspaper, paper towels, tiles, sand, reptile carpet?

- what are you feeding him/her? I have read some petstores reccomend mealworms which really aren't very good and can cause impaction.

 

[StarStitcher]

For all the info I thought I gave... I gave you almost none. Sorry about that.

I have been researching your site for days reading very little else. I have learned a lot but I do have some questions since I have read even more.

I have been feeding Nessie crickets every day, dusting them well with calcium. She eats 2-3 times a day, depending if she seems hungry or not. Now as I am reading, I'm seeing people say that they never feed crickets??? Even to babies? They feed Reptiworms? Is this right? Besides crickets I have been feeding her chopped turnip greens. They first day she ate them a lot but then we figured out that we were starving her. The pet store told us to feed her about 5 small crickets twice a day. I'm not sure when I should be adding veggies or fruits but I understand this to happen when she is older? Is that right?

Currently she is in a little 10 gallon tank with a piece of cork wood balanced to go up the side of the tank. I am using a reptile rug for her bottom. Again, when i read your site I quickly took out the Aspen wood shavings the pet store sold us as a must for her substrate. I have also used plain white parchment paper. We check after each meal to make sure no crickets are left in there alive.

I just happen to have a couple Reptisun 10 tubes that I will put up in her new digs as soon as I put her in a bigger one. They are far too big for her 10 gallon. I'm not too sure I trust our current digital thermometer for temps. It has been running at 80 by the top of her wood which I consider her basking area. It has the bulb and fixture the pet store said we had to have for her UVB above it. I realized it is just too low and put another light that is a regular home light bulb to the side of it, pointing to the basking area. It warmed up to the point that it was reading 90 and Nessie had her mouth open part of the time. Personally, I think my temps are all messed up. Like I said before... I have a temp gun ordered.

So... my head is spinning about what is the best size of tank to get her right now, for now. I want to make/build her a vivie but that will take months. Of course, she is only 2 months old max... just a wee baby. Mostly, I want to get this right.

Maggie

 

[StarStitcher]

For all the info I thought I gave... I gave you almost none. Sorry about that.

I have been researching your site for days reading very little else. I have learned a lot but I do have some questions since I have read even more.

I have been feeding Nessie crickets every day, dusting them well with calcium. She eats 2-3 times a day, depending if she seems hungry or not. Now as I am reading, I'm seeing people say that they never feed crickets??? Even to babies? They feed Reptiworms? Is this right? Besides crickets I have been feeding her chopped turnip greens. They first day she ate them a lot but then we figured out that we were starving her. The pet store told us to feed her about 5 small crickets twice a day. I'm not sure when I should be adding veggies or fruits but I understand this to happen when she is older? Is that right?

Currently she is in a little 10 gallon tank with a piece of cork wood balanced to go up the side of the tank. I am using a reptile rug for her bottom. Again, when i read your site I quickly took out the Aspen wood shavings the pet store sold us as a must for her substrate. I have also used plain white parchment paper. We check after each meal to make sure no crickets are left in there alive.

I just happen to have a couple Reptisun 10 tubes that I will put up in her new digs as soon as I put her in a bigger one. They are far too big for her 10 gallon. I'm not too sure I trust our current digital thermometer for temps. It has been running at 80 by the top of her wood which I consider her basking area. It has the bulb and fixture the pet store said we had to have for her UVB above it. I realized it is just too low and put another light that is a regular home light bulb to the side of it, pointing to the basking area. It warmed up to the point that it was reading 90 and Nessie had her mouth open part of the time. Personally, I think my temps are all messed up. Like I said before... I have a temp gun ordered.

So... my head is spinning about what is the best size of tank to get her right now, for now. I want to make/build her a vivie but that will take months. Of course, she is only 2 months old max... just a wee baby. Mostly, I want to get this right.

Maggie

 

[Malon3r]

Haha don't worry about it. That's why you came to the forums and asked for help after all, we don't know everythiht away. I currently haven't even baught my beardie yet, but I see many people asking the same questions as I do, so I attempt to give them helpful answers just as I received about 2 months ago.

First off, good job getting rid of the aspen chips. They can cause impaction if eaten so you are off to a good start there. I understand the tank dilemma but for 40$ if money isn't tight and its guaranteed to last them into adulthood, or until you build an enclosure I see no downside to it.

You are not using any kind of light @ night correct? Beardies prefer complete darkness at night, and unless your tank falls under 65f, you would not need anything. If that were the case, you can get a CHETceramic heat emitter) which puts off no light and only heat.

As for feeding, crickets are fine to be feeding your beardie just make sure they are no bigger than the space between the beardies eyes. Some people(like myself) cannot, or just dislike keeping crickets and use one of the many alternative feeders available. Calciworms/reptiworms, silk worms, dubai roaches and some others. Most people preach not a set amount of food, but basically however many they will eat within a 10-15 minute time span. Be sure to get rid of any excess crickets from the enclosure if they are not eaten as they may decide to nibble on your beardie at night.

Your basking temperature is quite low. The gradient that people have said is around 75-85 on the 'cool side', and for a baby the basking spot should be 105-110 and adults around 100. A 10 gal will be hard to get this temperature gradient however.

 

[littleman94]

I bought my 40g breeder from them at the 40$ deal so they should have one... But as for the phoenix worm/ reptiworm situation my beardie actually eats them way better than crickets. He is picky and lazy and he wont eat out of another bin so its a pain with crickets so I buy the reptiworms or phoenix worms in bulk of 1000 and keep them in a small cooler with a frozen water bottle to keep them at around 60 degrees to make them last a good month if they last that long (which they don't trust me) but I would buy the 100 worm test thing for like 6$ just incase yours doesn't like them.

 

[StarStitcher]

I got some superworms today for Nessie and fed them to her tonight. She saw them in her dish and made a flying leap to the dish, just staring at them. She at 13 worms. I worry because even though they said they were small they seemed rather big to me. She was much more excited about the worms than the crickets though. I'm definitely ordering some.

Any suggestions on where is the best place to order them where they will be small, healthy and fast shipping?

THanks,
Maggie & Nessie

 

[rempop]

As for feeding, crickets are fine to be feeding your beardie just make sure they are no bigger than the space between the beardies eyes. Some people(like myself) cannot, or just dislike keeping crickets and use one of the many alternative feeders available. Calciworms/reptiworms, silk worms, dubai roaches and some others. Most people preach not a set amount of food, but basically however many they will eat within a 10-15 minute time span. Be sure to get rid of any excess crickets from the enclosure if they are not eaten as they may decide to nibble on your beardie at night.

The Calciworms/Reptiworms/Phoenix worms that Malon3r mentioned are not the same as superworms. My understanding is that until your beardie gets over 16" you want to avoid superworms as there is risk of impaction due to a kink in the digestive tract until enough length is attained by your beardie.

Reptiworms ship from CA and Phoenix worms ship from GA. They are both Black Solider Fly larva, but there are differences in what they feed the larva per what I have read on the sites. I have ordered from both companies. We are in WI and have been happy with both companies. Both ship priority mail, I have mine delivered to my work to reduce possibility of die off due to temperature. Both companies ship on Monday to Wednesday.