Brumation???????????

[Bella12898]

OK, My beardie is 10-12 months old. A few weeks ago my dad was telling me all this weird stuff about brumation.Apparently your lizard goes down and sleeps for God knows how long. OK now i got some questions. How old will your lizard be when it brumates, or is it different for all dragons? Are there any "hints" they will give you before brumationg? (not eating, no poop, behavior change?) Will males brumate sooner than females or vis virsa? How long do they ususally brumate for? When they brumate do you still need to have their heat and uv lights on? Do you need to wrap them up in a small towel or a washcloth or something? OK quite the number of questions huh? lol I just want to know so when Pablo does it, Oh another question, Do they brumate every year ant the same time? OK i think im done... Im excited to see what you reply!!!! Thanks :mrgreen:

 

[mrbeardie]

ok im pretty new to the brumation thing as well but i have been reading a bunch about it and have like every local reptile store and vet in my area and was getting generally the same thing for all of them.

here goes:
brumation will usually start when the dragon is considered an adult (around a year or so), they will become drastically inactive and want to sleep all day long in their hide box or whatever they have rarely coming up to the basking area. they will not eat as much as well, but keep food like a salad or veggies in the tank everyday in case they wake up to get some food and water before they go back to sleep. the vet said to have the dragon checked out before letting him brumate to make sure he is healthy and not just sick. i was told that brumation can last a week, to a month, even up to 6 months just depends on the dragon i suppose. with the lighting you would reduce the lighting by two hours everyday until the lights are completely off. set up a hide area, a shoe box or something, and put a towel or something in there so they can curl up in it. usually if your dragon does brumate they will do it every year around the same time but sometimes dragons some dragons wont even brumate so its up to the dragon. hope this helps you out a little. im still new to it as well because my dragon has been giving signs that he might be starting to brumate. oh also they will want to sit in the cooler parts of the cage and not bask as much!

good luck

 

[Jiffy]

Hi Bella.
I know this is a lot of information that I am about to give you a link to, but it is some great info, and you may want to look over it, and maybe show it to your dad too. It may answer some of the questions you have about brumation. But all beardies are different, some never brumate, some brumate for a long time, some for not so long. And sometimes they may only slightly go into brumation.

Here is the link, and feel free to ask any more questions you have. We are all here to try to help.

http://www.beardeddragon.org/articles/brumation/

 

[Nikki1292]

My beardie Gizmo went into brumation for the first time last year so let me just say from experience that it can make you a little anxious once in a while. He "went to sleep" around late September and didn't come to until March. I made sure that he had a hid box to crawl into but that it was open enough that I could see inside and check on him. I kept the lights on but only for about 8-9 hours a day (I never kept his lights off all the time because it got far too cold in the tank and in the wild it would not be night all the time) and he didn't eat until March. I hated not feeding him but he was asleep and my friend who owns several beardie's said that its how he's cared for them during brumation and as long as it doesn't look like they are overly skinny then they're fine. But as Jiffy said, all beardies are different and therefore brumation is not the same for each beardie.

 

[Bella12898]

Thanks guys! I think i got everything i need to know now!!! Thanks