New and in need of help

[Sound_B]

Hey, I'm new to both reptiles and this forum, so if this is in the wrong place sorry!

I am looking into getting a pet reptile. After some research, Bearded Dragons kept coming up as a good "beginner" pet. So I have decided to go with them. Now, I am only in the early processes of research, and have quite a few questions.

1. I once heard that Bearded Dragons were one of the most aggressive reptiles, yet many sites claim they are some of the most doctile, and can be handled the most. Which is true?

2. I also hear that bearded dragons come from Australia, yet my local pet store has "Chinese Bearded Dragons". Are these the same?

3. My parents, while not insectophobes, are not very keen on having crickets around the house. Would it be safe/a good idea to keep my crickets outside (or in the attached garage) (in a container of course)? And also to feed my pet would the crickets have to be alive and would I have to hand move them to the aquarium?

4. I pretty much go to the local pet store every Sunday, so would it be o.k. to just buy a weeks worth of crickets or would you recommend buying a months worth or something?

5. The reptiles at the pet store in question are all about 7 in. long. How old would these be, what size holding area would they originally need, and how long before they would need a larger aquarium?

6. What would be an estimated overall cost for the initial set up? And what would be the monthly cost?

Like I said, I'm new to bearded dragons, and would like to find out as much as I can before I go any further. I thank you for your answers [if you give them] and apologize if this is a bit long-winded.

Sound_B

 

[ghettophish]

1 handle them and their nice
2 those are probobly water dragons.. look at pics on site or google.. takes a sec
3 garage should be fine.. if not to hot or cold
4 weeks worth
5 up to 2 feet.. do some reasearch .. again.. it will help
6 AGAIN please do some reasearch on this site.. you can spend from 40 bucks up to 93849083980 bucks for setup... and per month depends on what you feed them.. id say at least 20 a month and i would of spent alot more when mine was a juv cause of the amount of cricketts he ate

 

[glowgirl]

Hi there honey and welcome to the room :wink:

Well I think ghettophish has just about covered everything there ... Well Done honey :wink:

I am mum to two beardie's and I can , hand on heart , catagorically say that neither of them has ever shown any sign's of aggression toward's me , my hubbie ... or my 4 kiddiewink's :wink: They are absolutely wonderful member's of our family ... :wink:
Unfortunately for your parent's ... YES ... beardie's should be fed live , gut-loaded cricket's ... BUT ... It's a thing you get used to :wink:
Finally ... It cost us roughly ... £300 for the viv etc ... then a further £145 for Crumble , our Sandfire ... ( We had Crumble for 18 month's before we bought Dory , our Pure Citrus ) ... This will probably give you an idea of the initial out - lay :wink:
Hope this help's honey ... Don't hesitate to give me a shout if you need any further help :wink:


Big Hug's ...... Glowgirl xxx

 

[beauty&beast]

i am new to reptiles also but in my short 8 days experience i can tell you...
1. my two beardies are sweet hearts- maybe not to each other sometimes but to me and my b/f always!
2. what that chinese thing was- probably a chinese WATER dragon
3. it's not my parents that don't like crickets- it's me! my b/f kept them in our room which was fine b/c our aquarium stand has doors and compartments underneith but once i saw one on my floor :shock: it was out to the garage they went! you can keep them in a garage which is what we do now but outside is not a good idea. i've tried to feed my beardies canned (dead) crickets and they won't eat them or even go near them. but when a dead (live) one ends up being fed to them they eat the dead ones that weren't canned. i have a small cricket keeper (from petsmart) and it's great! so there is no need to touch any crickets what-so-ever... all you need to do it put some cricket food in the container, no egg cartons for them to hide or climb in b/c they hide in the two black cylinders so when its time to feed them all you do is take out one black cylinder and tap it against your tank or wherever you feed your beardie and some come out! look it up on petsmart.com and what i just said will make sense!
4. me and my b/f buy 100 small crickets at a time anything more usually dies. i mean i'm sure there are people who keep more crickets but i'm not raising a cricket farm and i have better things to do then try to take care of crickets!
5. some beardies grow faster then others. i have two hatchlings that were from the same um... i don't know what it's called - a liter? lol and the one is about triple the body width of the other one and about 1 inch longer. i know that hatchling beardie's are about 4 inches long so if it's 7 inches i don't think it can be more then a couple months old... if it's male or female, if they're sick or in good health, if they get enough uvb light all depends on the size and growth. like i said in my introduction--> i have a 4 1/2 and a 5 1/2 inch beardie and i have them in a 65 gallon tank and they seem happy! i know most people can't afford that, before the 65 gallon tank they were in a 30 gallon breeder tank and they were ok in there i guess but the crickets were climbing on to the tree i had in there and climbing upside down on the screen top and getting burned by the lights- it freaked me out so we got something that they can't get close too! so since i have two and they were in a 30 breeder and a 65 gallon i would say that you should be fine w/ a 20 or 30 gallon tank for quit awhile! to me, there is no point in buying tank after tank b/c the babies grow so fast. so i just bought something that i wouldn't have to replace for a year or so, therefore, i don't have to deal w/ buying a new tank every 3 months!
6. hmmm, my beardies were 59 each, my water and feeding dishes were 4.99, 7.99, and 12.99 (it's a set ), my tree was 24.99, my basking spot was i think 12.99, my drift wood jungle gym was 27.99, the newspaper that i use for substrate is .78, my lights (bulbs and clamp lamps) were 10.72, 8.99, 8.99, 9.72, 11.79, 11.79, 11.79, 14.79; my thermometers and hygrometer were 12.99, 24.99 which = 337.28 not including tax which is another 27 and my 65 gallon aquarium in oak with stand was 399 without tax which is 32 so that's $795
*oh and monthly costs include
~a way higher light bill
~three cases of bottled water (b/c they're not supposed to be in tap water) and they do have to have baths
~food... which depends on what and how much they eat- i get 100 crickets for 5.50 and i get 100 4x a week so that's 22
~plus the calcium that you have to sprinkle the crickets with
~worms if you're gonna give them treats and um... that's about it

and like glowgirl said- look up things about them. try this http://www.dragonsbus.net/bearded-dragons.html it's a link to a whole bunch of websites about bearded dragons!!
*http://exoticpets.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ&sdn=exoticpets&zu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.herpcenter.com%2Farticles%2Findex.html
*http://www.tandldragons.50megs.com/photo6.html
*http://www.reptilehabitat.com/bearded_dragon_feeding.htm
*http://www.herpindex.com/center/pvcare.html
*http://mulberryfarms.com/super2.htm this is a good place to get food for cheap
*http://www.bearded-dragon-resource.com/bearded-dragon-wont-eat-part-2.html

those are some websites that i looked at before i got one now i'm sorry for being so longwinded :wink: but i wish someone would've given me answers like this when i was looking into it- i hope this helps you and answers all of your questions :lol: