New to beardies and unsure :/

[MadDan]

Hi there,

I got my bearded dragon 5 days ago. He is approx. 8 inches long and I'd estimate at a rough guess.. 1-2-3 months old at most.

Since getting him, He's been in a 3ft vivarium with a newspaper substrate and a couple decorations. Including a basking log, another log in the cool end of the viv and the water/food bowl. My issue is, he seems to spend most of his time basking under his heat lamp (100W Red bulb). The temperature is around 40C/100F and as I understand, this is ideal for a basking temperature. He seems to ignore every cricket I put into his vivarium and even goes as far as shying from them when I pick one up and hold it infront of him. The only time I have seem him eat is during the morning when I offer him some dusted crickets. Even then, he only eats 5-6 and then nothing else the rest of the day. The crickets are really small, and I even bought both a bigger and managed to find a smaller set of crickets to see if it was a size/colour issue but no progress. Not yet seen him eat out of his salad bowl which consists of everything the care sheets on this website suggests is ideal for a beardy.

When he's not ignoring food or basking, He seems to be running up the back of his vivarium. Trying to get up the wall. I asked a friend who keeps beardies and they've told me hers do it aswell so they put in some polystyrene for it to climb up and sit on. Is there a problem with him :/? I might try mini mealworms or hoppers to see if a different kind of insect takes his fancy. He has no objection to people picking him up.. Quite happily sit in your hand and have his head stroked.

 

[GlueStick]

Alright, my first couple of questions...

What are you using to measure your temperatures? digital therm, stick on? Ideally you want two therm, for both the basking area and coolsides of the tank:

What kind of UV source are you using, if you are using any at all? This bulb is not the same as a heating bulb.:

How often is he pooping?:

Do you bathe him?:

And I understand that you are using a red bulb.... Bearded dragons thrive under white light because they are diurnal reptiles, not nocturnal. A lot of people dont understand that those red and blue bulbs are for nocturnal reptiles for both heath and viewing purposes.

You want a basking, for a juv, of 105-110F and a cool side of around 82-86F.

It could be that your bearded dragon is going through relocation stress, has incorrect temp, or has no UVB source, which is why he/she is not eating.

Do not feed any kind of mealworm/superworm until he is at least 8-10 months of age. Hoppers (mice) should never be fed to a bearded dragon! As adults, pinky mice may be fed to gravid females once a month or males every three months if you so desire.

That running back and force is what we like to call, 'glass dancing'. This is completely normal, especially if they have to poo =D

 

[MadDan]

I have 2 stick on thermometers, One at each end, The cool end reads 80F pretty much all the time. I do have a UVB bulb.. A Reptisun UV 10.0 bulb. Set at the correct height according to the guy in the shop.

Mini mealworms I have been told by many people are the ONLY form of worm that are safe to feed to very young dragons as the shell hasn't formed and hardened to a point it can cause harm.

I've also cleaned his viv out 3 times so far for poo. Twice for very small amounts and 1 large ones I could easily identify cricket remains in.

I have also bathed him once so far.

 

[GlueStick]

The only thing I would suggest is buying digital thermometers, as stick on therms can be up to 20 degrees off. These items are only measuring the air/wall temp, not the surface temp of your bearded dragons' basking spot. Say for example, it can say 80degrees on the wall, but really be 100degrees where he's actually sitting. Of what you said that you had found cricket remains in his poo, it could be that his basking temps are too low, registered inaccurately by stick on therms.

This is the one I use for the hot side (basking area). It is a digital therm w/ a probe by Zilla. You would put the probe exactly where he sits under his basking lamp (its ok, he'll prob lick it once or twice then forget its even there) The temp reading should be 105-110F for a juv.

On the cool side, I use the digital therm/hyrgometer made by Flukers. This temp reading should be 82-86F. The humidity should read 30-45%.

Now you can find these items at a local petstore, or if you are trying to save money, you can go to your local walmart, target, or lowes/home depot and they will have similiar digital therms that have probes. They are a lot cheaper, but bulky.

The last question I must ask is if his poop is reeeeeaaaallly smelly? And I mean, really bad. This could be a sign or parasitism, and is usually commonly found when stock is bought from petstores or warehouses.

Other than that, I would give your beardy a couple more days to acclimate to his surroundings. I find that blocking off 2 of the 4 windows on a beardys' tank helps with stress (from my own experience and others). And find out what his temperatures really are.

 

[proudbeardieowner]

I agree that mini meal worms are great for dragons. We raised our beardie on them when we first got him, and this is where we ordered them: http://www.minimealworms.com/ Once you get them, just cut up a potatoe and put it in the container with the worms, and they will thrive. I ged my beardie about 15 each morning, and he just loved them. He was 7 weeks old when we got him, about 7 inches or so long, and now at 9 months he is 17 inches long. I fed the minimealworms since that is all that he really liked in addition to crickets, and he seemed very happy and healthy. We also put salad in his bowl every day as well to get him use to it, but he did not eat it that much at a young age.

At about 4 months or so, is when I switched to the superworms since the minimealworms were too small for him at that point. I think he will do well with them, in addition to making sure you have the proper heat and he is close enough to the UV light.

Good luck with your beardie, they are wonderful pets