FrozenPrince
Member
Hi everyone, I'm from Montreal, Canada and this is my first post here on this site so I hope I will receive some useful feedback on my new beardie !
The thing is I just bought a new enclosure from a bearded dragon breeder and fortunately he gave me one of his new off-springs as a gift. I named him Spike , he is about 5 weeks old and about 6-7 inches long (including tail). Not sure if it's a male but I hope he is. So after spending 2 weeks with him, I came to realize a few things some his behaviors:
Housing: I put him in a 48x24x20 enclosure with 1 big tree branch + 1 big Zilla hiding and basking cave + 1 water bowl and 2 food bowls ( 1 for salad and 1 for everything else). I use a mixture of tile and Zoo-med repti sand dessert white as my substrate (8:2 ratio).
Lighting and Heating: I use a 160W Zoo-Med PowerSun UV ( from 10:00 am to 10:00 pm directly 16 inches on top of the basking spot with no screen top) as his UVs and heating source on the warm side and one 100W Zoo-Med ceramic heat emitter( no light for 24/7) on the cool side. Basking spot (measured with a temp-gun on his basking cave) 100-110 degrees, middle-enclosure is about 90s and cool side 80s. Temp at night is about 75-80. Question : I noticed that he rarely uses his basking spot that I provided for him but he just wanders around the enclosure or spends most of his time on the tree branch which is in the middle of the enclosure. If I take and put him there, he will stay to bask otherwise he never went there. Is this a normal behavior as he is trying to regulate his temp or maybe he's sometimes lost and does not know where to go ?
Feeding: I feed him 2 weeks old crickets everyday with some phoenix worms in the afternoon. I dust the crickets with Zoo-Med calcium + D3 every time and 2x/week with Rep-Cal multivitamin. I bath him 2x/ week and give him water by using a small syringe everyday. Question: I usually gives him 15 dusted crickets in the morning and he will eat them all but then he stops eating for the rest of the day or just eats 1-2 worms in the afternoon when I come back from school. Is my beardie eating healthy enough ? A lot of pp say theirs eat somewhere between 30-50 crickets/day but not mine ! He does poop regularly though (normal poop) and looks very alert whenever I get close to his enclosure.
Handling: I tried to handle him sometimes after his first week with me but he always runs from me when I put my hand in the enclosure. When he is out, he becomes more calm and will stay on my palm. Question: Will he one day just become more relaxed as I take him out to play when he gets older ?
I know this is kind of long but I hope you guys will help me answering my questions and do not hesitate to tell me what I do wrong here. Thank you
The thing is I just bought a new enclosure from a bearded dragon breeder and fortunately he gave me one of his new off-springs as a gift. I named him Spike , he is about 5 weeks old and about 6-7 inches long (including tail). Not sure if it's a male but I hope he is. So after spending 2 weeks with him, I came to realize a few things some his behaviors:
Housing: I put him in a 48x24x20 enclosure with 1 big tree branch + 1 big Zilla hiding and basking cave + 1 water bowl and 2 food bowls ( 1 for salad and 1 for everything else). I use a mixture of tile and Zoo-med repti sand dessert white as my substrate (8:2 ratio).
Lighting and Heating: I use a 160W Zoo-Med PowerSun UV ( from 10:00 am to 10:00 pm directly 16 inches on top of the basking spot with no screen top) as his UVs and heating source on the warm side and one 100W Zoo-Med ceramic heat emitter( no light for 24/7) on the cool side. Basking spot (measured with a temp-gun on his basking cave) 100-110 degrees, middle-enclosure is about 90s and cool side 80s. Temp at night is about 75-80. Question : I noticed that he rarely uses his basking spot that I provided for him but he just wanders around the enclosure or spends most of his time on the tree branch which is in the middle of the enclosure. If I take and put him there, he will stay to bask otherwise he never went there. Is this a normal behavior as he is trying to regulate his temp or maybe he's sometimes lost and does not know where to go ?
Feeding: I feed him 2 weeks old crickets everyday with some phoenix worms in the afternoon. I dust the crickets with Zoo-Med calcium + D3 every time and 2x/week with Rep-Cal multivitamin. I bath him 2x/ week and give him water by using a small syringe everyday. Question: I usually gives him 15 dusted crickets in the morning and he will eat them all but then he stops eating for the rest of the day or just eats 1-2 worms in the afternoon when I come back from school. Is my beardie eating healthy enough ? A lot of pp say theirs eat somewhere between 30-50 crickets/day but not mine ! He does poop regularly though (normal poop) and looks very alert whenever I get close to his enclosure.
Handling: I tried to handle him sometimes after his first week with me but he always runs from me when I put my hand in the enclosure. When he is out, he becomes more calm and will stay on my palm. Question: Will he one day just become more relaxed as I take him out to play when he gets older ?
I know this is kind of long but I hope you guys will help me answering my questions and do not hesitate to tell me what I do wrong here. Thank you