hey im building a vivarium and im wondering what pants i can put in there that will be safe for my beardie. can someone please help me put by giving me a few names of the plants. thanks.
Im not sure what plants are safe, but I don't know if Id use live plants. It might raise the humidity too high. If you can control it, and someone chimes in with safe plants, then Id say go for it.
I think its hard to find plants that can withstand such high heat and low humidity while still being safe. I'd be interested to hear what is safe though! I never really thought about using real plants before, but if it was safe I think I would give it a try.
I know petco (at least my petco) sells live plants for both desert and tropical vivs. All their desert plants are fairly smooth (I don't know the specific names), so I don't think you should use anything to spiny, it might be dangerous. But maybe you could check out your local petco and see if they have a small section for plants. I don't really know if I would trust what their employees tell you is safe of not though, so hopefully someone with experience with this will chime in on here.
If you take a look here and scroll down to the bottom, it lists safe plants although I would worry about having to keep them watered and raising the humidity level too. http://www.beautifuldragons.com/Nutrition.html
aloe - non toxic, only needs watered once every 2 weeks
carex buchananii - more of a "natural" grass, similar to what they might find in the wild.....this is a desert grass, and even if it dies it still looks nice in the viv
Looking at the list on Beautiful Dragons, I think Hens and Chicks would be a good idea, since they are a succulent, wouldn't need to be watered much, and look "desert-y".
I've been looking into live plants lately too. (My planted aquarium and planted crestie tank have inspired me to get rid of fake stuff as much as possible right now! Haha. ) From the research I've done jade plant is a safe one, so that's what I will probably try. I saw the carex buchananii grass that someone was using in their viv, and I really liked the look of it.
I thought that aloe was toxic to some animals? I feel like I keep hearing different things about that one.
Actually, the juice from the aloe vera plants is fine to rub on their skin to help the shed loosen but it shouldn't be ingested by them because the juice can cause irritation in their throat, etc. So, wouldn't recommend putting that plant in their tanks.
i have it in my tank and he ignores it completely.
also know someone first hand whose beardie ate a big bite out of theirs and had no ill effects at all.
im not saying to feed it to them, just saying if they did ingest it, no big deal.....its not toxic, its actualy quite common to see some species of reptiles eat it, like turtles