>>For a B/W Argentine Tegu would it be okay to have a bowl in the cage for drinking purposes only and not soaking purposes? Only if your giving them baths though. Just thinking it would have more room in the cage this way. (hatchling tegu, 4'x2' cage)
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I find that even my adult sized tegus like to get into their water tubs and soak now and again. It doesn't take away from the floor space that much if you have an adequately sized cage. For a hatchling, 4x2 is plenty of space and you'll be upgrading the cage size when the tegu is adult sized anyway.

With that being said, you could certainly get by with just a drinking sized bowl. It is important to make sure the humidity in the enclosure stays above 60% at the bare minimum to ensure proper hydration and ease of shedding. Many sources indicate a humidity of 80% to be ideal.


>>If so, how often would you give it a bath? Luke warm water? Before or after it eats?
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Hmmm...I don't know if I had a set plan for bathing. When my tegus were roaming the house for exercise, I didn't want 'accidents'. I developed a routine of sorts where I would take them out to feed them them, then soak them in the tub until they went poo. Then I would clean both the tegus and the tub.

Now (well, when they were awake), they roam the back porch. They eat out there and if they have an accident, I can hose down the porch. While the hose it out, I can mist them or make a puddle for them to sit in.

I do still clean them up once a week since two have a tendency to get gunk in the corners of their mouth. Fortunately, living in FL provides a good source of humidity. They live in my garage and the humidity is generally 70% .


>>As food feeding a baby Tegu. What is a perfect diet plan or a plan that has worked well for you? Not including crickets though. But include supplements; the brand you use and when you use them.
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>>I know everything they eat but some people have found good diets for them, I'm not looking at power feeding it just a healthy diet.
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Perfect plan? I don't have the perfect plan, but I can share how I fed my hatchling.

When I had a little one, I fed her a variety of insects such as crickets, supers (not too many since they have a hard exoskeleton), silkworms, etc. I also fed meats such as chicken gizzards, livers, hearts, fish fillet, chicken chunks, and ground turkey or lean ground beef. She got pinkies two or three times a week and eggs once or twice a month. Not everyone agrees on this point, but I'm a fruit feeder so I offered fruit at every meal when she was about a month old. She ate strawberries, blueberries, banana, mango, melon, grapes. I fed her 6 days per week and let her eat her fill.

This continued until about 18mos-2yo when I switch to feeding every other day. However, I still feed the same types of food, except for insects. Sometimes my red will grab a super, but it would take way too many insects and the others just aren't interested any more. I feed the biggest rodents and quail they can eat whole to ensure that they are eating whole prey with complete skeletons for a natural source of calcium. I still feed whole rodents/poultry twice a week with other meats the other days and offer fruit at almost every meal.

For calcium supplements I use ZooMed Calcium w/o Vit D and Rep-Cal Calcium w/ vitamin D. I have both and I use both alternately. Since I don't use Cod Liver Oil, I'm not as concerned about a Vit D overdose. I also have Blue Iguana (brand?) Strontium which I use on occasion. My rule is that if it is a food with a poor calcium: phosphorous ratio, then I supplement with calcium. If I'm feeding ground turkey (or any boneless meat), then I mix in calcium to a pound of meat according to the directions. If I'm feeding insects, I gutload and dust.

The multivitamin I use is RepCal Herptivite. Since I feed a variety of fruit and Herptivite contains phosphorous, I only use this once a week or once every two weeks.


>>Really would appreciate feedback. I have read a lot of care sheets but some differ. I know a lot about boas and some of the care sheets I read give WAY wrong information, so experience from good owners is the best advice IMO!

I haven't seen bad tegu caresheets, it's just that owners are in disagreement about certain aspects of husbandry. You'll find that people disagree with info I have posted. For instance, not everyone feeds fruit. Not everyone uses calcium with Vit D and a lot of people use cod liver oil (which contains vit D). I don't think either way is wrong, it's just personal preference.

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