If I may recommend, do some reading on the monitor forum and you'll never wonder again why a fossorial animal does better with higher heat and humidity. Most monitors not of the odatriad (Tree monitor) family are quite fossorial. Spending more time underground in appropriately heated and humidified areas. Leos are no different save for the fact they're nocturnal for the most part. They're insectivorous like many small monitors and will even take advantage of mammals and lizards that are small enough for them to swallow. I wouldn't put it past wild leos to also eat small snakes...There is far more to keeping them than just throwing them in a box.. with a set heat and light schedule and food schedule. Especially if you want healthy animals. You have to know what conditions would actually be like where they live...not just the country but the actual regions, individual rock piles, etc. Temperature readings are readily available as are humidity readings. 4 inches below any level of sand, loose or hard packed, the ground is about 20-30 degrees cooler than the top of it. It would be the same with rock piles only they would collect more moisture and evaporate it even slower when it got into the cracks. Humidity does not equal wetness. Wetness is just bad all around and can cause problems but true air born humidity can't be beaten for rehydrating a dehydrated leo. I've gotten many rescues in.. both petshop and private owners. I've lost one out of 13 and she had some genetic condition that prevented her from absorbing calcium correctly so she had MBD something fierce. I tried everything for close to 3 months before I was forced to euthanize her because she would have died on her own anyway. She was 4 years old and the size of a 5 month old hatchling. I even saved one poor guy that came in nearly frozen to death... he was completely stiff... He's the one named Lazarus in the 3rd picture above... and he's quickly become a favorite. He gets to live out his life with me now... I think he deserves it after surviving being frozen nearly to death. I think I've saved many leos where others wouldn't be able to and all because I don't take a set approach to anything. I don't read the husbandry books.. many of them are very outdated and very wrong. I watch my captives and go by what they tell me they need. I learned this with my monitor. And it applies to all my animals...

One of my mystery babies from this year... from a breeding of now known triple hets (blizzard x albino x patternless)... I have 7 hatchlings and at least 7 more on the way.. plus one female just beginning her laying cycle.. which means at least 16 more eggs...






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Lucien

1.1 Columbian Redtail Boa (BCI)(Sutekh and Isis)
5.11.Leopard geckos (1.2 Blizzards (Caine, Phoenix, and Mirage), 0.2 Tangerine Albinos (Tequila Sunrise ...Tiki for short, and Casper), 1.0 Tremper Albino (Mycah), 0.3 Poss. Het. Albino (Annika, Lace, and Aris), 1.1 dbl. het blizzard x tang albino (Malice, Malfeas), 1.0 Full Stripe Chocolate Tremper Albino (Discord), 0.1 pastel (Raven) and 1.2 Normals)
0.1 Savannah Monitor (Kiros) (R.I.P. November 18, 2005)
13 rats (plus pups)
2 Dogs (Loki and Storm)
2 cats (Ashe and Hercules)

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