Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi guys!

I have a questiono grow an albi to smaller than the average, if he lives in a smaller cage than it is recommended?
He lives in his cage from the juvenile age and it's a good equipped enclosure and he is not overfeed!

I appreciate for the answers.

Sorry, NO. Reptiles aren't fish. If fed properly they'll continue to grow to their normal size whether they're in a 5 gallon tank or a 500 gallon tank. Only way to keep them small is to underfeed them, and that will kill them eventually. JMHO.

Quig
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Don't interupt me when I'm talkin' to myself

What do you think about a 370 gallon cage with a lot of haus walking ?

As helpful as volumes are for holding water.. any chance we can know it's dimensions?

I haven't researched Albi/Ionides requirements in some years, but I imagine it's something along the lines of a 4' x 4' x 4' enclosure atleast, preferably 6' x 5' x 4'
Which takes up more than a quarter of a room.
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2.0 Beardie
1.1 Common Boa
1.1 Ackies
0.1 Giant BW Tegu
Thousands of Roaches, T's, and Scorps.
R.I.P. My Beautiful Savannah Monitor.. and my prized Leopard Geckos..

Uh Oh.....better run and get your fireproof jacket.......

Let the flaming begin!

Thank you for the yuck, but it was not a comic question!

Thanks

Keep a lizard that get from this big..

To more than this big, or expect it to live in a cage that small?
Reconsider what species your capable of keeping, be prepared for 10x5x4ft or bigger depends on how big it gets or how long it lives.

Also consider that Sobek has grown since this picture, shes not even 5 years old yet, and shes the smaller sex, female.

Sorry guys, but I will keep my albi not a small cage,only I wanted ask what is the minimum enclosure size, what an albi can live but not overfeed ( what I've seen on a lot of pictures ! )in??
And if the min.size is 4x4x4'then my cage is over the minimum size but not a small room size!
I'm gonna make everything my lizard for a good living to live in
my house,and I'm gonna not overfeed him and he's gonna make a lot of house-walking in my house.
Otherwise I have had for a long time a Pazifikmonitor(indicus)
and he growed to more than 4,5 feet long till I had to sale him and everybody woundered at him how beautyful he always was!

Cheers!

Albig at all.
The cage could be used for around 3 months for a newborn if your lucky, also if the growing baby albig eats and grows (which they do alot) there is no such thing as overfeeding, of course if you listen to a few very outdated sources of info then normal feeding is powerfeeding, but using it as a term is a lie.
No, a 4x4x4ft cage is ok for an ackie, not in any way for an albig unless its a tiny hatchling. Keep in mind that the above pictured female was 5ft long at 1 year old, yes she was CBB for real.
Keep in mind a young albig should eat every day. A hatchling alone will eat an adult mouse or 50 plus crickets a day. Ive even had WC BTs grow from 2ft to almost 5ft in 3-6 months time.
How big is your albig anyways, you should not be thinking about minimum sizes, but what would be better for the lizard, if your not capable of keeping them this way maybe someone else should care for it instead.

a hatchling albig eats an adult mouse or 50 crix a day? How big do you think hatchling albigs are?
here is a hatchling right out of the egg:

most of the hatchlings weighed between 12-20 grams while adult mice weigh 20-29 grams, so i would go as far to say that a hatchling albig cant eat an adult mouse, but can eat, pinkies, fuzzies and maybe a hopper after a few weeks to a month to grow. I've also found that not all albigs will eat every single day, and bombarding them with food like that, when not wanted nor needed is stressful, especially with crickets, as the crickets can go wherever the albig does, constantly pestering them.
In reality, albigs (hatchlings) can take a small handfull of crickets daily to every other day, in addition to pinks, or chopped fuzzies or mice, anything more than that is ridiculous and can cause harm to your monitor. This is my experience that ive had with hatchling albigs, and ackies, too much of a good thing does cause problems, like too much bad information.



here is one of the above hatchlings 10 months old:

this animal is in a 4 x 2 x 2 cage, it eats every other day or so, at least food is offered every other day, it doesnt always eat though, This animal, in my opinion has a normal healthy growth rate. Not all animals grow and eat like sobek she is not "textbook" and the sooner that fact is realized, the sooner you can stop dishing out all this rhetoric and bad information.

A cape banded WT on the other hand is smaller, and does not get so big.
So, can we assume that the individual has a cape banded WT or most probably a BT or some form of WT from a more northern area which gets so much larger, so much faster, and no Im not just referring to one lizard, Im referring to many BTs and more average WTs found in the pet trade (Tanzanian).
Like I said Ive had 2ft BTs that grew to 5ft in a matter of 6 months time easily, Ive seen this fast growth in Tanzanian WTs kept differently than mine. Also most of these lizards were kept in 12/12 or 14/10 heat cycles, a few were kept 24/7 basking lights. I can refer to BTs kept by another friend who went from 12 inches to 4ft in one years time.
Depends on your definition of an adult mouse or from whom you buy it the albig hatching can eat it. Most of my albigs were fed from another supplier other than rodentpro at first, the mice were smaller, as a matter of fact I get mice also from a guy very cheaply that are various size adults in bags, they range from small enough for young ackies to swallow with little effort(these are smaller than the fuzzies I have from rodentpro) to the size rodentpro sells as jumbos. As far as eating daily mine always leaped for the food before I could get it in the cage, mice, quail, peeps, etc. Even today Sobek still chases after the food when the door opens, only now she is a tiny 6ft 5 inches and 32lbs.
I have yet to see any albig in my collection that will not eat 50 crickets a day when small (up to a few months old) if offered. They seem to last about 1-2 minutes tops.
Then again I have never had an ackie even 24 hours old that doesnt eat crickets like crazy, mine went through 1 thousand per week. Now I feed them mostly roaches.
So how big is the albig in the 4x2x2ft cage? My young ackies live in a cage that size, sometime soon they may get a 3x3x6ft cage. The last time Sobek saw a cage that small was when she was first delivered at 16 inches and 2 months old, she was out of it in a matter of a month or so.

With all this, they can eat this, no, they can't eat that, stuff. Your missing the point.

First, have you ever actually proved an individual albig hatchling was harmed from eating to much on a regular basis? This is a very good question. I get the feeling that you assume it will harm them.

But that does not matter anyway, as hatchling albigs can and do fill up two or three TIMES as day. The catch here is, under what conditions. If your albigs cannot process a full belly everyday, then they are limited by your conditions.

I am not saying your conditions are bad, they are obviously very good, but the monitors still have far more potential then your allowing.

For instance, if we keep hatchling albigs indoors, they can eat daily, but after four or five days of feeding, they often miss a day or so. Outdoors, in our summer, the very same albigs can and do eat their fill two or three times a day. obviously, having our summer heat has a lot to do with it. But just as important is the ability to burrow down to cooler temps. So outdoors they can get FAR hotter, and FAR cooler then indoors. Again, obviously indoors is very limiting, as their indoor performace indicates.

Personally monitors self regulate themselves. If they cannot digest their food quickly, they simply do not feed again until they are ready. I have not seen any harm from offering food.

We may assume lose crickets bothers the monitors. But I have never experienced that. I throw crickets in, and if they are still there the next day, I do not throw more in. I would think anyone that keeps throwing crickets, day after day, in a cage that already has crickets in it, is not all that smart a person and would lose their monitors from all sorts of other problems. I would assume this type of person should not keep living animals.

So what I think is important here is, the amount of food and frequency of food taken and processed is directly related to cage conditions(husbandry) This should be taught and understood.

I would hope by now, we can get passed this silly, they do this, no they do that, no both of you are wrong, they do another this.

What they do, is what they are allowed to do. Period.

A thought for the advanced keeper. I was taught that animals are designed to fit conditions, that is, if they placed in conditions below normal, they will fail. Also, if they are exposed to conditions above what they are designed for, again they will fail. Their beat performance is within the conditions they are designed for. With these and most other animals, they have a range of conditions. In this range, express a range of results from low to high. This is their potential.

The average keeper has surely explored the lower limits of varanid potential. Most often resulting in death or worse, a life of doing nothing. I am not sure any of use have seen what the upper limits of their potential is. I have bounced around thinking I have seen it. Only to have the monitors prove me wrong. For instance, five years ago, I would have said, 8 or 9 clutches a year for ackies would be the upper limit. Then this year, we had two females produce 13 clutches each(one is gravid again) So I was retaught what their limits are.

What this taught me was. It taught me a better meaning for the word, support. What we do is support them. We are suppose to support them, not limit them. In most cases, our results are from limiting them. I would say, 99.9% of our successful results is still limited by us. Cheers