I picked up two baby cresteds from Chuck Snyder about two weeks ago now. I'm very happy with my purchase, and have happy & healthy animals. I think they're both gorgeous, but I don't have a clue how either of them will turn out as adults. Can anyone tell me? Anyone know what phase or whatever I should call them?
They are both unnamed as of right now, because I don't know the sex of either. They were labeled 221, and 222 by Chuck. 222 was hatched 8/18/06, and 221 was hatched 7/21/06.
So, here is 221.
Any given time, she looks like this. 
When she starts to get worked up, she ends up something like this.
And when she's really fired up, she turns these colors.
This is 222. 222 is much more handleable already than 221. 221 refuses to sit still at all, and jumps constantly. 222 will actually eat baby food off my fingers on occaision!
Right now I have them set up in little Kritter Keepers, with some fake vines, and paper towels as a substrate. Eventually I'm going to move them to a planted vivarium. I've had a really nice planted tank set up for about a year, just waiting for something to go in it. If they turn out to be a pair, I'm going to put them both in that. If they turn out to both be males, I'm going to put one in that, and the other in a 26 gallon hex tank, and plant it the same way.
How long do you think I should wait to put them in the bigger planted vivaria? The tank set up now has topsoil and coconut fiber as the substrate, and I have moss that will hopefully cover the substrate one day, but for now, there's a lot of soil & coco fiber that they could ingest. How big do they need to be before it's not a problem?
They are lovely little geckos. I don't know much about the different varieties, so I can't help you there. With my baby, I waited until she was about 6-8 months old before moving her to a bigger tank with a friend. They're just so little before that, it seems the bigger tank will be really intimidating for them. I say, when they start to look too big for the house they're in, move them up. 