Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well, we finally brought home the new leo last night. My son decided on a jungle - I must say he picked out a really cute baby. Nice colors/patterns, we will see how he develops.

Our little leo looks pretty healthy, has a nice fat tail and seemed to be bigger than most others in cage (had about 20 to choose from)and is active. His first night he pretty much stayed in the humid hide (about 90 degrees).

We realize he will take a few days to acclimate to the new surroundings, but can someone give us an idea as to when we might expect him to start eating, drinking and pooping. Since he is so new, we are not really concerned about anyhting in particular right now, but I guess some loose benchmarks might be helpful and reassuring. Can/should we do anything to get him interested in eating? In addition to the humid hide, the setup includes a cool hide, warm hide, some small (dusted) mealworms, water dish and a small dish of a leo vitamin supplement that conatins calcium.

thanks in advance for any thoughts, our last post re: UTH's elicited some very quick responses, great site!

Well the calcuim dish that you have should be PURE calcuim only. You should dust the mealies with vitamins and calcuim with d3 once a week. It shouldn't be the vitamins in the dish. Yes it includes calcuim but it's not what they are to be supplied.

It usually takes about 1-2 weeks to get aclimated and used to everything. I would leave him go for about 2 days before trying to offer the food and after that first week they usually are ok, pooping and eating good for you. Good luck! Congrats on your leo!!

Pics if you can would be awesome!

leolady - thanks for the quick response.

I will swap out the vitamin for the calcium. I assume the leo will sort of self regulate the calcium intake - am I correct? Do we just leave it in until it is gone, or should we replace every few days?

Also, could I ask what temps you like? I see some conflicting info from some seemingly very knowledgable/experienced people. Some say 86-88 on the warm side, others say 88-92. The reptile store where we purchased the little guy from said about 92. This is a very reputable and respected store, so I have no reason to doubt him other than some info on this site and others. Right now we are at about 91-92 at the hottest spot. I do have a dimmer that i can use on the UTH, but have hesitated thus far. Any comment would be helpful.

As for your comments re: his habits for the first week or so, it is what we sort of expected, but it is always reassuring hearing it from experienced leo keepers. Tough part is trying to convince my 8 year old son and his little sister to keep hands off for a while, they really want to interact with him, so far they seem to understand.

Will try to post some pics soon.

Your welcome, Anytime!

Temps are ok as long as they are never above 94. That's just too hot. Anywhere from 85-92 is usually what is recommended on very caresheet i tend to keep it about 88 myself. The cool side is about 75 due to the ambient temp in the room is 75 at all times, to regulate all the herps in there.

Yes they will regulate themselves on what they need for calcuim intake. I replenish with new stuff once a week unless it is low i will just add a bit, other then that i clean out tanks once a week and they all get clened and new calcuim.

Yea i understand little kids! They are just excited! Just try to keep them away for this week and you should be fine. Good luck and if you need anything else you may email me Brizzdown@aim.com or my instant message name is Brizzdown.

leolady

I probably should have mentioned this previously, but the temps are that of the substrate, which is tile, not the air temps. Air temps are probably very low 70's, have taken out the regular thermo a few days ago.

I have seen the digital probe thermometer read as high as 93 in a certain spot on the tile, so maybe dropping the temps very slowly might be in order. Some others have suggested the same.

thanks for your offering your contact info, we won't bother you unless it is an emergency!

No problem emergency or not i am always available to answer any questions. Yes i would probably bring them down to about 88-90 ground temps 93 if layed in the same spot could fry your leo.(not literally but it will basically make his insides to hot and cook him alive) so i would do it asap. Good luck and i hope all goes well. Keep us all posted on how he is doing and pics whenever you get them.

Our first Leopard Gecko took exact 36 hours to acculimate. He would still drink, but that was it. As soon as that 36th hour hit he was hungry and wanted food. It seems like he just can't get enough to eat. He's still an aggressive feeder. We feed our guy mostly crickets. He doesn't seem to like mealworm or wax worms. I guess he likes the hunt and crickets are much more active.

They grow pretty darn fast once they start eating. Our guy weighed 11 grams when we first got him. He was only 1 month old. He's now just over 3 months old and 46 grams.

They just keep going to! lol

quick update - he ate 7 mealworms last night, it appears as if he drank water and also ate some calcium, so we were all quite excited this morning when we woke up.

Leolady - I placed the UTH on a dimmer and am working on getting the temps in the 88 range. Right now it has stabilized at 85, will need to fine tune this evening.

Since we are getting a nice mix of rain/snow and ice this weekend, I should have time to pull out the camera and post a picture this weekend. Also a nice weekend to start making a gutload mix for the mealworms - may try some shredded wheat or oatmeal with a carrot - sound okay?

Sure. You could also just buy Gutload and put it in a little plastic dish. But that's up to you. Good luck and can't wait to see the pics, if you can take some of the whole enclosure as well so we can all see a nice job you have done! Thanks!!

Here are two pics. "Junior" is a bit out of focus, I did not want to rattle him to much, so I only took a few.

Very Very nice!! Setup and leo!! Soo cute!! Keep up the nice work.

thanks for all the advice, taking care of the little guy is fun. he is eating very well, and is starting to feel more comfortable in his home, he was actually roaming around last night. We may add a bit to the tank now, like a piece of wood and maybe a few rocks for climbing,it is small tank though, so we will see what we can do. Almost wishing i had gone with the 20gal tank, actually, it would have been the same price.