Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello all! I'm new to the whole Collared Lizard situation and was recommended that this would be a place to get some information and maybe have a few smiles. I will post a picture of my dear Lizzy as soon as I figure out how to! lol

I think it's a male now (thanks for the advice Kelly!) but I am having some difficulty with the handling of him. He will not let me near him at all... he has too much spring in his step and leaps and runs out of the way.

Also what kind of length would be suggested for such a creature? I have a 33 gallon tank right now (cursed pet store totally misled me on care for it) that doesn't seem long enough at all. Do you know of any websites that would help me build my own?

And the last thing (honest!) is:
Can I feed it mainly butter worms? Crickets don't seem to catch it's fancy (won't eat for 2-3 days if it has crickets in with it). I know they are fairly expensive but I just want to make sure he's happy!

Thanks a million!

I would not keep crickets in the tank at all. Only put in one or two. If he does not eat them right away, I'd remove them. Crickets can be nasty little biters. If they need moisture they will not hesitate to chew on your lizards tail, toes, eyes etc.

You can feed them butterworms, mealworms, superworms, moths, spiders to name a few. Sounds like he just needs to settle in for a few days. Collareds typically love those crickets. Perhaps if you are shaking vit/supplements powder on them you can leave that off for a while. Sometimes, lizards (especially when not accustomed to powder) will ignore food after getting that new nasty taste.

Keeping the crickets in the cage some sometimes be stressful. Sometimes I pinch off the back legs of the crickets (not the collareds) and put them in a deep dish. Keep a tiny bit of greens (collared or mustard) for the crickets to eat off of in the dish as well. My collareds will sometimes go in the dish to eat the superworms or crickets and end up eating some greens too...pretty good food them as well.

Best of luck with the new lizards.

John Eddington

Thanks for the info... I thought they needed to eat 3-4 crickets a day. So I was really worried that he wasn't adapting to his new home... thankfully that's not the case from what you've said. Could one alternate between superworms and butterworms? I take the crickets out every day if he doesn't eat them for about 4 - 5 hours. Those worms tho, he is so happy to eat those! Makes me smile. He actually let me hold him today for 1.3 seconds lol but then I noticed he was getting a little stressed out and I put him down.

I'm currently building him a new much larger home. It's 69 inches long, 20 wide and 27 wide. I'll post some pictures soon as I'm documenting the process.. I'm such a nerd! On that subject... how do I post a pic?

Again thanks for all the tips... I'm looking for yet MORE of these beautiful pets in my area (reptile show coming up in MAY!) and hope to eventually breed. Those Aquaflames you have Eve are absolutely GORGEOUS. I'm pretty happy to have discovered such a rewarding endeavor.

Rick, thank you for the kind words, also I give many of mine superworms, I have a few collareds that don't touch crickets, weird but true. Just gutload your bugs/worms well. Here are some instructions for picture posting

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POSTING PICTURES ON GALLERY INSTRUCTIONS

It is easy once you have them on your computer, you go to the link below and register for photo Gallery space (each Kingsnake member gets FREE pic space. NEW, 10 times more space than before, ENJOY!

When your there, Register up top, where it says FREE, later if you want more space you can choose a different account.

Give your info, then it will tell you what to do. You pick a catagory such as collareds, .... and then , hit the "Browse "

This will retreive your picture, from your files on your
computer.

Now that your picture is in Photo Gallery, come back here, and under this text box, you will see:
Select Image from Photo Gallery, click the little arrow on the right and (Your picture should be here.

** If you still have problems just holler we will help you !
PHOTO GALLERY REGISTRATION

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PHEve / Eve

Contact PHEve

Sure is nice to have a new collared lover join us Be looking forward to seeing your Lizzy! As far as running from you, sometimes they just need to learn to trust (slowly) Keep working on making friends

Do not approach your lizard from overhead, always keep your hand coming in the tank low, infront of him, or low off to the side, where he can see you.
In the wild large Birds/preditors swoop down upon them from overhead and make a meal of them so naturally they fear your hand coming at them that way and will run.

Just be patient offer him a superworm from your hand or something he really likes. As far as waxworms all the time, they are extremeely high in fat and usually used for treats or to fatten a thin lizard.
Like Johneee told you in his post only put a couple crickets in and if not eaten take them out. Some collareds only eat every other day.

Your tank sounds fine for one collared, later if you want to upgrade to a larger one I'm sure he will appreciate the extra space.

Hope you stick around, enjoy the forum

Suncharmers/Collared Care and More

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PHEve / Eve

Contact PHEve

Good to see you took the advice and joined the forum, nice to have you, I was hoping you'd show up

I agree with Eve and John by the way, I have had to resort to feeding some of mine every other day, they get fed daily, those two get really lazy when spoilt.

They aren't keen on crickets either, i feed them medium sized locusts...not sure if you can get them over in Canada, but they work for my lot.

Nice to see ya !
Kelly
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Kel

www.collaredlizards.co.uk
0:0:1 Timor Monitor
2:3:0 Collared Lizards
0:0:2 Chinese Water Dragons
0:0:1 Dune Scorpion
0:0:1 Imperial Scorpion
1:0:0 Desert Hairy Scorpion
0:0:1 Mexican Red Knee Tarantula
0:0:1 Green Tree Frog
0:0:1 Grey Tree Frog

So what's the easiest way to put a gender on my Lizzy? Kelly thought he might be a male from the coloring(?) perhaps, but he has a slim face more female in nature. I'll make a new post for the experts to give me a hand