Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Caudos are so fricken cute.

Yea but, they are not social and do not EVER hang out in groups. Which means, they do not know how to DO THAT. hahahahahahahahaha.

With that in mind, why do they do that flock thing, where their heads all point the same direction. We see that will all our species. Big and small.

The single individual to the left appears male. Congrats.

I have all the confidence you will produce lots and lots of babies. So we can trade for some truely cute ones, V.gilleni. Cheers

Maybe not social by some narrow definitions, but it sure seems like something’s going on there. Why do they do that pointing their heads in the same direction thing? It seems to me like it has to do with communicating that they’re part of the same group.

The single one to the left is my old female. You’ve inspected her yourself in person and she’s laid many infertile eggs. But I think she has a masculine look. The one in the middle of the three is the male.

Here’s some pics of the one I believe to be male. Cheers

Nice pics, what kind of camera are you using and what size are those pics? They are really nice. Cheers

Thanks FR. All my pics are shot with an old Sony Cybershot 707 5mp. It was ok for a consumer camera when I bought it 5 yrs ago, but I’ve been wanting to get a decent DSLR. I’m spending quite a bit on lizards lately so I may have to hold off on the new camera..

I'm not 100% certain what you mean by size, but I sized them down to a 12x9’ dimension and reduced the image quality slightly to get them 301 kb and 256 kb. Usually I reduce pics for sharing down to under 200 kb.

Cheers

" Why do they do that pointing their heads in the same direction thing? It seems to me like it has to do with communicating that they’re part of the same group."

maybe this is way too obvious, but wouldn't you think it's because for 1, their eyes can only rotate a tiny bit in their eye sockets, and 2, they're all trying to look at the big scary guy with the camera. So naturally all their heads are in the same direction. Of course 3 or 4 monitors in a small cage can emphasize this interesting display. If there's more to it, I would love to hear about it.
cheers

As you progress to having monitors in groups and you start to see these types of behaviors, please keep your eye out for these reaped patterns and their related movements. Particularly how they react to eachothers head movememts. Cheers

Hey Frank,

I'm not sure but I think in the past you said you have put babies in with their parents (I apologize if i'm wrong about this). If so, did you ever notice the babies heads follow in line with their parents' heads (the direction they were looking like the photo posted). Kind of like a meerkat troop on their mound (home) scanning their territory. Thanks. D

Yes, I have and had, several generations in groups. But all groups of all species I have worked with do this meerkat thing. I imagine its for the same reasons meerkats do it.

Its odd but people have to have an answer to look or think about something. In this case, its not by accident. But exactly why is something I do not know, other then for the protection of the group.

In Neals case, the three were looking at the camera with Neal attached. The truth is, they do not have to have their heads at the exact same angle to look at Neal and the camera.

Which is what I bring up. They sure know how to do this, and I know there is a reason. What exactly that reason is, is not what I wonder about. I wonder how they know how to do that, when they are not social. If they did not hang out in groups, they would never have developed the ability to do that. But they all do it. Hmmmmmm Cheers

I think this is a good topic for discussion.

With my lack of experience with groups of monitors, I obviously don't see this the same way you do. But for the sake of discussion let me present a few arguments that support my previous statement.

I know you didn't bring Meerkats into the discussion, but you did support the similarity between a group of monitors looking in the same direction, as Meerkats do. The difference I see between the two is this. I see an organized social family structure in the Meerkats. When they're on the lookout for predators and you see them all standing together, there's always one or two Meerkats looking in the opposite direction from the group. As to protect the family on all sides. Here's a pic for example



What I see in the group of monitors is the opposite. They appear to be looking out for themselves only. There is one threat in their line of site and they're all looking at it. Not one of them is designated to watch their backs and see what might be coming from the other side. I don't see any kind of organized communication, but I could be wrong...have been plenty of times.

You mention that they do not have to have their heads at the exact same angle to look at Neal. And I agree with this statement. However I'm sure it's the most comfortable and natural position. It's the same with people. When we all pack into a theater to watch a movie, we don't all need to have our heads facing forward towards the movie screen, but it's the most comfortable.

What it boils down to for me is this...in my opinion. I'm not surprised that they're all looking in the same direction with the same exact head angle. In fact I'd be surprised and a bit worried about a lizard who isn't facing that direction where the danger is. He'll be the first one to die. But in my limited experience I've yet to see a monitor in a group, or alone who doesn't look directly at the danger. So my gut tells me these behaviors are self preservation, not group preservation.

I hope this doesn't sound argumentative. I do find this subject interesting and look forward to a more experienced point of view.
cheers

Shay said:

"I'm not surprised that they're all looking in the same direction with the same exact head angle. In fact I'd be surprised and a bit worried about a lizard who isn't facing that direction where the danger is. He'll be the first one to die. But in my limited experience I've yet to see a monitor in a group, or alone who doesn't look directly at the danger."

You are incorrectly assuming that they see me as a threat. I guess you think they are stupid? They have already learned that I am a source of food, not a threat.

They were looking in that direction because it gives the best view of the room, not because they were staring at me. I had to walk past the trough to get the camera. They did not turn their heads to look at me. Now after I carefully opened the lid and pointed the camera at them, they were looking into the camera. I purposely approached with the camera from the direction that they were already looking, so they wouldn't get all goofy and change position.

If I’d known there would be this type of debate I would have shot the pic from above and through the lid so you could see that they were not looking at me. I shot the pic the way I did because I wanted a clear pic, with no reflection from the flash and I thought the pic would be cuter if it showed their faces. When I shot the pic, it was for my wife who was at work. She thought I was cute when she had observed two of them doing the same thing, so I thought she’d really think it was cute when three of them were doing it. I didn’t have the foresight to think that you would be using it as an excuse to start an argument.

I shot this series of pics yesterday afternoon. There is less than a minute time lapse between the first and the last pic.

That is the male and one of the females he was raised with. The first pic is through the top (notice the reflection of the flash). The second pic is right after I opened the lid. The camera is less than 12 inches from them, yet the male only looked up at me for a moment after I opened the lid, which is what you see in the 2nd pic. In the 3rd pic he is no longer looking at me, because he didn’t see any food.

So my gut tells me these behaviors are self preservation, not group preservation.

Hahahaha, you really don't have a clue about this world do you?

As usual a typo. That should be: “She thought it was cute when she had observed…”. But maybe the other way is also true.

This is a great topic of discussion, but you are most likely not the best one to be discussing it with. The reason is, you always look for opposing views. Which is fine, but why not try looking at both sides. You are always prejudiced in showing your right over somebody else being wrong. Which means you want to debate, not discuss.

In this case, I have currently 18 outdoor cages active. They have groups of monitors. I am at a low at this time, in the past, there were far more.

With that in mind, I commonly(many times a day) see this group pose. And yes much like meerkats. But also unlike meerKats, as least from the pics. The monitor often(most common senario) have a group together like Neals, and I single individual, again like Neals pic. When the individual that is out moves, they all duck. The dominate individual appears to be a lookout. I mentioned this many many years ago. I mentioned it with V.tristis. They were really wary and did this on a repeatable basis.

I could remove the dominate(lookout) from the cage and another would replace it. This worked repeatedly and with many species.

The major problem was size of monitor. The larger monitors did the exact same thing, but the amount of space had to be very large. Exponetly so. Which is very logical as larger monitors can see farther, move faster, and keep in contact from much greater distances.

And yes, I have seen it with wild monitors. And with large and small species. The problem is, you have to watch from great distances with larger monitors. Individuals may be 30, 40, 100 feet apart and still be aware of eachother.

One behavior is to sit tall on top a rock or termite mound or fence post. You have to wonder about this. As sitting on top a boulder or post is not the safest of behaviors. They can easily be picked off by a raptor. Why do they do this? You can say they are basking, but they surely can bask without making a target of themselves. My naive guess is, they do this to be seen. And of course, not be their predators. Then what are they to be seen by????? There is no possible good to be seen by anyother animal. But there is good to be seen by members of your own species. Why why why.

Why on gods earth would Kimberlys have black and white banded tails. Why do they leave them hanging out of cracks and wiggle them? Why do V.tristis hold their tails strait up in the air and wiggle it. Hmmmmmm and only when they see another tristis in the distance. I don't know, but I have a feeling if they were solitary, they would not do these things. They would avoid being seen by their own type.

You could compare that to anoles flashing their red dulaps, or spinys doing pushups and flashing their blue dulaps. I know when I see one do that, I look where its looking and I always see another individual of its own type. Of course nature is not single purposed, when cornered, they will flash you.

So back to you, you say you have arguements. Well, cool, I could come up with millions of arguements against such things. The problem is, why do we keep seeing these things on a regular basis. That sir is something you have to answer.

I could say, nope, they are not doing that, nope they are not doing that. In fact, thats what I did say, until I kept seeing these things, over and over. Now sirs, you are the ones who need answers. As these monitors have exposed themselves to some of us.

ALso, it appears very few support their animals to a level that will take that past survival and include social behaviors. You see, even social animals work in a solitary way when kept below their minimum requirements. When you starve any animal to a high degree, they will eat eachother(become solitary). In the case of captivity, starving is about more then food. They are starved for conditions that support what they are.

It appears that keepers that have no problem breeding monitors(meeting minimum requirements) also are the ones that see this other stuff. Is that luck?

In your case Shay, I do not expect you to reach that level, ever. The reason I say that is, you have a need to be right. Which means you often do things you have judged as right. You gain the information to make these judgements by listening to people and debate and discussions. The problem becomes, what have these people seen and done? what grounds do they have to say what they say. Have they shown superior results? consistant results? Or are they expert at discussion and debate and the practice of theory. My suggestion is chuck those folks and test the waters. Not water monitors, but the actual working of monitors.

The truth in keeping monitors is, you(all of us) are wrong a lot. We have to learn from being wrong. We learn from escaping wrong into the areas of right. The current state of varanid keeping is sadly wrong, to an almost unthinkable degree. Just read these forums.

So if you still come to our forum, you have seen reports of a couple of groups of monitors. They are laying clutch after clutch, nesting after nesting, in groups and in pairs, working together, with no intervention from me. They lay many clutches, they do not get skinny, they do not lose weight. They just go on and on. And they pose like meerkats.

Now please do not think this is bragging, its not. After all, they have done this for tens of thousands of years, all on their own. I say this, because its evidence they indeed perform well in this way. I see this stuff and make my judgements from successful events. Year after year, species after species, generation after generation, going on two decades.

Which of course is totally opposed to your group that makes their judgements from repeated failures. Or from field authors that tell you what monitors do, by what they did not see, not from what they did see. Then figuring it out with forumulas.

Notice in the pic, they are posed the same, but looking in different directions. Cheers

that is such an awesome pic, tortures me knowing i cant properly care for larger monitors at this time and seeing such cool behavior like that.

They were posing like that long before I got the camera and came near the trough. But thanks for making assumptions. I thought is was neat so I tried to capture it and got lucky (they didn’t change position). I understand that you are new to monitors, but I started keeping and breeding monitors in the early 90s, so this is not the first time I’ve seen these things.

I suppose you think that being in captivity has produced behaviors that their wild counterparts just don’t have the potential for? Wow you’re the clever one.

yes I'm new to monitors... what do they eat, and how long can I keep my Argus monitor in my 10 gallon tank? I've seen them all poke their heads up in the same direction to, but I equate that to a curiosity of what's lurking in the distance. sorry for being new, and stating my opinion.

...they are watching for what is lurking in the distance. That is why they are called monitors. But when they choose to be close to each other and mimic each other, like what you see in my pic, and they do it very often, it might cause a person to wonder about it. I have only seen that mimicking thing with monitors that seem to get along well and have some type of “bond”. I haven’t seen it with strange monitors that were just thrown together and don’t get along. Now I don’t really claim to have all, or heck any of the answers, but when FR talks about this social stuff, I think maybe he could be onto something.

The one in the middle is male, I'd recognize that ugly mug from a mile away.

Neal, remember me in about 4 years when I'm finished with this project, I'll be looking for more caudo's and storri (ackies too Frank).

cute ones.. question the orange one on the table is that the same species? I loved the colorisation of that one..

You mean the one laying by itself under the light? All four are line/stripe-tailed monitors, V. caudolineatus. I think the orange hue you’re talking about is from the basking light.

ahhh.. it looked so pretty.. to bad they dont come in orange it suits them