Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This is NOT specifically in responce to anything anyone wrote ON THIS FORUM!

Read this once and respond and maybe we can make a standard response from now on??? Imagine never having to write to another kiddo trying to make $$ off of breeding his dragons. Just go find it where ever you save it on you computer, copy, paste, and its done. No raising your blood pressure while you imagine some 15 y/o raising his hatchlings on cantalope and sunflower seeds. No searching for a polite way to say, excuse me moron, we just established you have been giving your dragon improper care for the last year, and now you want to breed her?

I wrote this the other day, because one too many kids were asking how to "Bread bearded dragons". If you can't spell it you probably should NOT do it!

I Want other small breeders to read this and see if they agree with its accuracy. Maybe I am doing things wrong? People are always saying I am crazy for saying it costs this much, and I am just trying to scare them.... I want to know what other small(less then 15 breeding dragons) are paying for things. There are SO many occasions where I want to post something that tells people what it really takes to breed dragons.
They seem to think they will throw a couple of unknown dragons together, put the eggs in an incubatore, ignore them till they hatch, and...this part is a mystery to me (i believe people think that maybe the little dragons will raise themselves, or the mother will take care of them),not that they have to spend hours a day with them, then have juvi dragons that they can put a little ad in the paper and sell them like puppies in a few days for $100s...great way to make a buck! HA! Not at least 6 months of spending a lot of every day raising dragons.

So maybe if we had a standard response to these:

"New to dragons, want to breed. Oh, and I know nothing about them and have been keeping the adults I intend to breed in abusive conditions; not because I don't care, but because I never even bothered to buy a book".

So I was wondering if a standard responce already existed, with a breakdown of prices of things...This is what I wrote, please read it and tell me what you agree and disagree with. It would be great to be able to copy a responce to these guys and paste it everytime I see the messege instead of writing a new one for each post.

What do you guys spend? What age do you sell? How many crickets at different ages?

Please let me know about

This Is My Response!

He is VERY right about not making money, but more importantly you would lose money. If you want to make money before say the 5 year of breeding then you can not offer accurate care for your hatchlings. The only way to make money the first few year(or not to lose thousands) is to deprive the babies of things they need to thrive.

It costs:

$40.00 for an incubator, from one breeding you can get 120 eggs give or take 50. I can get 40 eggs in an incubator. So $120 for incubation.

Now the real cost of incubation comes form the fact that incubators can heat, but can not cool. Also that dragon eggs will die if exposed to temps above 89 for even a minute. SO, you have to keep your home a constant 78 degrees or lower AT ALL TIMES. You can NEVER let the temp in your home change, even for a few hours, of the incubators temps will rise and kill the eggs. YOu only have a few degrees to play with. So my air conditioning bills are HUGE!

Once the babies start hatching after 2 months of checking the temps on the incubators obsessivly and making sure the humidity is just right the babies will start hatching.

What you need. Say your first clutch to hatch is 20 eggs. You will need 4 large plastic tubs... I think they are 25-30gal, but I can't remember. Bout a foot by a foot and a half of floor space anyway. These are about $6 each. You need UVB light tubes over each of those tanks..and hoods to hold them. $20 for a 32 inch Repti-Sun 5.0, you need 2..$40. The hoods are about $60 each for the 32 inch, so $80. Those can strech across two tubs.

Then you need a heat bulb for the basking spot is a clam lamp. The reflector clamp lamps with ceramic bases cost about $10. YOu need 4, so $40. Then regular household 40w bulbs will do. You need repti-carpet for newborn babies, because other substrates harm the little guy. It is about $7 a tub, so $24.

Then you need the crickets. For the first few weeks they eat a few crickets a day each...At about 2.5 week they hit the growth spurt, and they are EACH eating 15 crickets 3X a day! That happens to be 900 crickets PER DAY! I get about 7000 crickets for $100. So that is about $100 a week in crickets. But really you lose a lot of crickets when they are only 1/4 inch, so you have less then 7000.

I go through a $7 jar or repcal calcium weekly. I have a $11 jar of herptivite that lasts all the clutches.

I spend about $10 on salads per week for them.

Oh yeah, and did I mention that the mother's apitite is HUGE while she lays eggs. First you have to fatten her up to get her ready, Then expect to feed her 100 large crickets a day over several feedings while she is gravid. If you let her down on nutrients during this time you will seriously harm her and possibly kill her. This is a very vital time to keep her fat as possible. A dragon that has had any weakening problems is NOT a good candidate to breed.

Ok, so now your first clutch of 20 eggs is about 4 weeks old, you are getting the hang of it. Your next clutch will be ready to hatch. This clutch will probably also be 20 eggs...so 4 more tubs, four more heat lights, 2 more UVA/UVB, double the crickets...and they will probably be on different sizes at that point, so you will have to house the crickets seperatly.

By the time the 3rd clutch hatches you will maybe have given away/sold some of your first clutch...but only if you were really dedicated to it. That means at least 4 hours a day caring for all of your dragons, and 3-4 more hours advertising, thaking and updating pics (dragons change a LOT at this age), answering e-mail, setting up shipping. Hope you don't have another job!!! With SO many backyard breeders there are WAY more dragons available then there are people willing to take them. Anyway if you have worked hard at selling, you may have a tub or two open to put some of the third clutch into. If you haven't sold any....4 more tubs, ect.

So what does is take to raise 20 hatchlings from egg to finish?

Incubators 4 @ $40 each = $160
Air conditioning?
Plastic tubs 4 @ $6 each = $24
Uva/Uvb 2 Repti-Sun 5.0 32-34 inch @ $20 =$40
Hood to hold Repti-sun 32-34 inch 2 @ $60 each = $120
Heat lamp with ceramic base 4 @ $10 = $40
40w bulbs 4 @ 1.00 = $4
repti-carpet for tubs 4 @ $7 = $24
Crickets 6 weeks worth at $100 = $600
repcal 5 jars @ $7 = $35
Salads 6 @ $10 = $60

Thats $1107.
If your dragons are ABSOLUTLY gougous you can maybe make that money back..not really though cause the incidental costs are around $400 in 6 weeks of raising the babies. But regular nice dragons with a bit of color..expect to average $50/dragon if you sell them individually. If you sell them to a petstore expect $15/dragon if you can find one to take them.

Thats for 1 clutch of eggs..about 20. Like I said, if you breed your dragons 1 time you could have over 120 eggs. You begin to be able to recycle some things with the later clutches, but the MAIN costs are still there. That does not include things like air conditioning, or what the mother eats, advertising costs, vermiculite for the egg incubation, water treatments, cricket food, a GOOD digital camera to take pics for advertising (nobody buys dragons with bad pictures),or the fact that you CAN NOT really have another job and care for that many dragons. You HAVE to feed them 3 times a day like clockwork or they actually start eating each other. Then you have babies missing toes and tail, and in some cases even LEGS. Try finding people to buy dragons missing legs.

Thats my best estimate of the costs of dragon care.

Also, never breed an female that is under 14 months old. Never breed a female that is not at the TOP of health. Be prepared, if you care about finding GOOD homes for your dragons you will have to hold on to them for a long time. If you care about good homes you will probably need a full year to find homes for all of them.

Any other questions? There ARE some people who this is great for! I breed my dragons...I have lost thousandsof dollare doing it too! I also usually have 50 or so dragons that I need to find homes for, and I have to feed every day 3X a day. I can NEVER even leave for a weekend trip. I can't even go out for a full day. Gotta feed. But I love it. I can't imagine not having the little guys. They ARE my whole life though...there is little time for anything else but them and college and my husband...and dogs, and cats, and horse...well. College and the animals...

GOOD LUCK!

Jen
-----
MY Dragons!!

Hi Jen,
I don't breed (I just got my first beardie-she is 4 months old) but GOOD FOR YOU! I think that the number of people out here hoping to make a quick easy buck is disgusting. When I imagine my baby being raised like that it makes me sick. I think your idea is a good one and I totally support you!
maggie

I agree with everything you said but I would like to add something. First let me say that I totally admire all you breeders out there. If I had known (and I did the research) what I was getting into I wouldn't have done it. Until you are in the middle of it you don't realize the money, time, love and sometimes heartbreak it takes. I have a 22 month old mama that gave me 30 babies. I did it out of love for my dragons and friends who wanted babies, I definetly didn't do it for profit, which is good because I am going to lose money on this venture. Anyway, after you get these little darlings and you think things are going well, you come home to find that they have bitten the tails of their cage mates!!! Now you have babies that are injured and need special care. It takes special people to be good breeders. Please think carefully before you decide to put your dragons and yourselves through it. sharon

I think what you said is good but some of it is not right. Im a 17 years old and i breed my dragon and i do not do it for money and i love my dragons very much so please do not put down people just because of age.

Brandon
-----
0.1.1 bearded dagons (crisis,voodoo)
0.0.2 turtles (Buffdaddy,X-con)
0.1.0 dogs (Sassy)

p.s yes i just started with my dragon and do not know to much but i thank everyone that helps me on kingsnake.

THANKS FOR ALL THE HELP!
-----
0.1.1 bearded dagons (crisis,voodoo)
0.0.2 turtles (Buffdaddy,X-con)
0.1.0 dogs (Sassy)

i think if youre new to dragons and not solid on the basic care, i think its downright unfair to your dragons to breed them at this point. looking at your questions, youre VERY new to dragons and havent done as much research as you need to just to provide the best possible care, much less breed. ive learned a lot about dragons myself in the two months ive had them, and i would love to breed them. i even just bout a male for my female so eventually i can. BUT i know i dont know nearly enoguh to fill all the needs a gravid female or a ton of little hatchinglings are going to need. i think at this point you should be doing what im doing - reading as much as you can, learning as much as you can, learning what behavior is and isnt normal for you dragons, and seriously consider breeding LATER.
-----
proud mama to:
1.0.0 ball python (mr snake),0.0.1 albino florida kingsnake (CK),1.0.0 leopard gecko (sebastian),0.1.0 colombian rainbow boa (luce),1.1.0 bearded dragon (kaipo and dulce), 1.1.0 colombian redtailed boas (adam and eve)

While I don't necessarily agree with all of your expenses, here are some other things to consider.
1) Dragons DIE, yep it happens. They get sick, egg-bound, mysteriously die... they have to be replaced. Especially if it's a female that was raised for a year and fed every day and now you are going into season without a female to get pregnant!
2) Dragons get sick, they need vets and vets cost money along with the meds they prescribe. If your Beardie gets something contagious you must quarantine the animal. That means a new tank, furniture, fixtures, and the works for each sick animal. If you get hit with something really bad you could loose your entire breeding colony.
3) Time, Beardies require time. Time is money. The more beardies you have the more time it takes.
4) Space. As Beardie babies grow so do their need for space. What does not sell must be housed. The more babies the more space. Be prepared to store crickets in your bedroom! (You know who I'm talking about)
5) Competition. There’s lots of it at the lower end for normal beardies. Be prepared to sell cheap just so you’re not stuck with unwanted growing beardies. There is always a market for 20 lots @ $10 ea but try to sell a baby for $50 and then $35 shipping (sometimes they die and your out the Beardie and the money and the shipping) and they have to go to the local store to buy the setup for $100 but if they buy a $50 dragon there the setup is only $80 and no shipping! Oops, can you say overpriced?

Unfortunately all of this will fall upon deaf ears as it always does. The people that you are talking to only want to hear the easy part (what's that?). These people are the ones that answer the spam "be a millionaire working at home part time".

To the people who are serious about making extra money or starting a new career, I say, it works for me and I love it. Talk to breeders and vets read this and other forums daily and get as much info as you can. Start posting answers to questions and see if you go down in flames, see how much you really know. If you research it for 2 months diligently, then maybe you can make it. If you dont own the type of animal you want to breed, buy 2. Breed them for a season and see how it goes. Not all females lay eggs or lay fertile eggs every year (more money down the drain). Remember, start small - aim high - and take care of our little friends. They are not just a business. They are living breathing creatures, G-D's creatures, and if you don’t care for them properly you cannot win.

Good luck with your decision.

-----
Bennett

www.beardiedragon.com

First I want to say..........

I agree with A LOT of what you wrote and it makes a great point in a "plain, face the facts, no nonsense kind of way" which nobody can ignore.

But......

Some of the numbers are way out there and yes you also forgot to add a few "suprise expenses" such as the vet, meds. etc.
Example, an office visit for a "new patient" runs $25 EACH dragon here and $9 for a fecal and then misc meds if anything is found.. average $10. That is $44.00 you have to pull out of thin air, right on the spot and thats only for one dragon. You have to keep stock on a few items incase a bulb blows or you run low on suplements, etc and that costs a bunch too! You have to have shipping supplies on hand if your going to sell via the web. Insulated boxes average between $2.25 and $4.00 (depending on how many you buy at a time, Deli cups and much more! If your anything like me, I buy 20 - 30 at a time and thats a lot of storage space for all those "extra, just incase supplies"!

I guess I am one of the few lucky "small time breeders".. I have actually made enough to cover my expenses so far. Then again I started with a single pair and sold locally before I added a couple more females and started the web part of my business. As it sits right now, I have 1.3 at breeding age and 1.2 future breeders.

I can fit 48 eggs into a simple hovabator incubator and have two running all the time. I actually have 72 eggs "cooking" as I sit and type this.

I LOVE the fact that you wrote how much time it actually does take to care for the adults and the babies properly..... far too many people see them as "low maintenance" animals, but they are FAR from that as babies and require a great deal of time and care. I am like you and can not go away for a weekend or even an entire day.... my husband has nothing to do with my dragons, so if I am gone they don't get fed, misted, etc. I went to the Daytona show and had to leave early to come home and care for my dragons!!!

I think with a little "fine tuning" your response letter would be GREAT!

>>This is NOT specifically in responce to anything anyone wrote ON THIS FORUM!
>>
>>Read this once and respond and maybe we can make a standard response from now on??? Imagine never having to write to another kiddo trying to make $$ off of breeding his dragons. Just go find it where ever you save it on you computer, copy, paste, and its done. No raising your blood pressure while you imagine some 15 y/o raising his hatchlings on cantalope and sunflower seeds. No searching for a polite way to say, excuse me moron, we just established you have been giving your dragon improper care for the last year, and now you want to breed her?
>>
>>I wrote this the other day, because one too many kids were asking how to "Bread bearded dragons". If you can't spell it you probably should NOT do it!
>>
>>I Want other small breeders to read this and see if they agree with its accuracy. Maybe I am doing things wrong? People are always saying I am crazy for saying it costs this much, and I am just trying to scare them.... I want to know what other small(less then 15 breeding dragons) are paying for things. There are SO many occasions where I want to post something that tells people what it really takes to breed dragons.
>> They seem to think they will throw a couple of unknown dragons together, put the eggs in an incubatore, ignore them till they hatch, and...this part is a mystery to me (i believe people think that maybe the little dragons will raise themselves, or the mother will take care of them),not that they have to spend hours a day with them, then have juvi dragons that they can put a little ad in the paper and sell them like puppies in a few days for $100s...great way to make a buck! HA! Not at least 6 months of spending a lot of every day raising dragons.
>>
>>So maybe if we had a standard response to these:
>>
>> "New to dragons, want to breed. Oh, and I know nothing about them and have been keeping the adults I intend to breed in abusive conditions; not because I don't care, but because I never even bothered to buy a book".
>>
>> So I was wondering if a standard responce already existed, with a breakdown of prices of things...This is what I wrote, please read it and tell me what you agree and disagree with. It would be great to be able to copy a responce to these guys and paste it everytime I see the messege instead of writing a new one for each post.
>>
>>What do you guys spend? What age do you sell? How many crickets at different ages?
>>
>>Please let me know about
>>
>>This Is My Response!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>He is VERY right about not making money, but more importantly you would lose money. If you want to make money before say the 5 year of breeding then you can not offer accurate care for your hatchlings. The only way to make money the first few year(or not to lose thousands) is to deprive the babies of things they need to thrive.
>>
>> It costs:
>>
>>$40.00 for an incubator, from one breeding you can get 120 eggs give or take 50. I can get 40 eggs in an incubator. So $120 for incubation.
>>
>>Now the real cost of incubation comes form the fact that incubators can heat, but can not cool. Also that dragon eggs will die if exposed to temps above 89 for even a minute. SO, you have to keep your home a constant 78 degrees or lower AT ALL TIMES. You can NEVER let the temp in your home change, even for a few hours, of the incubators temps will rise and kill the eggs. YOu only have a few degrees to play with. So my air conditioning bills are HUGE!
>>
>>Once the babies start hatching after 2 months of checking the temps on the incubators obsessivly and making sure the humidity is just right the babies will start hatching.
>>
>>What you need. Say your first clutch to hatch is 20 eggs. You will need 4 large plastic tubs... I think they are 25-30gal, but I can't remember. Bout a foot by a foot and a half of floor space anyway. These are about $6 each. You need UVB light tubes over each of those tanks..and hoods to hold them. $20 for a 32 inch Repti-Sun 5.0, you need 2..$40. The hoods are about $60 each for the 32 inch, so $80. Those can strech across two tubs.
>>
>>Then you need a heat bulb for the basking spot is a clam lamp. The reflector clamp lamps with ceramic bases cost about $10. YOu need 4, so $40. Then regular household 40w bulbs will do. You need repti-carpet for newborn babies, because other substrates harm the little guy. It is about $7 a tub, so $24.
>>
>>Then you need the crickets. For the first few weeks they eat a few crickets a day each...At about 2.5 week they hit the growth spurt, and they are EACH eating 15 crickets 3X a day! That happens to be 900 crickets PER DAY! I get about 7000 crickets for $100. So that is about $100 a week in crickets. But really you lose a lot of crickets when they are only 1/4 inch, so you have less then 7000.
>>
>>I go through a $7 jar or repcal calcium weekly. I have a $11 jar of herptivite that lasts all the clutches.
>>
>>I spend about $10 on salads per week for them.
>>
>>Oh yeah, and did I mention that the mother's apitite is HUGE while she lays eggs. First you have to fatten her up to get her ready, Then expect to feed her 100 large crickets a day over several feedings while she is gravid. If you let her down on nutrients during this time you will seriously harm her and possibly kill her. This is a very vital time to keep her fat as possible. A dragon that has had any weakening problems is NOT a good candidate to breed.
>>
>>Ok, so now your first clutch of 20 eggs is about 4 weeks old, you are getting the hang of it. Your next clutch will be ready to hatch. This clutch will probably also be 20 eggs...so 4 more tubs, four more heat lights, 2 more UVA/UVB, double the crickets...and they will probably be on different sizes at that point, so you will have to house the crickets seperatly.
>>
>>By the time the 3rd clutch hatches you will maybe have given away/sold some of your first clutch...but only if you were really dedicated to it. That means at least 4 hours a day caring for all of your dragons, and 3-4 more hours advertising, thaking and updating pics (dragons change a LOT at this age), answering e-mail, setting up shipping. Hope you don't have another job!!! With SO many backyard breeders there are WAY more dragons available then there are people willing to take them. Anyway if you have worked hard at selling, you may have a tub or two open to put some of the third clutch into. If you haven't sold any....4 more tubs, ect.
>>
>>So what does is take to raise 20 hatchlings from egg to finish?
>>
>>Incubators 4 @ $40 each = $160
>>Air conditioning?
>>Plastic tubs 4 @ $6 each = $24
>>Uva/Uvb 2 Repti-Sun 5.0 32-34 inch @ $20 =$40
>>Hood to hold Repti-sun 32-34 inch 2 @ $60 each = $120
>>Heat lamp with ceramic base 4 @ $10 = $40
>>40w bulbs 4 @ 1.00 = $4
>>repti-carpet for tubs 4 @ $7 = $24
>>Crickets 6 weeks worth at $100 = $600
>>repcal 5 jars @ $7 = $35
>>Salads 6 @ $10 = $60
>>
>>Thats $1107.
>>If your dragons are ABSOLUTLY gougous you can maybe make that money back..not really though cause the incidental costs are around $400 in 6 weeks of raising the babies. But regular nice dragons with a bit of color..expect to average $50/dragon if you sell them individually. If you sell them to a petstore expect $15/dragon if you can find one to take them.
>>
>>Thats for 1 clutch of eggs..about 20. Like I said, if you breed your dragons 1 time you could have over 120 eggs. You begin to be able to recycle some things with the later clutches, but the MAIN costs are still there. That does not include things like air conditioning, or what the mother eats, advertising costs, vermiculite for the egg incubation, water treatments, cricket food, a GOOD digital camera to take pics for advertising (nobody buys dragons with bad pictures),or the fact that you CAN NOT really have another job and care for that many dragons. You HAVE to feed them 3 times a day like clockwork or they actually start eating each other. Then you have babies missing toes and tail, and in some cases even LEGS. Try finding people to buy dragons missing legs.
>>
>>Thats my best estimate of the costs of dragon care.
>>
>>Also, never breed an female that is under 14 months old. Never breed a female that is not at the TOP of health. Be prepared, if you care about finding GOOD homes for your dragons you will have to hold on to them for a long time. If you care about good homes you will probably need a full year to find homes for all of them.
>>
>>Any other questions? There ARE some people who this is great for! I breed my dragons...I have lost thousandsof dollare doing it too! I also usually have 50 or so dragons that I need to find homes for, and I have to feed every day 3X a day. I can NEVER even leave for a weekend trip. I can't even go out for a full day. Gotta feed. But I love it. I can't imagine not having the little guys. They ARE my whole life though...there is little time for anything else but them and college and my husband...and dogs, and cats, and horse...well. College and the animals...
>>
>>
>>GOOD LUCK!
>>
>>Jen
>>-----
>> MY Dragons!!
-----
Lisa
www.beginnersbasics.com

I do not breed bearded dragons, but I do intend to. While I agree with the costs and everything else. I don't think it's accurate to generalize and say that it is children that is acting inappropriately and trying to make a quick buck.

While it can get annoying from time to time when questions like these are asked. However, childrens, adolescents, should be commended for taking the time to come into a forum and ask these questions!

Where are their parents? Are they not responsible for what their children do? Whether they are clueless or simply don't care what happens to the animals, their children are the one attempting to learn and get it right.

I find that usually it is adults that are in to make quick money. Children do it for the love of the animals.

Personally I don't breed bearded dragons, but I do breed seahorses and chinchillas and the amount put into it is extraordinary. When you put so much effort into animals that you raise yourself, you usually went them to go to good homes. Therefore, if you're not in it for the money, you end up turning down some prospective buyers because they don't demonstrate knowledge in taking care of bearded dragons.

Several of you have given me some good things to add, but you also have said that some of my prices are way off. Can you help me with those? I don't know which ones they are, those are the prices I pay for things. I actually make my own hoods for my UV bulbd, but that is what I priced them at at reptile stores. I also buy crickets in 20,000 shipments, and lose about 5000 of those...i am not saying they die, but well lets say my neighborhood has an unusually hight number of feral crickets. I prices shipments of 7000 at two cricket places and that is what I got...am I feeding too much? I don't really know exactly how many crickets each baby eats, but I do know that I often pour 100 crickets into a tub of 5 and 20 minutes later there are no crickets. I also personally give mealworms as well, but that is not part of the MAIN care. When I say $10 on salad, I mean salad with at least 4 ingrediants and reptical pellets. Please be specific in what I have priced wrong...(Maybe I will save some money too!!) hehe. Those vet prices DID sound way low to me. my vet charges $40 to visit, and a fecal is $25.

So. please, tell me what I said that was wrong. I PROMISE I WON'T BE OFENDED!

To what flamedragon said before..I haven't read your posts, I don't know what kind of care your dragons get...I wasn't talking to YOU when I wrote this. If you were offended by it, maybe there is a reason. Maybe you feel guilty because you knew that it was describing you. I don't know. Maybe you will be a great breeder, and have wonderful luck with dragons...this was not written for you. If you feel upset by what I wrote, maybe you need to ask yourself why?

To...umm the other person that said children should have supervision and good for them for learning about dragons!
I would have to strongly AGREE that they need parental supervision..unfortunatly you missed the main points of what I was writing and got hung on the example. There are many kiddos that DO NOT understand what it takes to breed dragons... I believe it is wrong for them to try to do it. BUT...I intend to provide ACCURATE information to them about what it takes to care for this many dragons. I don't want to tell them the wrong prices of things, or tell them lies about how baby dragons die so easily that you only get 1 or 2 out of a clutch. I want to be able to accuratly express the reality of the situation. Children should play with toys. They should not play with LIVES. BUT I AM NOT JUST TALKING ABOUT CHILDREN. There have been a lot of children LATELY, and that is why my examples were kids, but I am just as much talking about adults..the WHO is irrelevant. This is a huge problem, I have taken in SO many sick little dragons that I have to rehabilitate and then sell for nothing in a huge lot to a petstore where they will probably just suffer more. These have come from people who thought it would be "neat". They though that there would just be 1 clutch if they bred once. They started it, got overwhelmed, started losing babies, and ran for help. I can't care for these dragons myself..they are not nicely colored, in good health, or worth any money...they are just poor little consequences. I have to put $200 into a clutch like that just to sell them to the pet store for $15...and the pet stores I sell to DO NOT care for thier dragons preperly. I wpuld NEVER sell my own dragons to these places, but I DON'T HAVE TIME to individually place 20 extra dragons a month, on top of my own...And like a previous post said..individuals won't buy a dull dragon for $50 when shipping is $35 more...Just won't happen. I can only sell these guys in big lots..and I KNOW they are going to bad places!!! BUT I CAN'T KEEP THEM! I did not breed them, I did not starve them when they hit that first growth spurt and started dowing crickets by the 100s, but I am always sitting up all night feeding them pellets from a syringe. Then I am left with OTHER PEOPLE'S GUILT when I sell them to JoBOB's Pets! Who cares if I am being unfair to poor little unsupervised children? They don't need to be playing with LIVES. They can just face reality like adults...I am not sure what you are saying? should we encourage 14 year olds to breed their dragons when we see the posts? should we just help them out with the questions they have...like what is UVB? I believe that we should NOT! If you have ever had a teenager around, you would know above all else.. THEY HAVE A 15 MINUTE attention span...and dragon eggs take 2 months to incubate. That causes serious problem. So when kiddo is bored, and wants to play with his friends or spend the night at bobby's house, or have soccer practice after school, or be a normal kid..WHO IS GOING TO CARE FOR THE BABY DRAGONS? The deadbeat parents?...not likely. they may be fasinated by dragons one minute, but its not going to last. Especially when they reliaze they can't have social lives and raise dragons.
That was supposed to be short.
It was also a bit harsh. I apologize in advance, see...I just spent hours picking through about 5000 crickets. I orderen 1/4 inch, but it seems that I recieved about 3000 1/2-3/4 inch mixed in...so I gotta pick'em all out...GEEZ. The cricket place hasn't even called me back about it yet! Last time I got an order I opened up the canister and dumped them in with others their size and immediatly noticed spiders crawling up the sides of the tub...there were WAY too many crickets to throw the tub out...so I sat and killed spiders as they climbed up the tub wall for hours. ...There is an example of one of those UNEXPECTED breeding things that comes up...grrr crickets. If only they could be bred without those back jumping legs...and maybe silent...hmm. I think that feeders is where the money lies..nobody breeds feeders for the love of the species..no need to find good homes..nobody gets upset when you say "so I got a male and a female cricket, how do you tell them apart, when will they breed?"
-----
MY Dragons!!

I wish I could help you out here, but to be honest, I think you're beating your head against a wall.
I doubt very seriously that anything you or anyone else says is going to convince the...erm..."people in question"? not to attempt breeding dragons. I'm betting they just won't believe you. Most folks have to learn the hard way, and see for themselves.

Probably the best advice I can give you is this:
You already have your plate full, it seems, with what you're doing. So why not make life a bit easier on yourself and just ignore the idiots? Wouldn't your own animals, and yourself, be better off if you devoted the energy and resources to dealing with them, rather than wasting it on a bunch of people that aren't going to listen anyway?

I can fully appreciate how you feel when you see an animal that's been mistreated. It's tough to walk off and leave them to whatever fate comes their way. As a matter of fact, we lost one of the first two dragons we bought to coccidia and stress. After all the reading I'd done beforehand, and from prior experience with other reptiles, I knew better than to take the "runt of the litter". But my stubborn streak said I had to try anyway. Unfortunatly, some things just can't be prevented. A trip to the vet and one week later, the Bitsy died.
In the end, all we really accomplished was to prolong the inevitable, and make ourselves feel really rotten.

I'm new to bearded dragons, but I've kept and raised all sorts of other reptiles, from turles to iguanas. Been at it since I was a kid. ( I'm 40 now ) I'm aware of just how tough it can be to just keep them alive sometimes, much less to sucessfully breed them. I also know every time I walk into a pet shop and see a tank full of baby iguanas that 90 out of 100 aren't going to survive a month. 9 out of the other 10 will never see their first full year.
And after what I've read on these forums, and seen with my own two eyes, I'm pretty sure that most dragons don't fare much better.

Can I convince anybody how much work an iguana actually is to take care of? Can I make them believe how many hours of reading is needed just to learn enough about a bearded dragon not to kill it within a week of getting it home?
Not a chance. Us humans just aren't too bright sometimes...

Anyway, that's my two cents worth.
Wish I could be of more help.

D.A.

P.S. Sorry for rambling on. It's almost 3:30am here, and I probably shouldn't even by trying to type at this hour... :-/

You made alot more sense than I did on my post! And it's only 1:30 here!

>>You made alot more sense than I did on my post! And it's only 1:30 here!

Yeah, but it was only 2:30am when I started.

D.A.

Oh I totally agree with you, believe it or not. I was just afraid of the finger pointing. It seemed rather unfair to say kids this, kids that when adults are the ones that are supposed to be responsible.

Breeding should be discouraged unless people know what they're doing. That's why it's great that you're trying to put this together. However, I think that when you start out saying something negative to someone inquiring about breeding a pet and it is perceived as a negative ATTITUDE, people start to take offense immediately and you lose your credibility. What you say simply goes unheard.

I also think that alot of times there's nothing you can do to change someone's mind. You can probably change what? One out of ten people's mind? The other nine people you should still help them out for the animal's sake.

If they don't know what UVB or UVA is they need to go back to 5th grade.
Matt

Try the cheapest but best so far out here near me has been $69 for the exam, $25 for a fecal........and thats per dragon. Adds up mighty quickly, lol. chris

OUCH!

Guess my vet prices are pretty reasonable then eh? lol

>>Try the cheapest but best so far out here near me has been $69 for the exam, $25 for a fecal........and thats per dragon. Adds up mighty quickly, lol. chris
-----
Lisa
www.beginnersbasics.com

than Florida, my vet charges $20 for an office visit for the dragon, fecal is $10 and meds are $2-$5.. Once established as a patient, they will do fecals without having to see the animal, but just bringing it in to weight and a history intake on them.

This vet is really good, we first met him when one of ours prolapsed on a Saturday night...... he had never seen us but our regular vet was out of town. He even spent the night with her after replacing the prolapse to see if she did again, placing her in an incubator, adjusting the humidity down to what we keep ours at and the temp. I trusted him right off, he was very knowledgable, relaxed with handling her and replaced the prolapse in less than a minute.......

course the baby squirrel hanging on to a peice of fake fur on his chest and feeding from a tiny bottle suspended from a string around his neck did set us at ease that he cared

Anyway, long story shorter ..... she prolapsed again on Sunday, he came back to meet us at the office that night and did the surgery, called us at home a few hours later.

3 days in hospital, 3 day in incubator, surgery, meds for 2 weeks, fecal, gram stain and recheck to remove stiches... $125!!!!!!! I was expecting $400-$500

YA need to move to Florida!

Vet bill is all I have to add, I agree with it. I may know how to breed and take care but I could not afford all the costs and I would have no time for that many babies, I studied beardies for 2 years before I got one.
Matt

Felias I agree with you attempt to push the realities of breeding dragons onto people new to breeding. Though younger people lately seem to be the ones that post here completely confused as to why their female dragon who was housed with a male dragon suddenly laid 25 eggs all over the floor of their enclosure. Those people who have been keeping mixed sex dragons together for 8 months without even realizing that yes they will make babies are the ones that really do worry me. I would think anybody past puperty would know how babies are made.

So I agree this 'form letter' type rundown on the costs and risks of breeding dragons is a good ideal. It is better than the usual habit for old timers here on the forum to stop posting responses to the 1-5 posts of people screaming for help cause their dragon is gravid, droppped eggs, how to incubate etc. every day. It's amazing how many very basic newbie questions are asked by people who already own a dragon for months or more. In this modern day it is not hard to find good information about anything if a few months of research is done.

This forum is a wellspring of knowledge if one takes the time to go through old posts, reading everything that has been posted, even when same questions are asked repeatidly. When I first came here I read about 3-5 pages of old posts before I even posted a single question. Not to mention I read countless caresheets, bought a couple books on bearded dragons and joined a bearded dragon egroup. I decided if I was going to get a reptile I wanted it to live for a long time and not die because I my incompetence or lack of knowledge on their care.

The breeding and care of any animal isn't easy. Reptiles more so than other animals because of all the special needs the babies require. Once the mother lays her eggs that is the end of her involvement with them. Unlike mammals and birds who raise their young to adulthood before they go on their own, baby dragons have nobody to take care of them. That is why us if we breed them have so much work to do.

Finding homes is not easy for any pet. There are many unwanted puppies and kittens being turned into humane societies every year (or worse, disposed of in some inhumane manner). Reptiles are not any easier if not harder to find homes for. Most people who buy reptiles either do so on impulse or because they really love the scalely little guys.

Onto some suggestions to improve your post. The expenses for light fixtures can be alot less if you just buy the plug in type florescent light fixtures at home hardware (home depot, any home hardware type place). I paid less than $30 for a 4' double fixture with plug in. These types typicaly are suspended over what you want to shine on by chains and can easly be hung over several tubs of baby dragons. Clamp lamps with hoods can also be bought at homedepot or similar stores for alot cheaper than at the petstore. A simplier and cheaper substrate for babies is just regular unprinted no name brand paper towel. Or just plastic table cloth or shelf liner if you want something a bit more easier to clean.

Unfortunately the big cost of baby bearded dragons are what they eat. Even raising your own crickets isn't a guarentee you won't have to go buy some anyway as the dragons eat alot more than you can raise unless you want to have huge amounts of crickets breeding in staggered colonies to ensure a steady supply of small crickets. (but doing this means extra expenses and isn't much of a money saver if at all in the long run, unless you can sell off the older crickets regularly).

Though dragons are very popular as pets, almost as much as leopard geckos, they are still very over poplulated as many babies never find good homes. Some the breeders keep or sell off at reptile shows (especialy the larger breeders) but for the small time basement breeder, often they are left with more dragons than they can comfortable house. Its especially true if the breeder lives in a smaller population area. It's a bit easier to find homes for dragons when you live in an area of over a million people and there are no other breeders around.

I considered breeding my dragon when she is old enough but I doubt I will do it. Not only is it alot of work and takes alot of time I just don't feel confident I could sell 50 babies without having to ship them and I really don't like the ideal of putting a live animal into a petri dish and trust the moron couriers or express post to treat it right. Since a bearded dragon can produce up to six clutches in a year with an average of 20 eggs per clutch that is alot of homes to find, especially when you are far enough north that you only really have about 5 months of the year where it doens't get too cold to ship dragons. I wouldn't even be finished with three clutches by the time that safety margin ends, even if the first clutch was ready to go on the first month of warm weather. (and since it has been known to get cold and even snow as late in the spring as June, still no guarintee of good weather on shipping day).

Ok, rambled long enough. Felias, keep tweaking the '101 things to consider when breeding dragons'. better let , label it "Why you should NOT breed your dragons!"