Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a small water monitor that has not eaten since I bought him about two months ago. Local pet store says he could be "hibernating". You think? I have tried every food I can think of. Do you recommend force feeding something like jumpstart? If so, how? Please help.

Monitors don't "hibernate". If your monitor is not eating and "hibernating" something is wrong with your husbandry. Too cold, too dry. I've never seen a monitor go for more than 2 weeks without eating. How big is the cage? What kind of cage is it? What are your temps. Do you have a water pan large enough for it to fit it's whole body and submerge over its back? Does it have hiding places in different places in different temps? What are you using for substrate? Is it able to dig. Does it have a basking area 130*-150*F? If your water monitor has'nt eaten for 2 months you should be very concerned. And last, have you any experience with large monitor species? Post this on the general monitors forum along with a description of your setup and you will likely recieve a good amount of feedback. This nile and water forum stays pretty dead. My guess is that if you are taking advice from petstores and you believe them when they say your monitor is hibernating you are not ready for such an animal.

Thanks for the reply. I will post this on the other forum, too. I'm sure everyone will eat me alive. The water monitor was actually my husband's buy, I am more used to my bearded dragon, Iguana, and red-tail boa. He wanted this for himself, but I'm thinking this is a bit more difficult than he anticipated. The guy we have talked to at the pet store owns two savannahs and a nile, but I should have figured he didn't really know much when he said to give my beardie spinach and carrots. Anyway, the cage is actually a shower room that we turned into a "cage". So 4'x5'. Built a door so he can't escape. I went in there myself and shut the door to make sure it was well ventilated. The monitor is only about 14" long including tail. My cool end is 90. Basking area is only 130. He has two hiding places, one on each end. His water is an extra large cat litter pan. He gets in it at least once a day. The substrate is that forest floor dirt, don't remember the brand name. I guess I thought since I am familar with other reptiles this wouldn't be such a stretch. I did a lot of internet reading before hand, too. It's hard to know who really knows from who just thinks they know how to take care of monitors correctly.

Do you realize that a minimal enclosure for a lizard of that type is like 10' x 6', when its full grown. Some will say a bit larger others a bit smaller but youre looking at a huge cage. If you get your eating and husbandry issues straightened out (likely one and the same) that thing can grow to like 4' plus in less than a year. I know they like high humidity and lots of water for soaking/swimming. People at petstores want to sell pets. I kina hard to sell pets when you start talking about proper caging you have to build yourself that costs hundreds of dollars and a food bill upwards of a hundred a month. I know a guy that owns a specialty pet store (Reptiles and birds) who has lots of high end hard to keep snakes (venomous) and monitors in his personal collection. He for sure knows the real deal yet he stood and lied right to my face, telling me that that canned monitor food was a complete diet or I could feed ground turkey as a staple with a moune here and there as a staple for my niles. Post on the general forum there are people much more experienced than I who will tell you something akin to what I've said.

Roger