Reptile & Amphibian Forums

The two foot yearling Sav I am raising was fed his daily gorge of a feed tonight, 5 small mice, six whole shrimp and a big glob of turky. Then he climbed over a wall, broke in and ate the entire feeding of a big 6 foot Water Monitor next door. The animal is now shapoed like his name sake, "Football".

Because he bites, I reached out an empty wrapper of a pound of turkey burger to him. To my suprise he jumped up, grabbed it, and went into a Death Roll.

Wow thats alot!! The water monitor didn't try to eat him?

No, the Water is very gentle and sweet. A puppy dog. But who knows? He is a monitor.

I talked to a guy who kept a lot of species or reptiles and his female water monitor got out one day about a 7 footer. And she knocked over the cage to the gila monster and ate it.

Yeah, normally reptiles will not eat when they are not hungry. They will simply eat until they are full and then stop.... Well, most reptiles, but not Savannah. Savannah monitor is one of the few reptiles that will actually gorge itself like dogs, wolves and human if given the opportunity.

I'm not particularly knowledgable about monitors in general. I don't own any and what I know of them I've gleened mostly from this forum. I do have a couple questions though. Is this sav WC, and how long have you had it? I know in the wild they'll gorge during the wet season in preperation for the fasting they do during the dry season. Might this have something to do with it? If not, and you don't want a blimp for a lizard, I think it's time to cut back on it's meals a bit .

Pretty much all savs are wild caught. Its not that profitable to breed them.

hahahaha I've kept him for about 3 months. I bought him from a pet store where a teenage boy had sold him in a horribly obese and spindly legged condition. He could not walk up on his legs but pushed himself along on his belly. Too much wrong food, too low temps and too small a home. So I put him in a 6'x12' with another young monitor of African grassland origen and put him on a diet of one jumbo mouse per day. Now he's healthy and back on a growthy diet. It is a robust animal, quite obsessed with food. Much of it's excercise is gotten chasing me around the monitor house trying to bite and, I believe, consume my feet. Yet it is a biting, whipping, hissing creature. Who would think it could climb a plywood 8' wall and eat the food of another monitor three times it's size while having a belly full already, THEN STILL WANT MORE!

Our Sav "Chomper" (who's name suits him well) begs for food all day.

I refuse to give in, He is kept on a strict food ration, even though it is hard to resist that constant "food dance" he does.
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Regards,
Wayne A. Harvey
Dances With Reptiles
Thamnophis

1.0.0 Ball Python - Python regius "Cain" Rescued from a crack house
0.1.9 Eastern MilkSnake WC "Carmella" adult super sweet temperment (Eggs all hatched!)
1.3.13 Storeria dekayi - Brown Snakes Casper, Xena, Athena, Copper, Sharon & Kids
0.1.0 Thamnophis cyrtopsis Easter Black Neck Garter "MoJo"
0.2.0 Thamnophis ordinoides - Northwestern Gartersnake(Blue Phase)
1.1.0. Thamnophis elegans vagrans Wandering Garter
2.2.0 Thamnophis Sirtalis - Florida Blue stripe Garter
2.1.0 Thamnophis sirtalis - eastern Garters
0.0.1 Thamnophis HybridAlbino Checkered Normal eastern"Mutt"
2.0.0 Thamnophis sirtalis - eastern Garters (xtreme orange phase)
1.1.0 Thamnophis RADIX - Snow Het
0.1.0 Thamnophis RADIX - Christmas Albino
0.0.1 Thamnophis sirtalis - Red Phase Eastern Garter red and white stripes
0.0.1 Thamnophis butleriButler's Garter Snake
0.0.4 Thamnophis proximus orariusCoastal Ribbons
0.0.7 Thamnophis sirtalis - Eastern Garter babies 7/11/08
0.0.7 Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis HET Anerythristic Scott Felzer stock.
0.1.0 Thamnophis sirtalis Eastern Snow "Snowflake"
0.0.1 Thamnophis sirtalis infernalis California Red Sided (R.I.P. little guy)
1.0.0 Thamnophis pickeringi - Puget Sound Garter "Sky" (adult, Sky blue)
0.0.1 Nerodia sipedon - Water Snake - "Aqua" adult WC Pink eater!
0.0.1 Amelanistic Corn Snake "CY" Sub-adult CB
1.0.0. Pueblan Milk snake "Oreo" adult CB
1.0.0. ASIAN GREEN SNAKE 3' WC Cyclophiops major"Limon"
0.0.1. Savannah Monitor "CHOMPER" Getting Huge!
1.1.3. Green Anole "Crystal" & "Chris"
0.1.0 Oscar (Astronotus ocellatus) - "Peach" (A Monitor with fins)
1.0.0. K9 "ACE" Black Cockapoo
0.2.0. Feline"Felix"(R.I.P. 4/27/08) "Kaja" & "Silver"
2.1.0. calico RATS
??.??.?? Mice - Feeder farm - Crickets / fish / Giant roaches
More herps than I could ever list out back on the land.

Please consider, most here totally miss the boat. We are mammals and we are working with reptiles. Reptiles are very different.

We are wasteful mammals. When we are hungry we feed to overcome hunger, or starve. That is what mammals do.

Reptiles have an advantage in certain enviornmental conditions. They have two basic methods to ease hunger. Of course the first is to feed. The second is totally forgotten or ignored by keepers and biologists acting as keepers.

Reptiles lower their body temps when prey is not available. This effectively stops hunger. To test this all you have to do is lower the temps and your reptile WILL STOP FEEDING. It does not matter when it was fed last or how hungry you think it is. Lower temps eliminate hunger. A tool used by reptiles.

In nature and under natural conditions(conditions they are evolved for) When food becomes sarce, they seek to lower their temps. In fact, they keep their body temps as low as possible to not waste precious energy, at all times. In addition, reptiles can be thought of as, energy conservation devices. At all times, they regulate their body temps to conserve as much as possible. Of course in arid lands, they also do this with H2O.

In captivity, keepers do not give them the oppertunity to conserve energy. These keepers think is a very funny way, that if heat is good, they give them heat all the time. NO REPTILE WANTS THAT. Most all reptiles are cool loving and seek heat to accomplish set tasks. Their base temps are cool, they use heat as needed. Not the other way around.

Monitors seek very high heat for short periods, they Need high heat to accomplish many tasks, BUT, they also need cool to conserve energy. SOOOOOOOOOOOOO

If you keep them warm/hot all the time, they are burning energy at a very high rate(mammalian like) and NEED TO FEED.

If they are burning energy at a high rate, they will gorge, they have NO CHOICE. They are effectively starving.

Sometimes I read what people here feed their monitors and I wonder. How could they eat that much. I feed mine much much less and mine grow faster, produce many times more and live longer. On less food. Well I offer my monitors a choice of temps so they can conserve to some degree. I also offer high heat, even if they do not use it much. At least they can use it if they need to. If not, they will choose what they NEED.

Then I hear folks say, I put my (fluffy) on a diet, they hold back food, but do not allow the monitor to pick temps it NEEDS, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm Kinda like you running a marathon without eating.

Yes, I get frustrated by folks here, as they think they are all expert and such, but forget the basics of reptile biology. As mentioned, even the biologists(?) seem to forget this very basic reptile ability. Cheers and good luck

That makes a lot more sense than, "Heat 'em and feed 'em".

Great post!

Actually, heatum and feedum, was a joke, coined by Scott Salsteh(sp) from vision cages. We both had a bit to drink.

BUT, it actually works very well when apply to what was normal varanid husbandry. Which at the time, 12 years ago or so, was very basic and lacked reproductive success.

The problem here is, everybody thinks they are at the same level of understanding(with varanids) and should understand everything.

The reality is, EVERYTHING said and written, is in some matter of context. Beginers should concentrate of basic husbandry and not worry about things they do not understand. Those with advanced understanding(a long history of success) should not be required to teach basics, or explain such things as heatum and feedum. They should be allowed to talk as well.

Again, Heatum and feedum, is about what we do and we still achieve very good success. But then, I already had a small undertanding of nesting, which is VERY important. Cheers

Good post I see what your saying about needing the ability to adjust their own temps and get at a comfortable cooler temperature. I mean really cold blooded isn't all that accurate since a monitor can sit under a 130F light for a short period of time to help digest dinner. Their blood gets probably much hotter then a mammal during that time frame...but then they need to go to a cooler side to get comfortable.

Thank you for explaining such an important thing. I really appreciate you teaching me and us. I am not an expert but an enthusiastic beginner , not a biologist but a nurse. I turned away from biology because the cruel experimentation and mechanistic narrow viewpoint I percived it had. Nursing is based on kindness and a wholistic veiwpoint. But yes, soaked in biology.

In my novice-ness I thought, hmmmm Savannah Monitors maybe they come from places in Africa with so little food they have no appistat, that is no brain set point to stop eating. So I did a test which monitors enjoyed. I tried to see if all my species would eat withot stopping. First let me say that all have a choice of temperatures. From mid 70s and less under Damp substrate in hides to mid 80s, and all have 130 degree basking platforms.

Both big Waters turned away after eating all they wanted, so did the Crocs. The yearling Water kept eating till I stopped him but he is a baby. Both African grassland varanids, my big albig and the Savannah ate and ate and ate. So I thought it was genetic from living in a famine place.

Now that you point this out I realize what I had been doing. Everytime I saw the Big albig sleeping behind the freezer in the monitor house I would drag her out and put her under the lights. The Savannah, he just does what he wants in a big 6x12 enclosure. I see he is crammed with food so I put him under a light also.

Ive found that they have the "appe-stat" and its similar to some other species, but at a higher setting than some others when young.
When younger they will eat amounts that seem almost impossible, but will make use of it quickly. As adults the appetite shuts down alot quicker, in fact supprisingly quick.
I was remembering the pictures over the years of monitors that had been cut open to find an obvious cause of death, some Ive seen in person. Seeing the large fat storage these critters had, imagine what the fat panels found in most pet bosc monitors look like! No wonder many dont live long. I would venture to guess the average keeper would greatly change their husbandry if they saw what they were doing to their critters, and just how much fat they contain when they seem very thin.

True, both of the monitors that did not stop eating in my experiment are about a year old, the young Water and the Savannah. The big albig that does not stop eating has a tremendous amount of personality. After she eats her's she swggers around like a Komodo looking for more. She tries to break into other monitors rooms and eat theirs. She will come up to me a seize my pants leg. I don't know how old she is but she is still growing. I measured her this morning after dragging her out from behind the freezer again. At that time she is least active.

Looks to me like what a lot of monitors get is not enough excercise with the too much food. I have bought several monitors from keepers where the animals were too fat and leg muscles so small and weak that they could not walk up on their legs. They pushed themselves along on their bellies. I think what got this young Savannah up walking like a Komodo was pulling himself up on the log pile. Sometimes he's on top of it, sometimes he's underneath in the cool.

OK, if monitors can store fat, its for famine times, right?

" K, if monitors can store fat, its for famine times, right? "

That's the general idea. How much this storage plan varies from species to species. I don't think anyone knows. In captivity everyone says "monitors" do this or that because in captivity we can only work around the general life principles that make them ....just monitors. Even the best cages can only provide the basic elements of the monitors real world.

In the wild different species live very different lives . Species that come from tropical areas and are tied to permanent waterways don't have go thru long periods with out feeding. Where there's water there's always food to some degree. Obviously some times of year will be better then others but they never starve.

Savannah monitors rely on the seasons. During the rain (Now) they become very active it all has to get done while there's water. During this time they pig out. Frogs, scorpions each other food is everywhere. When things dry up they shut down. Not 100% you can still see one here and there but for the most part they stay hidden and save as much energy as they can. Nile monitors come from the same country but use a totally different habitat and remain active all year.

Captivity provides unnatural consistency . Captivity levels the playing field. To much food and not enough exercise is an issue with many pets.

Ernie Eison
Westwood Acres Reptile Farm Inc.

yes, and patients, I mean, people too

I notice all three of the species in my experiment that ate what they wanted then walked away were water nearby types, Salvators, Crocs and the Nile. Again, all have and have had a temperature range. They are not cooked. haha

np