Reptile & Amphibian Forums

When I used to have Dwarf Monitors back in the 90s I was able to use both Vision cages and cattle troughs for breeding. Both worked, troughs seemed to work better at least with Kimmies, but my Ackies would breed in anything it seemed.

Troughs are tried and true. But for many of us they are less desired because of space, non-frontal viewing, etc.

What I am wondering is if people who use non-troughs (plastic caging, wood, custom built, etc) can post some pictures and give advice on how specifically Dwarf Australian Monitors such as Ackies, Kimmies, Stori, Tristis, etc, can be kept using stacked/rack-like systems.

I'm contemplating both troughs and non-trough caging for the 3 groups of Ackies I'm raising now (one 1.2 trio, one hard to tell trio, and one 1.1. pair it seems), and many cage makers have said they've built stacked cages for monitor owners, but my search for images and feedback about those cages is lacking.

What I'm talking about is something like the link attached below the picture at the bottom (Split Rock Reptiles Blackheaded Python setups).

Hopefully I'm don't get the "kicking a dead horse" treatment by those of you who use troughs, and hopefully I do get some feedback from those of you using caging similar to what I'm thinking of.

I've searched the archives and current forums, but many images/videos are no longer working in the posts related to this topic.

Thanks in advance. Glad to be back into Monitors having been in Dart Frog Land for the past 10 years now.

Sincerely,

Joe Baginski
Tacoma, WA

SPLIT ROCK REPTILES BLACKHEADED PYTHON SETUPS!!!

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Cheers,

Joe Baginski

The absolute best cage for those monitors listed involves the use of a trough of some sort.

There is just no other cheap durable solution available.

The downside to the trough is weight, looks and in the typical construction no easy method to view the animal.

I myself designed a few cages for Ackies, however do to my work load I kept out of monitors and actually no longer keep lizards.

The best design I came up with was essentially a sliding bypass desplay cage built over a trough. My intent was to fiber glass the bottom area of the cage so that when placed over the trough the dirt, began to fill the cage. This eliminated actually seeing the trough and if painted black you won't see it when they burrow either.

The benefit of the trough was of course durable to the digging as well as teh moisture from the soil. In my design I fronted and sided the cage with sufficant material to essential skirt the trough. Again in attempt to hide it from view.

Stacking is possible but difficult. If using full depth troughs and 2' of window space you will be lucky to get a double stack of cages. However if you take into account the ability to keep a few top inches of soil within the cage combined with the 12" deep trough you can achieve minimum soil depth. Again tied with a 2' window, it conceivable that you could stack two cages easily with some space leftover.

I myself would depend on commercially avbailable metal shelving for a support structure allowing the use of Ply for the cage structure, reducing the overall cost.

I do like your linked setup however that really isn't practical when it comes to monitors due to size and weight.

Curious have you posted these questions on the monitor forum?

Sometimes you can get info out of them, but typically cage design and construction is not shared readily.

Hope some of this helps.
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Jeremy Payne
JB Reptile

1.0 Snow "Kahl"
0.2 Triple Het Moonglow "Kahl"
0.1 Orange Tail Hypo Het Leopard
1.0 Ghost
0.1 DH Ghost
1.1 "Kahl" Albino
1.0.2 Hypomelenistic
1.3 Pastel Hypo
0.1 Anerthrystic
0.0.2 Normal

0.0.2 Morelia Viridis
1.1 Morelia Clastolepis