Reptile & Amphibian Forums

How is eucolyptus mulch? Is this fine to use with Tegus? I was looking into buying cypress mulch for my enclosure but its not disinfected for bugs. So it would be too much of a process to buy that one. But then i was offered eucolyptus mulch, is this ok? It is supposedly bug resistent. Well if anyone has an opinion let me know because im not going to purchase it until i figure out if its detrimental or not. B/c personally i've never heard of it. thanks

harvey

Great question! This may depend on whether you house them inside or out too. I know Ron St. Pierre and Bert L. has recommended eucaliptis (sp.LOL) mulch as well as cypress. Do not use pine or cedar due to their natural oils that can harm the tegus.

One other aspect with mulch is that treated mulch for insect protection, etc. can also harm the tegus. These chemicals can be ingested on occassion. I used cypress mulch bought at Lowes or even Wal-Mart. Recently we switched to topsoil because it was easier to remove their waste. However, topsoil was creating a mess with dust in our home, even moistened often. The tegus love it though. We have left 1/2 of the existing topsoil in their cages and placed approximately 3-4" of aspen mulch/bedding on top on the topsoil. This was only done this weekend so we'll see how the results go. The tegus absolutely love this stuff!!! We purchased it for $3.47 a bag at Wal-Mart in their pet dept. It is 1/2 the price than at petsmart or other major chains.

Good luck and hopefully others will offer more insights!

Greg

Well what i mean by disinfected is i bake the stuff in the oven, or i just throw it in the microwave for like 5 minutes. I usually buy the mulch that is from zoo med because i know its treated for bugs and things. But i just wanted to find out if buying the euciliptus mulch was better seeing as its said it resists bugs. But thanks for the reply. It certainly helped a little.

That is a good idea! We would do the oven bit with sand for our uros and beardeds. LOL I thought you mentioned "disenfected" as being chemically treated by the mulch supplier/company prior to bagging. The zoo med brand is good, yet quite costly, especially for the size cage required by tegus. :0)

My best wishes!!!

Greg