Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My babies have finally came. They have a father that is a red X normal and a mother that is a snow from Dragon's Den. Their so cute.

Some of them have lost some of their tails do to other babies. What can I do so this doesn't happen again?

And how do you guys get such great pictures?
My babies have such great coloring but I can't get it to show up on the picture.

-Ben

Feed them more and more often and house less per cage! How old are the babies? What size cage are they in? How many per cage? How much are you feeding? Also seperate them by size.

For the first 2-3 weeks I would recommend no more then 3-4 per 10 gallon enclosure or 5-7 per 60 gallon rubbermaid. After 3 weeks I find you need to put even less per enclosure.

I feed mine 3-4 times a day to reduce the chances of tail and toe nips. I also only feed one cage at a time and watch closely as some accidents happen during feeding time when a cricket crawls on one baby and another goes to eat it and nips the cagemate. If I feel a situation could be disasterous I just jiggle the cage a little and the babies stop in their tracks.

Sometimes no matter how hard you try or what precautions you take a nip is inevitable. Accidents happen! But when you have several nips, you know it is time to address the housing/feeding/care you are taking with the dragons. Sometimes things just need a little adjustmenting Goodluck and keep us updated! Lindsay

By the way cute little babies you hatched! To answer your question about the good baby pictures. I think most of us on here have good digital cameras. I personally have 4.1 megapixel sony cybershot dsc-s85. It takes pretty good pictures but does not do well with night shots or red eye reduction Oh well! I mostly bought it for web pictures.

Thanks for your help.

The babies were born on April 29. I have two clutches right now. With the first clutch I have 6 in a 15 gallon tank and 6 in a 20 gallon tank and I feed them once or twice every day. The second clutch just hatched saturday and some are still in the process of hatching, but the 8 babies that have hatched from the second clutch are in a 10 gallon tank.

How do you have enough room and/or money to buy so many cages?
I keep my 4 adults beardies in a huge custom build cage and then have two 10 gallon cages for the crickets and then a 10,15,and 20 gallon cage for all of their babies.

I've had as many as 29 babies in a 40 gallon breeder tank before, and never lost a tail or toe. You should be feeding them at least 2x per day, if not 3x. They are biting each other because they aren't getting enough food. To a baby, if it moves and they're hungry, it's fair game for feeding. And no, it's not just luck that nothing has happened to my hatchies. I hatched out 5 clutches last year, all between 25-30 each. All but one were healthy and perfect, and the one simply had birth defects.

You are not feeding them enough. Once or 2 times a day is kind of skimpy. Try 3 good feedings. They are hungry and are seeing tails and soon toes as worms or snacky cakes. And as they get a little larger they will start to nip and fight. Need more food and more tanks.