Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i was looking into getting a monitor a while ago but i could not decide which one to get i was thinking about either a water monitor, black throat, and other similar monitors around that size. which one out of the black throat and water would have the best temperment(those are the two i am really interested in)? my other question is about cage size every place that i look gives different sizes for recomended cage size and adult size of these lizards. so i do not want to get one and not be able to care for it properly. the area that i have is 8 feet long(might be able to make it longer) 7 feet high and i can make it around 4 or 5 feet wide. but i am not sure if this is quite long enough. they will also be able to walk around my room when i am home from school and not at work. and during the summer they will have and area out side where it can go. and to start with they will have a 75 gallon tank to go in until i can build a cage which will probably be built during the winter
also any other suggestions are welcome

Here is what I would suggest above all else. Before you get any monitor be sure to find out as much info on them as you can from people who are actually accomplishing the things you want to do. Next would be to build the final enclosure way before you get the monitor. This way you can make sure basking, ambient and cool spots are meeting the temp range you need (somewhere around 75 cold, 80-85 ambient and 120+ basking, no exact science, these are just suggestions), and air flow in the cage. You can also find out what kind of substrate and I guess "cage furniture" it uses in it's native enviroment and find something similar that it will recognize and use, which can take some time. Then I would think about what you are wanting to accomplish. If breeding is you choice, and this is what it usually becomes if you are still into monitors a year later, you need to concider if you have enough room to house 2 properly and somewhere to seperate if needed. As for the outside caging, it can be very difficult to maintain the temp range all day that is needed. Then I would get an idea of the feeding cost of the animal for a year and see if you can afford it. I would include mostly rodents as the main part of it's diet, as the have been proven to meet life requirements. These are the things I would concider most when buying a monitor, and this comes from personal experience and failures. Hope it helps. -Jeff

thanks for the advice... but would a cage the size that i metioned above be ok for a black throat?

;

Is a very bad idea for you and our hobby. Get an ackie which can live in a 4 ft cage all of its life so you learn what a monitor is and what they need without the danger to you or the public. I have had a few large species of monitor over the years and can tell you that a BT can outgrow 5 cages in the first year (as fast as you can plan and build theyve outgrown it). Realize that a foot of dirt for an aclie is great but a large monitor will need a few feet to be comfortable and useful to them. I have a 6ft albig now yet Im out of room for larger cages in less than 2 years, as well as the ability to give her more than a foot and a half of dirt. Sometime in the near future I hope to remedy that. My ackie has all the room he needs. If your in school Id wait to get a monitor period because they are demanding captives and need someones complete commitment for 20-30 years (if they live that long). I didnt have my first monitor until I was 21, and I still didnt know what my future held. If this doesnt seter you and you made your mind up for the long haul then good luck and ask questions at any time. Im one who will try to help as much as I can.

so how big of an enclosure will i need for a full grown black thoat? and this will not be my first big lizard i have had an iguana and a tegu so haveing a big lizard is not a new thing to me.

Well, inasmuch as you can call the two really great lizards I have mistakes. I love them, and I care for them as best as I can (these are *not* disposable savs!), but they certainly have been a challenge.

First of all, a BT (or even sav) is a huge lizard. A 6-foot iguana is much smaller than a 6-foot BT, since there is less tail and more body on a BT. That means more food, more strength when you want to try to get them to do anything, and more space needed. I certainly did not understand that when I got my first sav, but I made a committment to him, and so here we are. Fortunately, both of my lizards are sort of friendly, but what if you wind up wirh a hissing monster?

Speaking of committments, the lizards have been an issue in a lot of other ways--when I moved across the country, I had to figure out how to take them with me, and I even had to choose where I live partly on the basis of whether the place would allow lizards and what local laws were like. Are you ready to possibly change your like habits for a reptile? They cost me at least 50 dollars a month in food, not to mention electricity, vet bills, etc. Can you guarantee being able to spend money on them when they need it?

If you are, then go for it. If I had it to do over again, though, I would have started with smaller species and then worked up. Good luck.

Cortes, Xanax, and their human slave

i dont plan on buying one until i am sure that i will be able to afford everything i will nedd for it. i will make sure i know about acging feeding...ect but i was just on the pro exotcis site and they said that an enclosure of 8-12 feet is fine for and adult black throat. so i could make mine possibly 8-9 feet long and 4-5 feet wide and however tall it needs to be. but i may be able to make things larger. but i need to know how big te cage needs to be. that is the main thing i am conserned of right now. and he/she will not always be in there enclosure they will be able to walk around my room and at time possibly the whole house. they will have time in the summer weather permiting to go outside.

also why des pro exotics sell them for around 165 and opthr places sell them for around 95?

They are selling 2 types of BTs, $165 for a WC 3 month or so old that is in excellent health with colors and patterns that are beautiful (they dont post a pic to sell an animal an ship something that looks totally diferent), has been handled frequently and usually has a great attitude. Next they offer their own CBB BTs (yes they bred them, its true unlike so many other claims), for $225-250. Both of these prices are below the average for WC and CBB (CBB albigs average about$300) (WC average from $50-$300, depends how much money most places are making on you, but Proexotics you get their reputation for beautiful quality animals, no junk, no false claims, no over priced unhealthy animals. Their competitiors say their prices are high but these are the same people who sell WC, mite bitten, nasty, skinny, dehydrated animals for the same or higher prices.
I can get BTs for very cheap but I wouldnt get another from anyone else, Id get another CBB Proexotics animal.

so they are he best place to go through? and what would the advantages of buys a cbb over a well acclimated wc one? also do you have a bt? if so what size enclosure do you have yours in.

the biggest advantage of a CBB animal over a well acclimated wild caught animal is that you aren't taking an animal out of the wild and putting it through all sorts of stress. You are making your own little contribution to slowing the trade in wild caught reptiles. For every wildcaught reptile that survives rough handling and transport long enough to become a well acclimated captive, there are countless others that don't.

If you need more reason than this, perhaps something that has to do with you as the animal's keeper, with CBB you have a fair idea of what the animal's history is and what it has or has not gone through. With even well acclimated wildcaughts it's anyone's guess.

i just didnt know if health wise one was better. i would rather have a cbb but a wc is fine as well.

guess you didn't read my post

i read your post. trust me i favor cbb over wild caught but sometimes it is just not possible to get a cbb. if i can get one then i will put out the extra money to get one but if it is not possible then i will get a wc. cbb or not i wil still like the animal just as much.

I don't think you did catch what I was saying.

I was inferring that the difference between CBB and wildcaught isn't just about whether you like them or not. There should be ethical considerations as well, although there rarely are. People just think about price and how having a wildcaught affects themselves as a keeper (will I have to treat it for parasites etc). Very few people think about the reptile itself being plucked from a life of wandering around freely then suddenly finding itself trapped in a box in someone's basement on the other side of the globe. At least CBB animals have never known otherwise.

There are CBB blackthroats and water monitors available there, why would you want to go wildcaught?

if i can find a cbb then that is what i will get. i dont care about the cost. but if all i can find is a wc then that i what i will have to get.

also i saw somewhere that someone is selling cb white throats for 89.00 each. could this be true. it seems kind of low for a cb wt.

hm... if you went through the trouble of breeding your monitors, would YOU sell the babies for 89.00?

i figured it wasnt true since i have seen wc ones going for 175.00. but i figured i would post that and see what you guys thought.

My large female is in a 4x4x8 ft cage because Im tapped for space, but hope to remedy that in the near future with a 10x6x5ft cage, she is only 22 months old and right around 6ft. My male is much smaller (he was over 2 yrs old when I got him and 2.5ft long, 2.2lbs), hes now over 3ft and 6 lbs, his cage is 6x3x3ft for now also. My ackie is in a 4x2x2.5ft cage.

do you find that yours like to climb? because i was thinking about making a higher basking spot uusing like an old log or something to make the cage look good. because tegus are not supposed to like to climb but mine liked his elevated area over his lower basking area.

also me and my dad did some measuring and we figured that we could make a cage up to 9 feet long, 4-5 feet wide, and up to 6-7 feet tall. i know i probably wont need it that tall but how tall do you suggest i make it. id like to have around 2-2.5 ffet of soil or cypress mulch(had better success with this than sol with my tegu) in the cage maybe a little more maybe a little less
and then making a few basking spots and stuff. and would it be good to have an area where he/she can soak in water? i know i will need it for them to drink but do they soak in there water or should i just buy a misting system.

Monitors are varanids from more arid areas, and much different animals. Dirt is the best and cheap by the truckload already strained or free to dig. Albigs love to climb for some reason, and have been notoriously known to African bird watchers for almost 50 years to eat every bird or empty every nest they can find. My big albig goes up trees and our grapevine like shes almost walking on the ground. Once a monitor is living in deep dirt you will never want to use anything else, its like a fish in water.

so if i put logs in the cage and stuff they will use them? and will elevated basking be a good idea. because i figure if i use elevated basking spots and logs for them to climb on it will give it more floor space to use but it will also keep it entertain because of the logs and stuff it will have to climb on.

Keep up with good ideas like that and be proud of your animal and its cage. Post lots of pics...

10x6x5.. I saw how quickly the 4x4x8 was too small. Yet you dont want to use something big from hatchling on because they need a cage thats more proportionate to help monitor their progress as you raise them which means several cages as they grow from small to very very large. Ive heard of an enclosure that is 40x25x10 meters inside for a trio of albigs (one male, 2 females).

also i have a few more questions. how big do these guys get full grown? i have read a decent amount but each article that i read has a different size. one says 4-5 one says 5-6. so i am assuming that they get atleast 5 feet if not more. correct me if i am wrong. and the monitor will be kept in my room(my mom does not like reptiles bigger than her) and my room is just around 10 feet wide and around 16 feet long so would a cage about 9-9.5 feet long be okay or do i need the extra 6 inches or so? also about feeding i read that they need an all rodent diet when they are older and when they are younger a rodent/insect diet. so would it be wise for me to breed my own rodents?

also are there any major differences between a black throat and a whit throat? because they look the same in all the picures i have seen of both of them.

The largest BT Ive seen or heard of was 7ft 3 inches, the WT I saw was 6ft 10 inches, both males.
The BT is darker with a different pattern and is from Tanzania in a more lush higher altitude environment. They grow a bit longer and sometimes heavier than WTs, which are alot lighter on average. They are considered the same species mainly because they can innerbreed, yet so many other separate species can do this but are not grouped as the same.
CBB means you know the animals history, age, etc. The WC animals most probably have been starved, dehydrated, full of parasites, and may have had all kinds of inhumane disgusting things done to them in route to you, from the trip from their home country. Besides WC contributes to an industry that allows these horrible things to happen to them, and they dont care how many make it. If someone is breeding monitors (truelly breeding them) they care about them by spending a fortune in time , space, effort, money etc on them.
I just buy rodents bulk from rodentpro..

have you found rodentpro to be a good place to go thru?

The quality of what shows up is excellent and usually larger than what you expect.

Due to high prices of live animals in my city, i breed all my own rodents. Right now i have a 1.3 rat set up that gives me roughly 30 animals a month, which is more than adequate for my growing bosc. The nice thing about breeding rats is that i go to the pet store, buy a big thing of bedding for 12 bucks that lasts me 3 or 4 months, buy a big bag of dog food for 10 bucks that lasts a month or 2 and there's my cost. Once you have the cages and stuff, its much more cost effective (unless you buy frozen in bulk). Also, a tame full grown 2 pound rat is almost as fun to play with as a 3 foot monitor.

Talk about smell even with rats at some point they smell but not near as much as mice. I had a male and 3 female rats going in the basement when I raising my large bosc from a hatchling but no matter what, they could never produce enough for him (8-18 per 2 weeks per female consistantly), I still bought just as many as I produced and bought crickets and roaches. I order them bulk they get delivered by airborne express frozen, no care or cleaning involved. That and they are the same size months later, and no fights between the rodents either. Besides I cant iagine the smell, mess, and noise from raising your own chicken peeps, Ive seen chicken houses and barns and chicken coups many times. The last peeps I got were .11 cents a piece.

i will probably raise some not alot but that way a bulk of the rodents i use will be from me and i will not have to spend as much money on rodents. i will also probably breed my own crickets and mealworms and stuff like that.