Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Croc weighed in at 5 1/2 pds today. I hope thats a respectable weight for a yearling. Any comments?
Take care,
Karen

I did want to mention that he hybernated from October to mid January. I just checked Santiago's growth chart. He was 11 pds. at 1 yr. Well, now I don't feel so good.
Take care,
Karen

Remember Samtiego Has never hibernated. How long is he ( Tl & Snt to vent).How much do you feed him? Try giving him more food ,( as much insets as he will eat , twice a day as well as fruit and rodents .) . That may speed his Growth up. Did he hibernate on his own ? Try to keep the temps the same year round This may help Also.If he looks heathy Dont worry about it. I know that Berthas said that if they hibernate It takes 3 years to become a adult . Good luck Russ

Hi Russ,
Well, I haven't measured him recently but I'll try to do that tomorrow.
He did hybernate on his own but in my reptile room its hard to control for changing climate. The room adjoins the garage so whenever the door is opened in the winter the temps drop. In general the room runs 10 to 20 degrees cooler in the winter. In the summer its like a hot box. I really didn't want him to hybernate the first year but now that he has I don't mind as long as he eventually reaches his growth potential.
Food wise he eats 2 to 4 jumbo mice a day or maybe 2 mice and a chick. The jumbo mice are really large and the chick is larger. Earlier this spring he was eating around 6 regular adult mice so I decided to go with jumbo's. I don't have him eating fruit and veggies yet. I tried grapes and strawberries but no luck. I have some turkey so I'll make the SDZ diet up and try some in there.
Thanks for the response and I'll get back with those measurements hopefully tomorrow. You take care and give that baby(human) a kiss for me. I love babies.
Karen

That sounds pretty good to me Karen! Remember they don't eat at all when they hibernate so he still has 3-4 months to gain the 6 pounds difference. Not to mention ta equal Santiago is setting the standerd kind of high. What did Santiago weight at 8 months old would be a better comparison. Yours still has a good year of growth left! He's going to be a big healthy adult if you keep it up.

Rollin is right . Santiego was 6.71 lbs at 8 1/2 mouths and 42 1/2 "total lenght , and 15 3/4 " snt to vent . Take it easy .Russ

Thanks Rollin. I certainly hope he grows up big and healthy. He sure has taken off this summer. My next challenge is to get him to eat fruit and vegetables. Hopefully, as I told Russ, I can utilize the SDZ diet to get him eating those goodies. By themselves he doesn't touch them. I'll try to get his lengths measured tomorrow. I'm curious myself. Did I ever mention to you I have a first tegu probably 1 1/2 yrs old that hybernated for 8 months? It wasn't the temps either! I know that's what everyone will think. I bought him at LLL Reptile Supplies and after talking to Stella we believe he was from a different time zone. Like out of this country. He's not as big as Croc but he has grown tremendously since he finally woke up.
Take care and thanks for the encouragement.
Karen