Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Ive heard about when you get a new gecko you should quarrentine it before putting it in the tank with your original gecko. What exactly is quarrentine?
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I have a new leo named Mr.Crowley. He lives in a 20 gallon long tank all by himself. Here is a picture of him if you go to the url below...
http://www.sighost.us/members/theozzmaster/mr.crowley.jpg

Basically it means house your new gecko separate from all others. Keep it in a differemt cage and if possible, a different room. Use paper towel as a substrate so you can get a look at the fecal material (to make sure it is going and nothing strange is going on.), keep a water dish, calcium dish, and humid hide in the enclosure. Don't use the same equipment for your long term and the quarentine animals, keeps stuff from getting spread around! This should cut down on passing any pathogens or illness from a new gecko to your other ones.

How long would I have to keep it in a different cage?
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I have a new leo named Mr.Crowley. He lives in a 20 gallon long tank all by himself. Here is a picture of him if you go to the url below...
http://www.sighost.us/members/theozzmaster/mr.crowley.jpg

I go 30 days. Some people say 90...I doubt many go 90 days, that is a bit of overkill unless you have a wildcaught animal, a clearly ill animal or a highly "suspect" animal. I posted this pic before, it is the quarentine rack I keep in a closet outside of my herp room.

goo goo gajoob
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Tim W
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0.1 Dumeril Boa "Visara"
0.1 Domestic Housecat "Kiki"

Sometimes it takes that long for crypto and viruses to show symptoms. And most of the time you get no symptoms at all with other parasites, so it's best to get fecal tests done.
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chickabowwow

A longer quarentine period may be better, but as I said, 90 days is overkill for most situations. Many countries don't quarentine imported pets for 90 days, some zoos do depending on the animal. But for a private collection...30 days should be sufficient unless one of the other conditions I mentioned were present. Crypto could be present and not show up for a significant period of time, well past 90 days, which would clearly suck.

I don't see how 90 days could be considered overkill for any situation since this is a precaution we're talking about (and a very under-rated one at that). I can name people who quarantine for one year. Better safe than sorry no matter what kind of collection you own. Parasite-free herps are in the minority, WC or not. It can take a long time for one to ever start showing symptoms, so it doesn't make sense to quarantine for a shorter period of time.
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chickabowwow

Like I said earlier, 30 days should be enough. If someone wants to go 90 or a year...hey, knock yourself out. For all practical purposes, 30 should do it, as far as catching any problems before they spread. Something might stay "hidden" for the 30 days and show up later, but they may also stay "hidden" for 90 and have the exact same outcome. I have only had 1 problem (with some nic boas) that I have caught during quarentine and it showed up within about 10 days, no other problems to date, knock on wood (10 years and counting)!

Ok, Thanks.
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I have a new leo named Mr.Crowley. He lives in a 20 gallon long tank all by himself. Here is a picture of him if you go to the url below...
http://www.sighost.us/members/theozzmaster/mr.crowley.jpg