Reptile & Amphibian Forums

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Bennett

beardiedragon.com
Home of the Florida Orange

monitors are better! but that is just my opinion, i own both but i am relatively new to tegus, i just bought a pair at the mid atlantic reptile show from LLL reptile, they are really growing on me, however to me the monitors just seem more active, intelligent and more entertaining to watch forage about. Dont get all offended, im just messing around. have fun they are both really great animals.

but monitors are not easy to breed like tegus and they are a lot more unpredictable than tegus. I have seen some spectacular monitors that are dog tame and they are wonderfull but I think I will stick to tegus.

Anyway, I was looking for the scientific differences between the two.
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Bennett

beardiedragon.com
Home of the Florida Orange

OK, I'm no expert, but I own both and have considered the same question. First off, monitors are Old World, tegus are New World. In a lot of areas, they seem to fill the same preditory niche. Monitors have a longer, more snake like tongue and different scalation patterns. While there are heavy bodied monitors, many are sort of high speed/low drag lizards. Most monitors are strictly carnivors, although I have heard of one species that seems to need fruit. Dentition varies with monitors, as some have dentition to crush shellfish. Most do insects as hatchlings, then graduate to rodents and/or chicks. The dwarf monitors stay with insects, with occasional pinkies or fuzzies. Some monitors are very arborial, and some are very aquatic. Monitors like to burrow, just like tegus, and, from all I've heard, it is much more likely to get a tegu to trust you and permit handling than a monitor. Some monitors get upwards of 6-8 feet regularly, and some of them, like the Nile Monitor, have reputations for disliking everyone and everything.

Hope that helps.

Leslie

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Bennett

beardiedragon.com
Home of the Florida Orange