Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Heya,
Sorry to post a new thread on this, but the old one is drifting away down the board. I just managed to get a pic thats shows the green on my year-old tegus head fairly accurately. To recap the old post, I have had this tegu just over 2 months and over the last couple of weeks his head has begun to show tinges of pale, minty green. I was wondering if this is a sign of...well, anything really. I havent heard of a tegus head going green with age or illness or anything

I have more pics in my album at www.thetegu.com which show the colour. Its on the big scales on his head and across his neck and jowls. Its very very faint on the dots on his back as well. Anyone know why this happens?

T.merianae typically colour up with their "adult" colours after a year. Then they often slowly fade, although not always, and not completely. I've had greens, reds (which faded to a nice salmon), mostly whites, all black, black backs orange bellies, the so-called Chacoan blues and even some very colourful ones with faded hues of red, orange, green, etc. all together in one. They are a very polymorphic species and there are quite a few natural variants, some with strong, distinct patterning, others with more mottled markings.