Reptile & Amphibian Forums

In the first pic, they come up and investigate. Then in the second, one is shaking the mouse in my hand. The third they decided to split the mice into little pieces. The last pic they return for more.

What is of interest is, they do not bite my hand or the glove. While taking the pics, one or two, come up to my arm and tickle it with their tougues. Remember, I am holding the food with one hand and taking pics with the other. This is the first time for these guys, they are not sure of the whole thing, but hey, its food.

I will do this a few times to teach them that mice are on my hand, then I will photograph a series when I close my hand with the mice inside. That is sooooooooooo darn funny. They will claw at my hand and use their noses as a prybar to get inside, etc. That will be coming soon. (I have done this many times before, just not with this group). Enjoy FR

Love these photos even if blurry, I too would use the glove with these guys, however I wanted to try this without glove with my trio of BT, they are small and wont do damage, just curious to see if they can make the difference?

Also I am foolish to say this, but when I look at the top photo, I see a dominant female (left) subordinate female (center) and male (right) I know its silly to say this from a photo, but its what I see and cant explain. It be fun to know how they turn out.

Next aim glade you posted these! As yesterday I got a hatred email about me using wood shavings, its funny how some peoples think everything must be a one way!

Thanks! You have no idea (really)

Ps. The mollucan will lay anytime soon, this was my only wish for the time being.

I included the fuzzie pics to show movement. They are shaking the mice. You understand how they do that, yea.

Actually there is 2.2 in this cage. There is no waiting to be done.

This is an outbred strain, only partly related to my original strain, George and Gracie. They are very different looking from the them.

Thanks for having fun with the pictures. FR

Very cool pictures!!! I will keep using tongs myself. Keep the pics coming.
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Ed

These heat lamps make my electric bill to high.

This was the first time i did this with these, they were a little taken back by the change. I normally use tongs.

Soon they will be to large to do this with. So I am having some fun now. Even at this size, they would have no problem cutting right thru the gloves. Thanks and glad you enjoyed the pics. FR

You're a lucky man, Frank. And I'm not talking about those little lookers not biting your fingers...

Not that I worry about you losing sight of what's in front of you, but I really sincerely hope you realize how nice you've got it out there. These pics prove it.

The rest of us are pig-biting jealous, of course. Thanks for the entertainment.

Frank,

How can you raise such smart monitors? Mine are all dorks! I tried that trick with one of my sand monitors, and it took him a couple bites to figure out the difference between glove and mouse. Meanwhile, my arguses have a tendancy to try to kill my shoes, the newspaper, or any other miscelaneous debris lying around when I feed them.

Keep up the good work.

Luke

Actually sand monitors are very easy to train. Your problem is, you already trained them. They know where the food comes from and they are not shy about it.

Lacies are a bit shy. Of course males would jump out of a window for food. But they do not like the unknown.

My male croc monitor would turn his head and eyeball my tennis shoes, hmmmmmmm white like a rat. It was very interesting, as I would be in the cage with them.

What you need to do is let them bite your gloved hand and learn its not the food. (retrain)

With that said, I did this with adult peachies. After they knew my gloved hand was a source of food, I changed the game and closed my hand with the mice inside. They would try different things to get my hand open, from prying with their nose to digging at my hand with they front feet. I would only open my hand if they used their hands. They did learn this quickly. But, if I let them get sharp(really hungry) they would revert to other methods, including nibbling. They never bit the glove hard.

With that said, I would not do this with albigs. While they are very smart at some things, they just crush the glove and stuff comes out. hahahahahahahaha Thanks FR

>>Actually sand monitors are very easy to train. Your problem is,
>>you already trained them. They know where the food comes from
>>and they are not shy about it.

That's about right. Normally, I get my male sand to chase the mouse all over before letting him snag it (he is chubby, and needs the excercize). He probably thought he had to rip it out of my hands by force.

It also got me thinking about how much of this "biting the wrong thing" is because it is too dim when I feed them. Here in NY, electricity is cheaper at night than in the day (at least in winter). So, I keep the monitor lights on at night, and therefore I feed them at night. I don't think they see as good as we do in the dark. I know several times I've been in front of the cage of one of my big male arguses, and he's just sitting there basking like nothing is happening. Then I flick on the room lights, and all of a sudden he realizes I am there. He'll puff up and hiss. If I walk around his cage with the room lights on, he's all defensive. With the lights off, he is back to normal.

It is also interesting how the arguses react differently to mice than to, say, shrimp. Mice or rats, it is all grab, thrash, shake - ultra violent. A couple times I've had a bunch of freezer burned shrimp that I've given to the arguses (also scallops, chicken, turkey, etc.). The first bite they treat it like a mouse, but soon they realize that they don't need to. It isn't going anywhere. So I feed them a shrimp at a time from the hemostats and they calmly take them, one by one.

Luke

Do they react the same at all ages? or do they react differently as adults?

Now when I try it and my monitor eats my hand, it's all your fault haha