Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have had my leo for around 3.5 years now, I am thinking of introducing another leo or two into her (i am fairly certain its a female) cage soon. I was wondering if anyone had any information or advise or precautions or just about anything to guide me on my path to doing this. My cage is 24x18x12 and i currently have one heat rock which hasnt steered either of us (me or my gecko) wrong in the past 3.5 years as well as an underground cave for her with a custom rock entrance, a water dish, and a red heat lamp that stays on 24 hours a day over her rock entrance. Should i ad anything?

I am also curious as i have heard that it is wise to leave a dish of vitamin powder in her cage so that she can lick that for vitamins whenever she pleases. thoughts on this??

Share with me your knowledge

Thanks so much,
Jesse

First off you have been really lucky not to have problems with the heat rock,a under tank heater is much better and they don't cost too much.I would recommend switching.You should keep a dish of pure calcium in the cage for your leo to lick,you can dust you feeder insects twice a week with the vitamins.Do you know what a humid hide is? They are pretty important to keep your leo from having bad sheds.

As far as housing two together.Never ever keep males together,they will fight to the death,even some females will fight.I have a female that lives in a large tank so I put my daughters female in with her and they fought so I seperated them,a few months later I got another female that went in the tank with my first female(after quarentine),this time around there was no problems.So it really dependes on the animals invloved.

Whatever you do,you need to make sure they are the same size and keep your new leo quarentined for 1-3 month to make sure it doesn't have something that would make your first leo sick,like parasites.You need to be prepared to house everyone seperate if they don't get along,if they don't like each other then no amount of time will ever fix it.

When you are ready to introduce the leos,watch them very close for any signs of aggression or stress,mine never fought in front of me but I checked them everyday and that was how I found the bite marks,make sure both are eating and not stealing each others food,you may need to have two feed dishs and extra hidy spots so they don't have to compete for food/space.

The demensions of your tank sound like its only a 15gallon, this is not big enough for more than one leo. If you want two leos you need a 20gallon long, if you want 3 or more a 30breeder tank is the size you will need.

At 3.5years old you should be able to positively say if your leo is a male or a female. If you do not know how to sex, post some pictures of your leo's vent area on this forum for people to look at and they will tell you.

As mentioned in the above response you will want to quarentine a new leo in a seperate tank for at least 3months, and have a fecal run. Only introduce a leo of similar size.
-----
0.1 Bearded dragon
0.1 mexican kingsnake
1.0.2 Leopard Gecko's
0.0.1 Rose Hair Tarantula
1.0 BTS
0.0.1 Reverse Okeetee Corn
0.1 Bullmastiff
4.1 Cats