Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I had two tegu's Shipped to my house yesterday. This Male doesnt look to stressed out from the whole ordeal, but the female is very feisty and tried to bite me 5 times. So i decided tojust let them be for about a week at least. Any pointer on how to get these guys from being afraid of me? Also what do you recomend for there first feeding. I am going to get some pinky mice tonight and crickets. i tried ground turkey, grapes, and an egg yesterday,but they didnt want to eat. Once i see them eat something i will be alot happier. Thanks The girl is the larger one in the pic.

Snappiness for young tegus isn't that unusual. Thye'll sttle as they get older and get used to you. Just pick em up daily and reward good behaviour by putting them back in they're enclosure.

Try some poultry based cat food. My young tegus love it or some scrambled eggs (cooled).

The female still hasnt eaten anything, but she is Shedding I am working on trying to bring the temps up in there enclosure. They had a nice basking day yesterday and the male went crazy hunting down crickets. I'm going to try some cat food today and see if she will eat that. Thanks any other sujestions on food i could try?

You can try cat foor or scrambled eggs, but that's a bad habbit to get in. Eggs first off have little to no nutirtion other than protein compared to the fertile eggs they're used to in the wild. overfeeding on eggs can lead to disorder from lack of biotin.

As for the cat food, it is very heavy on fat and protein. If you want to use a canned food, get a lowfat dog food. Cats require much more fat in their diets than dogs. Cat food is even bad for dogs.

Best regards,
Mikal

A lot of people don't suggest using cat food at all. Personally I offer it every now and then since it contains some more varied nutrients, but its probably best to only be used very sparingly.