Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well Bonnie and Clyde are doing great, Clyde does an amazing upside down crawl along one half of their screen top. Bonnie she jumps all over the place making a mess in their nice clean water dish, yeesh. Clyde keeps on trying to woo Bonnie it is rather entertaining to watch him try, then she either runs away or puts her hand out, doing the I'm not that type of female lizard" thing. I'm hoping she will get over herself and I'll have little lizards at some time.

Though from pictures I've seen and just some general questions that keep popping up that I can't find answers to, I am coming to you my fellow lizard caretakers.

1. How much sand do you use in your cages?? I have placed a 50lb bag of sand into my cage, which is a traditional terrarium that can be purchased from pet stores. Glass on the bottom and all 4 sides with two mesh tops.

2. What type of cages do you have or would recommend?? To my wifes amuzement I am determined to build one at some point in the future.

3. Do you feed your lizards in a seperate cage??

or

4. Do you remove all the terrain when you feed the lizards??

I think that about covers my current questions.

Boost

Hi,
I'm not an expert, but I can tell you what I've done. For sand I use enough to cover the bottom an inch or two thick. I use more, but I think that would be adiquite. For feeding out of the cage, are you talking about taking them out to prevent them from eating sand or the insects excaping? I haven't had trouble with them eating sand, but have heard that they can have problems in there intestines if they don't have enough water( and eat sand). If you are worried about the food hiding from them. I am raising crickets, but utill they get bigger I've been catching grasshoppers and feeding large quanities at a time. They usually catch them all eventually, but there are always the few that die because no one eats them. It is easier to feed them a lot and not have to make sure they eat it right away, but I think that it is better to feed them a few at a time and make sure that they eat( the usually run over and eat it. Here people say Bigger is always better for aqurium size, and collareds will explore every inch of it. I've heard of putting a single( or maybe a pair) in a thirty gallon.

Good luck,
Morgan

Thank you Morgan for your information and input.

I have a 60 gallon tank which Bonnie and Clyde call home.

I am always worried about the crickets causing the lizards stress and/or attacking them overnight. I have placed veggies in there to placate the crickets so that appears to be working.
I am considering of just sectioning off the cage come breakfast and dinner time so then when they've eaten their fill I can remove the crickets and everyone's happy.

How many crickets for 2 juvies per feeding would be recommended??

Boost

Boost-you need to do more read-up on collareds to get yourself aquainted with husbandry techniques. There is nothing wrong with sand, I like home depot sand (play sand) not silica sand, it's cleaned and cheap and works well. However I have also used higher grade short nap astroturf and cut it to the size of the cage and that works well and is easy to clean. If these a young animals, I prefer to feed mine 3/8" size crickets and more of them than a few big ones. Always rotate some wax worms or superworms, and you should dust your crickets at least once a week with vitamin powder, You should also include a mercury vapor bulb for uvb/uva & D3 or flourescent tubes for the same. Temps for basking should be around 105 on one side and the other cool side should be around 85 degrees ambient temprature. Most collard lizards like rocks so a liberal distribution of large flat rocks and a branch are always a good cage arrangement. You can use plastic plants for looks. When feeding don't put in more than they can eat. If they are running from the crickets it may be that they are too big, but normally hungry collards will eat right away, I usually let them warm up in the morning and then feed them. A 60 gallon cage is fine for young, but in the future I would make a cage that is at leat 3 ft long by 2 ft high. I am concerned about not having height in a cage as some collareds like to jump and I've seen them jump up into the screen and mess there nose up. So be aware of that because the nose injury not taken care of can result in serious issues. When feeding waxworms and superworms, you can get a slightly deep bowl that they can't climb out of and put a few of them in the bowl and the lizards will get used of eating them out of the bowl. Be sure and be careful how you put your rocks together you might use silicon on them so they don't fall accidently if the cage gets bumped and hurt the lizards. Good luck and this is just some basic stuff, which you may already be doing but judging from the questions you asked I thought I'd through this stuff out to you. Check out William Wells web-site Crazy Crotaphytus, and others for husbandry......Cheers!!!
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Phrynosoma.com

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signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

Hi,
I see that will got answered the questions I couldn't for you. Another thing that I do is put a pile or a large rock under the heat light since they like to climb. I would be careful though I have seen cameelons that have been burned badly. And again as will said if you put a large rock or a stack, make sure it is very sturdy and suquire.

Good luck,
Morgan