THE FORUM (Grand Forks, N Dakota) 27 January 06 Reptile ranching: ‘Almost prehistoric’ pets turn Moorhead couple into bearded dragon breeders (Tom Pantera)
Nathan Hoyt likes having Speck and Oz around the house because they bring a certain prehistoric feel to the place.
Around Thanksgiving, they also brought 18 babies.
It was the third clutch of eggs for Oz, the female half of Hoyt’s breeding pair of bearded dragons.
Hoyt and his wife, Jodi, of Moorhead, have been keeping the lizards for three years.
“For me, it was something different,” he says. “They’re almost prehistoric.”
And while it’s not a moneymaking venture, the Hoyts have sold most of the dragons’ offspring to local pet stores.
Those aren’t the only animals in the house, either. The Hoyts have Grace, a border collie mix they got from Adopt-A-Pet last summer, and for years have had two cats, Toby and Shelby.
“The cats love ’em,” Nathan says. “They’ll sit on their post and watch.” In fact Toby, the male cat, loved Speck, the male lizard, a little too much at first. Shortly after the Hoyts brought the lizards home, Speck somehow got out of his tank. Nathan found him in the basement – in Toby’s mouth. Luckily the lizard was unhurt.
The dog is as curious as the cats, but more wary, he says.
The Web site www.zoo.org for the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, Wash., says bearded dragons are found in Australia and New Guinea.
They average 18 to 22 inches long and live anywhere from four to 10 years.
In the wild, bearded dragons are omnivores, eating a variety of animals and plants.
In captivity, they’re largely herbivores, with an occasional foray into meat in the form of crickets.
Hoyt feeds his dragons peas, carrots, spinach, celery tops and cabbage, much of it dusted with vitamin powder. Crickets and mealworms provide protein.
He says bearded dragons aren’t hard to keep healthy, though if their tank isn’t cleaned regularly they are subject to worm infestations and infections. He gives his dragons a wormer to prevent that problem, in addition to the vitamins.
As cold-blooded animals, bearded dragons are fairly laid back. As Hoyt talks about them, Speck lies on a towel while his master pets him and Oz crawls up Hoyt’s left arm, finally settling in across the back of his neck. They seem to enjoy simply hanging out in the living room.
“They’re really docile,” he says. “They’re easy to hold, easy to handle. They don’t bite.”
Bearded dragons can’t be sexed until they’re about a year old, so at first, the Hoyts thought they had two males.
They realized otherwise in October 2004, when they put the lizards in the tub for one of their regular constitutionals.
Oz – who was named for Ozzy Osbourne – appeared to have some discomfort, until Nathan noticed something he didn’t expect to see in the tub: an egg.
Bearded lizards usually breed in the spring, and Nathan says he “didn’t do anything special. Must’ve been the lighting.” He speculates that the lighting in the tank slightly changed the lizards’ biological clocks.
The Hoyts have no children, but the lizards are popular with young relatives and the occasional young visitor, like the piano students Jodi teaches in their home.
“The kids always get to see them,” Hoyt says.
Reptile ranching: ‘Almost prehistoric’ pets turn Moorhead couple into bearded dragon breeders