Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi everyone. i have had a female leopard gecko for about 2 years now. i just introduced a male. it is both of their first time seeing the opposite sex. is it normal that the make came into the tank and over night pretty much took over the hide box she always used to hang out in? now she sits outside of it. can you always see bite marks on the female after they mated? is there any other way to be able to tell? i bred leopard geckos about 6 or 7 years ago and i was young and dont remember a few things. thanks for your help.

Eric

I've never bred them before, but I do know that you should not permanently keep a male and female together. The male is going to dominate and over breed the female which is going to lead to a very stressed gecko and stress and pregnancy do not make good bed fellows.

so how long should i keep him in the cage for. like a week?

Well, again let me say I have never bred leopard geckos. I have been looking into it though because I would like to in the future. A couple places I've found say to leave the male in for a few days to a week, and it does say you will notice bite marks on the female, the male will grab her neck for mating. One site I found said that it does not separate the male (although it acknowledges that most breeders do). They keep one male with about 4-5 females year round. Most of the sites that sell leopard geckos also have tips for breeding, so search around.
Good luck!

...I've heard the opposite actually. Most breeders I've talked to say that to reduce fighting and acclamation time, you should only introduce them once and keep them together year round in a large enough tank - 2 in a 20L, 4 in a 40 breeder, etc to reduce 'arguments'.

Then again, I have yet to breed them as well. Your best bet would be to contact an experienced breeder online or at a show. Geckosunlimited forums can be a good source also.
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Danne
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1.0 '07 BRB (Monroe)
1.0 '08 BRB 66% het Anery (Ace)
1.0 '08 Pastel BP (Sebastian)
1.0 Dumbo rats (Wilbur)
0.4 cats (Cupcake, Smokey, Thelma & Emelia)
1.2 family members who can't wait until I move "the zoo" into my own place!
1.0 supportive boyfriend
1.0 '08 neutered grey sugar glider (Acco)
0.1 '08 whiteface sugar glider (Malina)

Email = dshoback@eden.rutgers.edu