Reptile & Amphibian Forums

my cuban is just about 2, and he's really starting to frustrate me. every single morning he decides he wants to be a little brat and scratch on the glass door and run into it and rub on it and make as much noise as humanly possible. he does all of this while i am trying to sleep. its incredibly frustrating since he does it for a good 30 minutes before he stops for 10 minutes, and then does it all over again. he has food and such in his enclosure, so i dont know what his deal is. any ways to stop him from doing this every morning? he doesnt do it any other time of day...maybe putting a sheet over the doors at night and taking it off when i wake up?

How old is he? What size cage is he in? How often is he let out of the cage? What's his light cycle? My baby lewisi is on an 8:30 A.M.-9:00P.M. light cycle and he still sometimes doesn't come out till 11:00, but he is young. My Rhino I use to have would scratch at the glass when I came home but he was spoiled and spent most of his time out of the cage. Therefore he never wanted to be in his cage. He also got use to the routine and time I let him out. Sounds like your cuban wants out. Is there some past routine in the morning that may make him act this way like feeding or something else? If he's big and tame enough I would let him roam the room while you sleep. Once my animals are big and tame enough they rarely sleep in their cages over night. I come home let them out to roam and they find their regular sleeping spot when it's time to go to sleep. I wake them up in the morning or they wake me up and I feed them and put them back in their cage. Cyclura are possibly the most intelligent lizards around. This is why I love interacting with them so much. People underestimate their mental capacity.

he'll be 2 in august. i dont let him out because he doesnt really let me handle him. the lights go on about 6:30AM and go off around 7pm. he's in a 5x3x3 cage, he's about 2ft long. he managed to escape from the cage a couple weeks ago and that was hell trying to get him back in. took me a good 4 hours. the second i touched him he would flip and run into a spot where i couldnt get to him

Well I don't know what your plans are for him or if you enjoy interacting with your pets and would like to have a very tame lizard or just a display animal. I have my cyclura lights come on at 830 and go off at 9. This gives me time later in the day or early evening to interact with him. If his lights went off at 7 he would be going to sleep or getting ready to sleep when I get home and we would never see each other. I would move up his day time to 8 or 9 and have it go off at 8-10 at night. This will make him sleep later and also let you sleep later. If his light comes on at 6:30 then by 8 his body temp is over 100 and he's ready to go. You should also really let him out. How would you feel if you were confined to your bedroom. In my experience from what I have seen spending countless hours just interacting with these animals, they really do want interaction and you form a relationship/bond with them if you do the right things. They become very curious of us and thats when great things start to happen. I have even seen signs of affection coming from my cyclura. Things I may not have seen if I had a pair. But one lone animal with only you to interact with, it's surprising. If you want some tips on taming him send me a pm and I'll give you my # and can tell you things that have worked for me. In a few months of dedication and patience you could have a tame animal. But with a relationship that has no vocal communication your actions are your only communication. You have to carefully build up trust with these animals. You try to grab them or chase them around you are only going backwards in your attempt to earn their trust. The less stress the better. In my opinion relationships with intelligent animals can be one of the purest forms of a relationship. There is are no B.S., sweet nothings, lies, ect, you have no choice but to lay your cards on the table.

Is the cage big enough to go inside of? That was the secret for us. Go sit with your lizard and talk to him. Let him get used to you and come to you. If he is in too small of a space he will feel threatened.

don't get me wrong, i do want to interact with him. the reason why i dont take him out is because i wont be able to get him back into his enclosure. when i go to pick him up he flips out and runs, and theres a lot of little knooks and what not in my room where he can get into and hide, he only about 2ft or so.

What have been doing with my lewisi for the few months since I've had him is I sit next to his cage with my arm laying inside the cage fro a half hour a day. I have him in a 6ft vision and it sits on top of a cabinet which puts me at a perfect height when sitting in a chair. I don't just sit there and stare at him, as this would probably make him nervous as well. I will play with the substrate, read a book or hold some fruit or hornworms patiently waiting for him to get the courage to come and take it out of my hand. Well not so much with the horn worms. The desire for horn worms or super worms conquers all fear. In time you he will be coming up to you with much curiosity. First him coming closer just to get a better look, than at some point to lick you and later maybe a walk on your hand or arm. You could sit in your bathroom with him. This would be better because it's much smaller quarters then your room which forces him to be in your presence. But before all this you must gain his trust to get him to the bathroom because it won't do much help chasing him around in his cage, stressing him out just to sit in the bathroom with him. His experience must be positive no matter how small that experience or your progress with him is. They have very good memories and will not forget about you chasing them around the week before........dedication and patience......good luck

I recommend blueberries over animal protein for a taming food. I know there are some people who disagree, but I see no reason for taking the chance with animal protein after what happened with my Kismet. She came to me with kidney issues since her foster family had given her crickets. Since they hadn't had her long and since the paperwork she came with from her original owner strictly said no animal protein, she couldn't have had a lot of animal protein. Also, why encourage a taste for something they really shouldn't have?

Not true as Cyclura have been observed in the wild eating insects, crabs, carrion of birds,fish and other prey items. Vegetation does make up most of their diet but they are opportunistic animals and will feed on various things they come in contact with in the wild. They are much more hearty of an animal then a green iguana. Kismets health issues could have been do to poor lighting, bad balanced diet or various other things but I doubt crickets alone were the culprit, unless that's all she was getting. Mine does like blueberries though and so do I....very good for you too. My cyclura only gets protein every now and then. 95% of his diet is fruits and veggies, mostly veggies...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ta8wD6cS784&feature=related

Yes, they do eat those things in the wild when they are living under real sunlight all the time and we all know that real sunlight can compensate for a lot of things. My iggies get a lot of real sunlight and we use Mega-Rays inside. However, I'm with John Binns on this one -- they don't *need* it and it is way better to err on the side of caution. If one of my iggies eats a bug that strays into their outside cage, I'm not going to freak out about it. But, at the same time, I'm not going to offer animal protein deliberately.