Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Although this forum has been extremely quiet for quite a while, hopefully someone will read this. I just checked on my 4 wild caught brumating chucks and I am so sad and angry at the same time. Both of the males are dead!! I can't believe it!! My kids (8,7 and 4) are going to be so upset when I tell them. They were looking forward to picking dandelions this spring.

The two females appear fine so I'm taking them out of brumation. Both males and one female were extremely calm. One male in particular had one of the best temperaments I've ever seen in a chuckwalla. He was also my most colorful one and the favorite of my family. Although he was from Box Canyon California (not being as colorful as say the males from Crater Range AZ) he had a very good amount of orange on him, as well as nice blacks, and was the best of a group of 20 or so that I had to choose from.

I had brumated these same chucks last winter and they made it through just fine. I can't think of anything I did differently. Anybody out there have a similar bad experience? Just trying to figure out what went wrong. I think I read that Eve checks her brumating animals once a week, something I didn't do last winter or this one. Not sure if that would have helped though because they all appear to have a good amount of fat reserves in their tails. If I would have checked on them within this last week, and they were looking as the females do now, I don't think I would have brought them out of brumation because as I mentioned, their tails look nice and full.

I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to find another pretty male from Box Canyon that has a great temperament. Anyone that can get me one please let me know. The other male that died and one of the females (the only one of my four chucks that is skittish) was from an unknown locale in CA. What makes this even more disappointing is that I had high hopes of breeding them this year. Last year when I brought them out of brumation was the only time I witnessed regular attempts at mating. Prior to brumating him, he didn't even do pushups.

Bottom line, at least in my limited experience, is that I think brumation is helpful to induce breeding behavior, but I don't know about ever attempting it again unless I can figure out what I did wrong. Any suggestions or experiences that any of you experienced chuckers out there have would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Perry

Are their tails relatively thin indicating minimal fat storage? This seems to be a common thread amongst socal chuck keepers I have known. Unless you have your heart set on breeding you would do well to avoid brumation altogether, or perhaps a very abbreviated down time. I'm presuming they were fasted before cooling to insure no food was present in the stomach or intestininal tract. Prophlactic administration of "Flagl" i.e; metronidazole for anaerobic bacteria and protozoans common in wild lizards might be of help.

Oops... "Flagyl"!!! It's late

All four of them had plenty of fat reserves. I would not have attempted brumation otherwise. As mentioned, I was intending to breed them. Otherwise, I would not have brumated them. I know some people like Maureen do not brumate their chucks and still have breeding success but others like Nick believe that brumation may be more important for males, possibly leading to better sperm production as it does in other lizards. I know four lizards is way too small of a sample to draw any definitive conclusions, but I wonder if there is any significance to the fact that only the males died. I did weigh them before putting them into brumation, but I can't find the paper I wrote the weights on. I haven't weighed them post-brumation but from all outward appearances, they appear to have just as much fat reserves now as they did from the start. If I ever do brumate again, I'll do it for a minimal amount of time. For those of you who do brumate your animals, what the minimal amount of time you have brumated your males to elicit a good breeding response? I wonder if only certain males really benefit from brumation. As I mentioned earlier, my mature male showed breeding behavior for the first time only after brumation last year.

Perry

http://www.uromastyx.org/comprehensive-care-sheet-t100.html

Here is a link to Richard Montanucci's care sheet. This year, We tried a brumation similar to what he used to do. I have been happy so far, but we don't know what effect it will have on breeding.
We have also lost lizards in brumation. It is extremely frustrating. Sometimes it may be attributed to the method of brumation, sometimes it seems to be the phisical condition of the lizard, sometimes it is kind of a mystery. If you loose one or two out of a large group, the lizard in question may not have been in top condition going into brumation, which may have caused it to die. If it was 2 out of 4 that died, it could be either scenario. If you look at it like loosing 50% of the lizards, I would look carefully at how they were cooled. Although, regardless of sample size, if those two lizards were just not 100% ready to be cooled, they may have died regardless of the method of cooling.
Of course, making sure they fast for several weeks prior to brumation is important. Part of the process that we tried this year was to let the basking lights come on for 2 hours a day, with a lower wattage bulb than we use durring the regular season. They can still come out and bask a little, to let their bodies resume more normal functions for a small part of the day. The rest of the time, the temperatures were cooler, and the lizards sought refuge. I think it worked well.
Any way you look at it, brumation IS a big strain on the lizards. You have to weigh the risks and rewards. We have only had breeding success with males who have been brumated, but we have had females produce good eggs without being cooled.
It is ultimately your call, wether or not to cool them. I hope this helps. I can't give you a definite fix, as we have not completely figured it out. All we can do is learn from our mistakes and try to improve every year.

Thanks for the info Nick. I had actually wondered whether it would be better to allow for occasional basking during the brubution period. After all, wild chucks get to bask on occasion during winter months but at lower temps and shorter daylight periods. Makes sense to me. If I attempt brumation again, I will try something similar.

Given different people's experiences with breeding their chucks, I wonder if some males simply need brumation more than others in order to exhibit good breeding behavior. I also wonder how much it might depend on particular locales. After I brumated my chucks last year, I mentioned that my Box Canyon male for the first time showed breeding behavior. I witnessed him biting the back of the females neck about a half dozen times but I never actually observed copulation. She would usually go under a rock before he could complete the act which would force him to let go. Also after brumation, head bobbing increased tremendously and the waxy femoral pore secretions became very apparent.

Finally, it would be good to know if there's a minimal amount of time for the brumation period to still get a good breeding response for those particular males (locales?) that need it. If enough keepers kept records of that kind of data, then I think all of us could avoid taking needless risks. Still mourning my losses. They were awesome chucks.

Perry

Perry, I think that breeding behaviour and success has a lot to do with environment. As you know, I have never brumated my Chucks, and note that the first pair I ever did breed, took a couple of years to acclimate to each other and to diet and seasons, etc. All of a sudden, they started mating regularly and produced every year. Chucks don't like changes in their cage furniture, and often take some warming up to a new perfectly good food source, which the others, who have been used to that food for a long time are chowing down on with great gusto. I keep my common Chucks separated, male from female, so they can see each other and "flirt" from a neighboring cage. I set them down together in an outdoor cage and the males dive on the females, Winter, Spring, Summer, or Fall. Sometimes they even try copulating in my hands on the way out to the back yard!

Don't know what else to tell you, but too many of my friends have death and misery tales after brumation. Good luck with your new guys, and...post those pics!!!

Thanks Maureen,

That's good info. I thought I had read every post (yes, every post ) on the chuckwalla forum but don't remember ever reading that before. So, they even tried to mate in your hands?? LOL You've had them breed every season of the year?? Wow!

I know what you mean in how it takes chucks a while to warm up to new foods, cage environments, etc. One reason that I was so upset about losing my males (one Box Canyon and one unknown CA locale) is that last spring and summer, my chucks had really settled in to their routine and were chowing down on most everthing I offered. I thought that by preparing them so well for brumation they would come out of it ready to go. The females started eating the day I woke them up like they hadn't even missed a beat. They are eating like crazy now and are so fat. Of the two new males, the larger one is regularly eating dandelions out of my hand no problem (though not as enthusiatically as my females) but hasn't yet taken to other foods. So most of the time you keep your males and females separated? How many others here do that? Keeping a single male with a group of females seems more common, but I may have to try that. Very interesting.

Perry

Want to fatten up those new guys? If you noticed on Gus' post with pictures, they have taken bites out of the cactus. I have been buying the French Haricots Verts (frozen-green beans) from trader Joe's frozaen section and boiling them. All the Chucks love them and can't get enough! They must taste like cactus. Also, Chucks like pulling flowers off of stems. It seems to really get them going. Go figure. So when I give them the green beans, I hold a long bean up and they will stand, balanced on back legs and tail and eat out of my hand, tugging on the bean to break it off and then going immediately for what is left. Some of them are wary of the hand at first, and plainly want to dive on it but won't eat until you drop it, but they ALL come around eventually! LOL

That's funny that you mention the chucks will notice habitat changes.. I agree 100%. While my Hispidus chucks are inside for the winter I clean and re-arrange their outside environments.. when they go back out, even if I try to put everything back just-so, they poke around and quite obviously disapprove!
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My other chucks stay outside in winter and I take no action to protect them (like covering the cage) unless we'll see damp weather into the 40s for more than a day. They have zero troubles and have always come out ready to go around Valentine's day.
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I think keeping, raising and breeding Chucks in a completely indoor environment is not so easy.. so my hat is off to those who can do that well.
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Thanks!

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Gus
A. Rentfro
RioBravoReptiles.com
www.riobravoreptiles.com

"Perfectly healthy animals are a minimum requirement.. everything else is just salesmanship" gus

Pewrry, I have a question about how you kept them prior to brumation. Do you keep your chucks on sand, by chance? You know that I also got a group of chucks from that same area, but as rescues. One large male was fine for awhile, but started dropping weight and when we did an xray, his belly was packed with sand. I tubed him for awhile, then fed him high fiber to help it all pass, such as finch seed and the usual greens. Within a few weeks, he resumed self feeding and has been fine since, and I do not keep any of them on sand. While fasting will help them pass the food stuff that they have in their guts, it will not help pass sand. That is much more tricky and can be deadly if they do down for brumation with a great deal of sand in their intestines.

One other thing also comes to mind. Did these chucks come in with red mites? If so, they very well could have been infected with malaria. One of my box canyon females started careening downhill for no apparent reason during a cooling period, though not a full brumation. I don't brumate either, but they were housed in an unheated room with enough light to heat them, but they did sleep quite a bit regardless. Blood work showed two types of malaria that are carried by red mites. Because there were no other obvious reasons for her decline, we felt that the malaria was the culprit and since there is no cure as of yet, there was nothing that I could do for her but hospice her, and she died. I am trying to get a dialog going about this disease. It infects chucks and scleporous that we know of so far. One guy, Joseph Schall is studying the disease and has tried to come up with a cure, but has not had luck as of yet.

I am sorry about your losses. Chucks really are a mystery. I am with Maureen though. I don't think they need to be brumated to breed. I have several of her chuckletts here as proof! lol They just need to feel comfortable enough to do the deeed, I think, and that can be a challenge with wc chucks.

Great info on sand and mites.. I agree!
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Thanks for posting.
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Gus
A. Rentfro
RioBravoReptiles.com
www.riobravoreptiles.com

"Perfectly healthy animals are a minimum requirement.. everything else is just salesmanship" gus