OK, so I got my trio home about ten days ago. They were in a 3x2x2 and that's what I've put them in at my house. I added about 4" of a mulch/EcoEarth substrate, a retes stack and a hide on the cool side. The cage is a Showcase 3x2x2.

Some stats: 135-110f on the top of the stack under two 50w basking lamps. Low temp on floor of cool side averages around 72f. Ambient humidity in cage around 35-40%.

The first four days or so that I had them, they were all out, all day. They were ready for feeding at 8am and ate everything they could. Then the male started staying in the hide. I would dump in 20-25 largeish crickets every morning plus either 4-5 cockroaches or 3-4 ft pinkies. Usually 2 days of roaches, then one day of pinkies.

So the male started staying in the hide. Since I could lift it, I did to make sure he hadn't passed away or something else happened. So that's my first question: should I be checking on him?

Yesterday, I had finished prepping the other cage. Same make and model, but with the cold weather, I added a 55w radiant heat panel to the cool side ceiling to keep temps up. I set the Helix control for 85 and placed the probe about midway between substrate and panel. I also changed substrate to be a 1/3 ecoearth, 1/3 decomposed granite and 1/3 soil mixture. I deepened the mix to about 7" in the back, 2" in the front. I added another hide and a large cork tube. I buried both hides in the substrate, leaving it low enough to show the openings to the hides. I also have a 3' T8 40w UV bulb (10.0) in the front tube inset in the cage.

I took the trio out of the first cage, put them in a tub with 80f water and let them soak while I finished up with the new digs. After drying them, I put them in the new cage. Fed them about 20 minutes later (they all basked at the top of the stack coming out of the water). They all ate nicely.

Going in today, the male and one female are both no-shows. I can see where they've gone into a hide and moved substrate around. The other female is out and ready to eat.

Sorry for the book, but I am new and I'm trying to answer any questions you guys might have so you can offer some help.

1) should I be checking on them or am I simply adding to the stress level?
2) should I be worried that I don't see the male (or whoever) when I go in the room? Should I assume they hear me coming and dive under the hides? I'm aware that in the wild they'd do their best to hide from me if they knew I was coming.
3) since the food does all disappear, should I be worried?!

I am trying to breed and all of the stories I hear of egg-eating also complicates this for me. I want to make sure, if I can, that I don't miss a clutch. I know one female was gravid when I picked up the trio and the other had laid the night before. Naturally.

Any help you all can offer would be very much appreciated. I have taken some shots of the cage and placed them on my smugmug page under 'ackie shots' at norcalal.smugmug.com.
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NorCalAl
On the Ridge
0.1 Green Tree Python (Wadjet), 1.0 Chuckwalla (Sauron), 0.1 CDT (Cartman), 0.1 Ferret (Felon), 1.0 Canine (Baxter), 1.0 Feline (Sam), 1.0 Eclectus (Merlin) 1.2 Ackies (Kookla, Fran, Ollie)
Not enough computers, cameras, or time!

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