all i wanted was a bearded dragon ....help... *whimper*

[slitherchick]

i'm going crazy, i SWEAR. a couple months ago i decided i wanted to acquire a reptilian confidante... so i've been busy researching, and have decided that i want a bearded dragon.

yet, everywhere i turn, the information i'm reading seems to contradict itself and the thing i read just before it. one care sheet says i should buy a 65 gallon aquarium for a bearded dragon, another says 20 gallons would be fine. and do i buy an aquarium, or one of those open air meshy dealies? and just HOW many crickets am i supposed to feed it? ******** messed me up, i'm never going onto that website again. it fed me useless lines of crap about how bearded dragons ate mostly veggies... bah. BAH TO *********. and then, another website was telling me the EXACT opposite. i don't know what to do!!!! i'm still interested in owning a bearded dragon. but i'm going crazy. if there's anyone out there that could offer me any tip/hints/sanity whatsoever, PLEASE!!! HELP!!!! To make matters worse i can't seem to find a breeder in my area that has bearded dragons available, or even somewhat available.

help me :(

my email is killermeow@hotmail.com... and i would honestly appreciate ANY help any of you could toss my way. i'm a little in the dark.

[Moe]

Your in Mississauga? Than email cindy. Her website is http://ca.geocities.com/cindythereptilewoman/ Ps- its 55g MINIMUM for an adult.

[reptilez]

Heres a Caresheet I used before i got My Dragon.
http://www.reptilia.org/care_sheets/Lizards/csheets_liz_bearded.htm
And you should feed your beardie untill S/he becomes full. At least a dozen crix should do it.

[ICULIZARD]

Hi there......

We are in the Hamilton area and breed many morphs of Bearded Dragons. (We are moving to Etobicoke next week, but will keep the same phone number for a while) Feel free to give us a call at 905-745-FROG. You had a lot of good questions and I think it's great that you are asking all of them before buying your dragon. You are going to find a lot of conflicting information on the internet. You are welcome to check out our care sheet on our website at www.iculizard.com but I would like to point out that the caresheet was written with what works best for us and our lizards.....a lot of it is personal opinion. Please feel free to call or e-mail us and we will do the best we can to answer all of your questions and sort out some of the confusion for you! :)

We deliver to Mississauga as well....

www.iculizard.com
iculizard@hotmail.com
905-745-FROG

[eyespy]

Originally posted by reptilez
Heres a Caresheet I used before i got My Dragon.
http://www.reptilia.org/care_sheets/Lizards/csheets_liz_bearded.htm
And you should feed your beardie untill S/he becomes full. At least a dozen crix should do it.


Whoa!!! That's not a caresheet I'd recommend. There's a lot of inaccuracies on it, especially the nutrition info. No wonder they only quote a lifespan of 6 to 8 years when they are mainly recommending empty calories like mealworms and lettuce. That's fatty liver disease waiting to happen, and mineral deficiencies as well.

Many of my patients who've from the past 18 years have achieved greater than 10 years and these are rescues! I've got over 300 patients still living who are above 12 years of age. In Australia they fully expect their beardies to live 20 years and can sometimes achieve 30 to 35 years, but of course they don't have the inbreeding problems we do.

Here's a much better one for feeding information:

http://www.australianbeardies.com/care.htm

[LurkerAccount]

Mealworms are 57% moisture, 24% protein, 2.8% carbs, 2.3% Fibre, .02% Calcium

When dusted with supplements how is a mealworm "empty calories"?

[V.hb]

They probably mean superworms.. They are far more common to purchase than regular mealworms..

Superworms are far more nutritious than mealworms are. They are a completely different species all together.

[slitherchick]

*gasp!*
i should have just come here to begin with!!!
:) thanks guys

[Samba]

petsmart messed me up, i'm never going onto that website again. it fed me useless lines of crap about how bearded dragons ate mostly veggies... bah. BAH TO PETSMART.

Just wanted to mention... veggies and some fruits are a very important dietary requirement in captive and wild Bearded Dragons. Whomever said that these weren't necessary are the ones who are wrong.

On another note, we don't have to name names here, we can avoid slanderous consequences by just saying a 'PetStore.' Trust me, most of us have issues with particular chains as well.

Keep doing your research and don't get too fed up... no one said research was going to be easy. You are heading in the right direction! Good Luck!

[Big AL]

Eyespy I liked that care sheet you provided. That is pretty close to the way I raise my beardies. I do have a calcium question for you though. I just switched to the Rep-Cal calcium and Herptivite. I think I remember you saying in another post it is what you use. I have seen people talk of different ratios of mixing and Rep-Cal suggests a 1 to 1 mix. What is the best mix and is it different for each species. I have beardies, Leos, Collards, a Mali Uro, a Veiled Cham, Iguana, C Water Dragon, and a Russian Tortoise. Any help would be appreciated...Thanks AL

[eyespy]

I like the KISS principle and keep things very simple with my supplements for my lizards and frogs. Everybody gets a teeny pinch of calcium at breakfast every day but Sunday. Everybody gets a multivitamin supplement with Sunday breakfast. I don't mix my vitamins and calcium together, most of the vites are water-soluble and they just pee them away if you give them too often. There's a little bit of calcium in the Herptivite so I don't "double dose" by giving calcium powder at the same time.

I just give my own Russian the multivitamin as he has a tortoise mineral block and some cuttlebone in his cage and goes medieval on them regularly. If your tort isn't self-dosing then the above schedule would be just fine.

Hatchlings, the sickly, or anybody who needs a boost gets Herptivite on Wednesdays too.

[eyespy]

I think it's time to say one very positive thing about Petsmart, and Dan Tisch, the Director of Customer Service.

Last summer the bearded dragon community got hit very hard by a multitude of diseases that were all traced to one mass breeder that used to supply most of the pet store chains and reptile distributors in North America, Europe and Asia.

I spent countless hours talking to Mr. Tisch, referring owners of sick animals to him, venting to his voice mail, etc. and he really stepped up. His work helped to provide the herp rescue community with the international statistics we needed to shut down the mass-breeding operation.

He could have just passed the buck, blamed the supplier, and moved on with his life but instead he worked very hard to find a workable solution for all parties involved.

Not all chains are evil, at least not all the time. ;)

[eyespy]

Originally posted by aaashrimp
Mealworms are 57% moisture, 24% protein, 2.8% carbs, 2.3% Fibre, .02% Calcium

When dusted with supplements how is a mealworm "empty calories"?

Most of the protein content comes from melanized proteins that make up their hard exoskeleton and are not well digested. In fact, it's so difficult to digest that exoskeleton that they draw moisture out of the digestive tract. Very little of that protein is soft body tissue which can actually be used by herps.

Even freshly molted worms that haven't got the toughened-up protein don't provide much bioavailable protein, most of it passes right through to the feces.

[Linds]

Just want to remind everyone, please keep the store names out of discussions... as Samba mentioned, its better just to use a generalized title, or star it out (as I did in the your post ;)). Thanks guys.

[LurkerAccount]

Originally posted by eyespy
Most of the protein content comes from melanized proteins that make up their hard exoskeleton and are not well digested. In fact, it's so difficult to digest that exoskeleton that they draw moisture out of the digestive tract. Very little of that protein is soft body tissue which can actually be used by herps.

Even freshly molted worms that haven't got the toughened-up protein don't provide much bioavailable protein, most of it passes right through to the feces.

Thanks, I heard something like that before but I thought It was only a problem in certain lizards, is this true for all lizards, even monitors?

[Conas]

man i was like 2 minutes away from making a topic like this.. i'm glad i read! :)

My problems w/ contradicting content is about temps. I read a book that said 95 basking spot and temps drop to low 70s at night. But that was way different than the million care sheets i had read. I thought that maybe any yahoo can make a caresheet and not everyone can write a book, you know? I've had my eye on a beardie for 2 months but don't want to buy him untill i know what the heck is going on!

[Linds]

Yeah many books are every bit as unreliable as most of the junk you find online. I think I have a book somewhere that says that iguanas need bird gravel to digest their food and monitors need temps of 70-90 :rolleyes: Some books are good, but you need to look in to that, as a lot of them as still fairly innacurate... remember, they are still just one person writing their opinions and beliefs and publishing it.

[eyespy]

Conas, even amongst beardies you won't find any agreement as to preferred temperatures. ;)

They come from a wide range of microclimates in their native Australia and so have a wide range of tolerances and preferences.

In my experience the happiest and healthiest beardies seem to be the ones that have a basking spot that's hot enough they only need to spend about 1/3 to 1/2 of their time basking and spend the rest of the time noodling about and digging and rearranging furniture and climbing and eating and all that other good beardie stuff. :D

So what I do is start with a basking temp of 120. If they gape and move away alot, I keep lowering the temp by 2 or 3 degrees until I find the individual dragon's comfort zone. Most of the under six-month set seem to prefer basking temps above 105 and most adults seem to prefer a basking temp below 105 but even within those preferences I see a wide range. The lowest basking spot I can remember keeping was 89 and I had one little rescue dude that insisted on no lower than 118 well into his second decade of life. He lived to be 16 and died of malabsorption syndrome from old sand impaction scars in his bowels. I guess he just needed things as hot as possible to absorb as much nutrition as he could.

They actually do well with even lower nighttime temperature drops, anything below 55 needs a bit of supplemental heat but they do great at temps 57 and up. In fact beardies that have cooler nights tend to live longer than beardies kept at a constant temperature. It's thought they get deeper sleep which helps them to generate new cells while sleeping.

[krrc]

damn eyespy when are you putting your book out?