Beginner's Question

[Simon]

Hi there,

I just got 5 leos within a month....they are very addictive.

At first all of them were eating like crazy. They were taking down 5-6 large crickets every two days. Then weird things started to happen....that is they slowed down a lot on eating......

now most of them are not eating and even if they eat they only eat 1-2 large crickets per meal....is there any reason for this?

Their tails still seems fat to me....but I do start worrying about this situation.....is there anything that I did wrong?

I am keeping them at around 80-85 in the day and around 65-70 in the night. I don't have a hide box for them since they are in racks which are basically dark most of the day (unless I open the rack and let them see me...)

Do leos require lightings???????

Thanks!

[Zoe]

Leos don't require UV lighting, but they do need a photoperiod as do all reptiles. They should have hides, even though they are in a rack.
What are you keeping them on? Did you have fecals done on them when they arrived?

Zoe

[Neo]

if your geckos are around like 6 inches their appetites may slow down a bit to every other day also vary their diets. give em mealies, supers, silks, and a monthly wax or butter. also u could raise the temp to almost 90 during the day. leos are nocturnal and arent bothered by red, blue, or black light

[Tim and Julie B]

You could try increasing the temps. Try for 85 minimum for daytime and 80 at night. I am guessing that you aren't providing a thermal gradient? That is, a cool side and a hot side? If not the hide boxes are vital to your leos health. By providing a humid hide box you are also providing a cooler area for your leos to adjust their temps should they become too warm. Keep this humid hide slightly moist at all times and use a digital thermometer to determine the inside temp of the humid hide compared to the outer air temp of the cage. I use an indoor/outdoor digital thermometer available at most hardware or home and garden stores. It has a main digital component which displays the temperature and a long cord that can be placed elsewhere for a second temp, and a switch so that you can read either end. I usually place the main component on top of the hide, and the smaller cord end inside the substrate in the humid hide. I have had a lot of success doing this in my rack system. The humid hides are always 5-10 degrees cooler than the rest of the tank.

It may be beneficial to provide a new food item or two as well. Try some mealies or silkworms if you can get them. Sometimes leos just get bored with their food, just like anything else can:D

Good luck with your leos, and be sure to let us know if their appetites get any better.

Julie.

[Icefire]

well get a way to give them like 10h day, 14hours night
get the temp higher like julie said, with a gradiant
how old are they? big crix are for 4 months and more...
getting too big prey can be fatal for young
and get at least X +1 hide by gecko (so 5 in total)
are they seperate? if yes, 2 hide per gecko, at least one moist
it will help them shed, and look for remaning skin on toe... important! :P
try to post a picture so we can look at it :)

[bob_thesnowman]

just a question for you,do you have them all in one dish??it is possible that one of your leos was sick,and passed something(most likely something along the line of hookworms)to your other leos,and even if you didn't and they were still in the same room airborn disease such as crypto can occur,also if you didn't wash your hands between handling each leo that could cause problems, but either way i urge you to take a fresh sample of feces to your vet,the tests are fairly inexpensive,and if there is nothing phsyically wrong with them,it'll definately ease your mind,hope that helped

[Simon]

actually all the leos are housed separately.
I will try and post some photos of them and will try and raise the temp up a bit. They all have their own hide boxes (but only one. so I will try and add a humid hide there.

I will also try different food items since I am only feeding it crix....but the thing is that I can't really find mealies anywhere.....so I guess I better raise the temp, add in humid hide, and try finding mealies everywhere in my town....hahah

thanks for all the help and I'll try to post some photos of them as soon as possible...

Thanks again all~

[damzookeeper]

It seems pretty much everything was covered but I do have one question. You said they are eating large crickets? How old are the leos? Are the crickets no bigger than 2/3rds the size of the leos head? too large of prey can impact them and this could cause them to cut down on eating and even get lithargic and stop eating completely. Just a thought, I could be totally wrong if they are bigger leos. Hope they start eating more for you soon.

[Mr. Gray]

lol, hell mine started doing the same thing. The buggers got fat and stuff. I corrected the problem easily by feeding them 2 times a week, on Saturday, and Tuesday. During the period inbetween they move their bowls enough, and start to get hungry. By the time it's eating day, they begin to get a bit active. I put in maybe 15 crickets for the 3 of them and bam, freakin massacre. They get eaten pretty damned fast. :) Fun to watch. My flying gecko will eat 1 cricket a day. No more, no less, 1 a day in the evening. Funny as hell to watch.

[Simon]

well I tried to feed them yesterday and all but my newest addtion ate.

I got both large crix and small crix for them (that is what they offer in pets mart only....large and small) and all of them ate both kinds.

Here are some photos of them in their feeding tank (and this is the frist time i fed them in the same enclosure...)

<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p9b82c979aea5533350ac024d8f29f3f6/fb1a6ac4.jpg">

<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p834203c336bab524d352be079af7f817/fb1a6a9e.jpg">

<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p2c7e932c4d978d909b88d248fd605006/fb1a6a7d.jpg">

This is the female that wouldn't eat...and I have noticed that she closes her eyes a lot and basically 'sleeps' a lot too....is this normal?

<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p74f7c1eab388f37f2f30e311e9904b92/fb1a6a6b.jpg">

She does more of this kind of half open and half closed eyes a lot...
<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p670aee5a3ea35a3dbaaf77a4a3f6c5ca/fb1a69f6.jpg">

Here she is after 5 min being in the feeding tank...
<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p0b301201fc63576368fef3e79cae1a84/fb1a6a4a.jpg">

<img src="http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid79/p6b30c8e0f7256d6fa1dbe54c8bdac130/fb1a6a26.jpg">

Is this normal at all?

Also is feeding 4 times a week too much for them?????
I still can't find any mealies....sigh...only crix.....sigh....

[Clownfishie]

When they're young, you can feed them every day -- once they're fully grown, feeding every other day or so is enough. With youngsters, you'll want to dust the food items at every feeding, and with adults it only needs to be every other feeding...
As for your newest addition -- as with any new animal, it will often take a little while for them to settle into their new home and start eating. Something to keep in mind with the new one though is that she's an albino, and most albinos are quite sensitive to light (hence the squinting that you've noticed). You should try feeding her at night, when the lights are out... I'm betting you'll get a much better feeding response that way :)
Also, it's great that you're housing all of them separately -- however, keep in mind that any new additions should be quarantined for at least a month (even if the breeder is someone you know and trust, it's better to be safe than sorry), and having all of them together like that for feeding time kind of defeats the purpose of a quarantine period...

As for mealworms -- none of the pet stores in your area carry them? If not -- I know that Grant at PCPC sells them, and will ship them by UPS when required, so that's something to keep in mind... Mealworms are great in that you can stock up on them, and then keep most of them in the fridge to keep them dormant until you need them...

Hope that helped a bit :)
Jen

[Emily-Fisher]

Albinos closing their eyes more are normal. Stitch, my albino, does the same thing. Albinos are more sensitive to light than others.

You can purchase mealworms in bulk online. What I would do is order at least 1000 of them, maybe 2000 and start your own breeding colony. It is really easy to breed mealworms. It took me forever to get my mice to breed but my mealies bred right away as soon as I had the beatles! If you would like to know how to breed them, you can PM me or PM Pixie. She has a very impressive mealworm breeding thing going on!!

Maybe when you bought your geckos, they weren't fed very much by the breeder or previous owner and so they were hungrier and suddenly wanted more and more food! Breeders can't always afford to feed their 100 or so baby geckos 30 crickets a week and so your leos were probably taking advantage of having an endless food supply. After a while, they probably got really full and din't want to eat as much. I don't know... I'm just blabbing off the top of my head ;)

Also, why do you have a feeding tank? I feed all of my geckos in their own enclosure. And if I DID house them all together, I would probably SEPERATE them for feeding time!

[Simon]

Thanks for all the advice.

To tell the truth....I don't know why I fed them in the same enclosure.....it was my frist time...and for somewhat of a weird reason they ate more than eating in their separate containers.....what I usually do is throw in around 5 large crix and 5 small crix in there and leave the crix in there for about half an hour to an hour and then take the remainder out. But usualy they only eat around 1 large and 2-3 small crix. But putting them together to feed I have noticed that some eat around 3 large and 5 small crix......but now to think of the quantine thing, I guess that I better not put them together to feed again.

Hum....I know for sure that I would get killed if my gf finds out that I am breeding mealies too.....I am already breeding around 100 snakes a year and getting around 6-800 hatchlings....and feeding those is already a problem....so I bought my own little (10 mice) mice coloney to breed (and boy she wasn't happy about it...) and then now I have added leos into my collection and because I am feeding these leos crix, I also have around 50 crix in the appartment....so basically speaking if I add anything else in the collection my head would be flying off my body for sure...hahaha

thanks for all the advice and it's a big relief to know that the little albino baby is alright (I thought that there were something wrong with her...phew) and I'll see if I can get any mealies from the internet or from PCPC

thanks again!!