New sav

[sav302]

I got a savannah monitor for christmas....she/he is about a foot and a couple inches long, he/she was bought from a local pet store so I think hes WC but yeah my question was do you think I can get him used to me? I pet him/her in its cage everyday and try not to take it out of its cage yet. So whos had success with WC savs???

[spidersweb]

my savannahs r lik cats

[Corran]

Ive heard of a few tricks to help socialize savs. First thing is, is it aggressive when you go in to change the water or does it come at you. Grab yourself an oven mit or something to protect your hand and just try petting him on the body area if your not sure. one thing i heard that you could also try is put a piece of clothing in the habitat that smells like you, if you dont have any then just sleep with a t-shirt for a week and use that. A friend of mine who runs a rescue got a sav a while back, he loved to be pet and would lean into your hand like some of the iguanas did. It nervous buisness whne you dont know how an animal will react, just watch it and how it reacts when your close by or have your hand in the cage. Yeh never know unless you try ;) also, everyone likes pictures so get some of those if you can =D

[sav302]

Ill try to as soon as possible on the pictures but yeah I started out just putting my hands in the cage regularly and now im up to petting her anywhere from her head to her tail and she doesnt mind it just walks away after a little bit of it. As far as picking her up and handling her I can pick her up and she just tries to back up repeatedly but she holds still sometimes, I have been told that you shouldnt pick them up and supposedly "force" a savannah to "be tame."

Spidersweb where did you get your savannahs??

[Corran]

Yeah its best to take things slow. Im more of a snake person but im getting kind of sucked in with the idea of a sav, the are just so cool. I know with snakes you need to be a bit forceful when dealing with them as babys. When you get nippy babys you need to teach them strikeing out doesnt work. When it comes to picking her up make sure your wearing a think long sleeve shirt, those nails can be sharp lol. Another thing is many lizards do not like the feeling of their legs hanging down and not on any support, many need to be held kind of like a cradle with 1 arm against your body supporting all 4 limbs. Best of luck, looks like htings are going well so far.

[king nick]

when i bought my sav in september he was about 13 inches and i held him every day, i noticed if i dident handel him for a couple days he would hiss and try to wip me with his tail, now he is just over 20 inches and he is very tame, there are a couple odd times that I skip a day or 2 holding him but he seems not to show his aggreshon anymore.

[Corran]

Yeah ive had several people tell me its know that savs can get aggressive if you dont handle them for a while so it's important to spend time with them every day if possible. Even for just 10 minutes, doing that every day helps. I don't own a moniter myself (yet) but I take my snakes out every day except for 48 hours after feeding. They dont even so much as twitch when i go into their cage to take em out because they are so used to it.