Tokay geckos

[stephanbakir]

Anyone have experience with Tokay geckos? There is one up for adoption close to my house for a 15$ adoption fee and I'm wondering what they are like, the last time I had to handle one was a mom protecting her eggs and she scared the crap out of me. Screamed bloody Mary and flew at my face, give me an angry retic any day.

When they aren't guarding eggs how is their overall temperament? Online half the people are saying they are gentle and calm with a good bite, the other half are saying they are the spawn of Satan and to stay away.

[Max713]

Tokays have always been, and forever will be known for their generally bad temperament. Every once in a while (aka rarely!) you will find a mild mannered one, but for the most part, yes, they are little heathens. Gorgeous gecko though, they are really more of a "look don't touch" animal.

[NennaMeerkat]

Every Tokay I have ever seen are little devils in lizard skin. They don't need a reason to bite...they just will.

[stephanbakir]

Sounds like the ones I worked with ages ago:( I already have the larger more dangerous animals, I'm working on adding some smaller animals to my collection that can be used to educate people and get them used to reptiles in general.

[bo2as]

i have owned 2 tokays. they are very tempermental. they would sometimes (almost always) 'bark' when i would just pass in front of the enclosure... i am the kind of persone that likes to handle my pets... i didnt keep them very long. plus they like to 'play' with their food before eating it... can get very messy... they are gorgeouse, but mostly quite agressive...

[stephanbakir]

I'm looking for calm gentle reptiles i can use to teach people about them and show them that reptiles aren't evil, I think I'll get myself a leo or something, not sure what yet but i wanted to check out the tokay since i had one available to pick up.

[Max713]

I'm looking for calm gentle reptiles i can use to teach people about them and show them that reptiles aren't evil, I think I'll get myself a leo or something, not sure what yet but i wanted to check out the tokay since i had one available to pick up.

Yep, the Tokay is about the polar opposite of what you need for what you want to accomplish.
Leo's would be perfect.

[stephanbakir]

Only reason i was asking about tokays is 15$ would be dirt cheap for a gecko and its right across the street. Gona have to pick up a leo

[TeaNinja]

leo's are awesome.

[SnakeyJay]

Why dont you get the tokay for your personal collection and a leo for "show n telll".... That way you get to have both lol..

[stephanbakir]

my personal collection has what i want and its getting what i want aswel, I have my fav snake (retics) and I'm getting my asian water monitor/emp scorp/theraphosa blondi, what I need now are animals that will help ease people into my collection who have prior fears/misunderstandings.

(before people give me the speech about Theraphosas, I know pretty much all I need to know about them, but any information you have would be appreciated) It will be a display animal only and won't be fed live.

[stephanbakir]

I'm getting the emp scorps, a pink toe and a Taiwan beauty snake. Hopefuly a leo but ill need to look into them. (I'm hoping these will be good starter animals for when i have new people over)