Pic. Any comments appreciated.

[atw]

Many studies have been done, showing adult dragons with sand impacting organs.

Studies? What studies? Whatever. I am sure this is just anecdotal evidence. Even if it is 'fact', I am sure there are just as many ‘studies’ that would prove the opposite just as how eggs are good for you one day and bad the next. Honestly, when it comes to keeping reptiles some people are overly cautious and this is an example of it.

Beardies have excellent aim when feeding and even if it decreases their life expectancy, so what? I would rather try to approximate my lizard's environment instead of proving it with a sanitized world because of the remote possibility of impaction or because it is simply ‘better for it.’ This reminds me of people that will by a single onion or orange at the grocery store and put it in a plastic bag. I hate people like this. The precaution is totally irrelevant and creates waste. In fact, I would say that keeping beardies on paper towel would result in more people neglecting their lizards because it takes more effort to remove the paper towel than it does to spot clean sand. Has there ever been a study done to describe a cause and effect relationship between reptile neglect and substrate? Probably not because this type of study would actually be informative.

Ultimately, however, it doesn’t matter because there is no single answer to the substrate question but if you want something that is easy to clean, looks good, provides them with something to dig in, does not provide hiding places for crickets, cheap and that approximates their environment, screened play sand is it.

Adam