feeding two tegus at once

Senator Gracken · 04-29-05, 12:29 PM

I feed my 2 tegus crickets, superworms, veggies and fruit at the same time / same cage but im worried about feeding f/t mice at the same time. will they smell mouse on each other and get nippy? anyone feed thier monitors or teids mice at the same time / in the same cage?

crocdoc · 04-29-05, 08:10 PM

I don't think you'd be able to make general rules about feeding two monitors or tegus together, as each species is different. I know of a number of people that feed their monitor together, but if I tried that with my monitors there'd be blood.

It isn't so much the smell of mice on each other as the movement of the mouse when it is in the other monitor's mouth. They see the movement and instantly that mouse becomes much more interesting than the immobile one in front of them. Or they gulp theirs down and still go for the other. What's worse, though, is that they don't try to grab the mouse, they grab the other monitor's head.

Consequently, I don't feed them together, or am very very careful when I do and use a snake hook to keep them apart.

Steve · 05-07-05, 09:54 PM

I have 1.2 tegus. My dominant female will fight for F/T rats, so I just feed her on the 2nd level. The male and the smaller female eat side by side with no problems. I always have gloves on and my hook ready just incase thought

lonewulf · 05-08-05, 07:33 AM

I have two savannahs and I feed them together but it is very hard to make sure they both get a mouse ... every once in a whileo negets over fed or they play tug of war over one .... generally speaking though I have very little problems

kap10cavy · 05-08-05, 11:02 PM

I enjoy going and bugging Bert at Agama International. He has threatened to put me to work helping cleaning cages if I keep coming up so often. Bert is a great guy and slam full of info on many lizards.
The reason I bring this up is Bert keeps his tegus together almost all the time, as far as I know he only seperates the males during the egg laying times. They live in groups no bigger than three to a cage. The sleep together and eat together. I am sure if he saw a problem, he wouldn't do this. He is way smarter than me in the ways of tegus.

Scott