Hello and some questions...

[Buzby]

Hi all.
I keep snakes and a skink but I've always loved tegus and am finally thinking of taking the plunge and getting a black & white. I'm still in the research stage and have read tons of stuff about housing, feeding, heating, handling etc etc, but would love to hear some more personal accounts from experienced keepers; Pros & cons, things you wish you'd known at the beginning, hints & tips you've picked up along the way... In short, anything that might help a newbie out and make that final decision for me as to whether a tegu is right for me.

The area I have my eye on for an enclosure would mean the viv would be 8' x 3' x 3'. Is this enough space? Obviously I would intend to get the tegu out as often as possible, but I do work 8-5, 5 days a week so I'm a bit concerned about whether that would work ok? I did consider the possibility of having the viv open so it could have access to the room during the day or is that a crazy idea??
All thoughts and opinions welcome please, if I do this I want to do it right.

[Montegu]

8x3x3 is perfect there is tons of info on lighting and food and everything you need to know all over the internet. Most people will say that Colombians are not friendly, mine is a sweetheart so dont believe what everyone says with time and care and dedication a pittbull can be trained to be lovely or mean. i wish i would have known for the first bit you want to feed her in the tank, i did not because if you feed them to much in the tank they will be food aggressive but when i took mine out she would be too stressed to eat. There are many people that have an open viv, just have to make sure that they cant fit behind anything or break anything. just make sure to pay attention to her regularly, I dont find this hard after work or such i come home and we all watch TV together and relax before bed. Tegus are very rewarding and if you keep snakes then you should be ok let me know if you have any specific questions.

[Buzby]

Thanks for the reply, I'm still reading anything and everything I can find, and intending to take the plunge next year.

[txrepgirl]

Hi Buzby. Welcome to our Tegu forum family. First I would like to say that the Tegus are the most amazing and loving lizards I have ever had/have. I had/have many lizards before but they are by far our favorite ones. I wish someone would of told me/us ( when we got our first Tegu ) not to feed him inside the enclosure. He got impacted and got a prolapse, it broke my heart. But thank God he made it. After you spend some time with your Tegu ( when you are going to get one ) you will learn what he will like or doesn't like. When he is hungry and when he has to poor or wants to be handled. Every Tegu has their own personality. Some tricks work on one but maybe not on the other one. I just tried different things and made some video of them if the tricks worked out well for my Tegus ( they are on my youtube channel ). As long as you have time to spend 30 minutes to one hour with him each day when he is still young you will be fine. When I came home from work I just put them ( one by one ) between my shirts and watched TV. I did the same thing when I had to do some work on the computer. They fell right asleep in my shirt . I just want to warn you not to get a Tegu from Varnyard ( Bobby Hill ). He does say that he ships to the UK but he is a scammer. Here are some videos of mine of the things that I learned and used on all of our Tegus and black throat monitor. It worked well for me. I also wished that I would of know some places on where to bulk order the feeders when I first got our lizards.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVyU44yDH4E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3xADhIa5dw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lz_wDAfBI7c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UscbESzNseg

[Montegu]

oh btw txrepgirl when i feed teggy in hes cage i put it on a small plate so that he does not ingest his substrate i dont think i have mentioned that to you, glad yours made it through though!

[Buzby]

Hi txrepgirl, thanks for all the helpful info - I've already seen all your videos, along with pretty much every other tegu video available

[txrepgirl]

Montegu. I'm glad to hear this . I'm glad that our Leonidas made it though this also. I had his food in a bowl but sometimes he flicked it around when he had a big piece in his mouth. The piece that fell of got onto the mulch. Then he ate it. I couldn't get the clamps of the screen top off soon enough to get to him. I fed him in there because I didn't want him to get stressed out. Live and learn ( and I learned allot ).

[txrepgirl]

Buzby. You are very welcome . I'm glad you checked out every ones videos. I wish I would of thought of this when I got our first Tegu. But back then I didn't know to much about computers :( lol.