# how big? please reply!



## kurtle55 (Jan 26, 2009)

how big will a female tegu get? how big will a male get? and how big of an enclosure will i ultimately need?

thank you for the feedback


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## Wooly (Jan 26, 2009)

A female and male will get anywhere between 4-4.5 feet, give or take a few inches depending on the tegu. In the end you will need at least a 6x3x3 or bigger.


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## kurtle55 (Jan 26, 2009)

thats just for one tegu? 

how long will it be until i need a cage that big?


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## PuffDragon (Jan 26, 2009)

In my opinion bare minimum for 1 adult _T. merianae_ is an enclosure measuring 8x4x4. If you do not hibernate your tegu it is possible to reach 4 ft. in one year. In this case you will need a suitable enclosure in a timely fashion. If they do hibernate you can probably get away with something smaller for 2-3 years. Tegu size has alot of factors including genetics, diet and husbandry so the variations can differ greatly. I always like to say get a big enclosure from the very beginning. Hatchlings to adults will appreciate the extra room.


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## kurtle55 (Jan 26, 2009)

the reason i ask is because i am building a new cage for my red tailed boa and i will have a 4X3X3 wooden cage laying around. i have ALWAYS wanted a tegu but i have only been exposed to red's that were not very tame. so i thought i wouldn't have the time to tame them. (not saying i wouldn't be committed to owning a tegu if i got one) but if that cage is big enough i would love to own one. 
plus if he is out of his cage roaming around the house, does the size matter that much? (i mean with in reason, im not suggesting something rediculously small in any way)


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## kurtle55 (Jan 26, 2009)

dang thats way too big for me right now. i guess ill wait a few years untill i have the space and money. thank you for your feed back. at least i didnt find this out after i bought it LOL.


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## PuffDragon (Jan 26, 2009)

Tegu's are a whole different lizard when it comes to brain function. They are just very smart IMO. The lack of space would be very detrimental to their development and well being. For tegus size does matter alot. 

A 4x3x3 would not be suitable in the long run. You would have a 4 ft lizard on your hands with no room to move around in the enclosure.


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## PuffDragon (Jan 26, 2009)

kurtle55 said:


> dang thats way too big for me right now. i guess ill wait a few years untill i have the space and money. thank you for your feed back. at least i didnt find this out after i bought it LOL.


I'm just glad you are looking into it before hand. If you can make the room Im positive you would be rewarded with an amazing species.


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## kurtle55 (Jan 26, 2009)

reptiles are my passion and i would never want to improperly house one. but on the good side i just realized that if i sell one of my old glass enclosures ill have enough money to build him a cage. so im going to think it over for a few days because i want to make sure i really want him and that i won't regret getting him (after hearing about people's relationships with their tegus it seems like this would be highly unlikely).


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## LouDog760 (Jan 26, 2009)

Check this out.


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## VARNYARD (Jan 26, 2009)

Females do not as a rule get as large as males in any of these types of animals. The females tend to be shorter and have less mass then males. Normal black and white males can reach 4ft and on very rare occasions, 4 1/2 ft. It is rare to find a female normal that reaches 4ft. Most are between 3ft-3 1/2 ft long, it goes the same for the reds.

However, a 4x3x3 enclosure is not big enough for even a female, they need larger cages as adults.


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## mr.tegu (Feb 20, 2009)

well if a female would top out at around 3 to 3 1/2 feet and my tegu is already 29 inches almost 2 1/2 feet long at four months old, then if i have a female tegu it would be fully grown at around 7 or 8 months old? or would it seem i might have a male tegu on my hands.


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## omgtaylorg (Feb 20, 2009)

mr.tegu said:


> well if a female would top out at around 3 to 3 1/2 feet and my tegu is already 29 inches almost 2 1/2 feet long at four months old, then if i have a female tegu it would be fully grown at around 7 or 8 months old? or would it seem i might have a male tegu on my hands.


well it may be getting its length fast right now but the filling out and gaining the weight is where the growing starts to happen, a skinny tegu and a long tail doesnt mean much. And that doesnt mean you have a female it just means yours had a growth spurt just as humans do...and females can get over 3 1/2 thats just the average, but the size right now wont determine the sex, they grow in spurts, it might not get any longer at one point for a while, might just fill out. Hard to tell sex at so young


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## omgtaylorg (Feb 20, 2009)

also, that 4x3x3 would be perfectly fine for a youngin, just keep in mind that you will be building a 8x4x4+ in a matter of months, and the cost really isnt too bad honestly, i JUST finished my 8x4x4 from rehabralphies tutorial on the how to do it youself thread and it costs under $150ish, not to mention it only took me 4 days. GREAT tutorial. But all in all, tegus are by far the coolest animal I have ever owned, its literally a reptile with what seems to be the intelligence of a cat...i have a ready to breed adult male being delivered to my house tuesday plus the other one I already have...only more to come with bobbys 09 season soon ahead. Addicted


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## mr.tegu (Feb 20, 2009)

ok then what is the average weight and thickness of an adult male/female. my tegu is about 4 inches wide and just guessing around 3 pounds.


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## ColdThirst (Feb 21, 2009)

Kurtle55, 
This is my cage size and setup, It is (LxWxH) 8'x28"x30" I would have made it wider but it had to fit on top of the other cage. 

ANYWAY, with as big as my cage is, I wish I would have made it at least 6" wider or so. My tegu is only 2'8" long right now and I feel like he is the perfect size for this cage and that when shes full grown it would not be comfortable. 

:blblbl And I said the running around the house thing to, and mine does, but I dont leave it out by itself bc I have caught it more than once trying to eat anything white (socks, kleenexes, plastic BB's etc.), crawling all over the power cords behind my entertainment center (pulling out home theater wires and yanking things off when a tegu jumps on the cord, getting up on my couch and trying to scratch its way inside it, I have left some nice designer town clothes on the floor in my room and it crapped on them, and you DO NOT want to clean that up, not to mention crap on your new pair of $100 shoes, their feces is a very strong and messy thing to try and wash out of somthing. 

OH MY JESUS!!! :doh I almost forgot, it wedged itself under he front of the dishwasher, went up underneath it, crawled up all the hoses and cords, wires in the back of it and got on top of it, underneath my countertop while I was at work one day. I found it (4 hours of looking later), when you knocked on the counter in the kitchen you would hear a loud hissing noise coming from directly underneath it. So I had to uninstall the entire dishwasher and take it out to get him, not to mention if he would have went under the stove or went under the water heater closet door and afixiated on carbon monoxide fumes or got burned really bad I would have felt terrible. 

Not learning my lesson I just blocked off the kitchen and shut my bedroom door, then wedged speakers on either side of my entertainment center. Problem fixed right? WRONG. I came home to find her nowhere. After searching I discovered her in a place i did not dream she could have fit, but she wedged up under my 55gal. Aquarium stand. The aquarium weighs over 800lbs full,(which it was) The stand weighs over 80 by itself not to mention its 4feet long. Draining and lifting is out of the question, the front piece that she was behind was load bearing so removing that was really out of the question. Stick your hand under, its getting bit, shes not budging. THREE DAYS LATER I wake up to find her out and back in her cage basking like where have you been?! 

So! I do not leave it out unsupervised and I am not home very much with my job and the hours I work, hence it stays locked in its cage most of the day and I am very happy that I made it this big, bc he is still comfortable when I am not home to let him out to run around *supervised*. 

Here is a link to the thread on my enclosure build, and a video of my tegu I took today, I hope you read all of that. It will help. 
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## mr.tegu (Feb 21, 2009)

LOL, sounds like a tegu. Sooner then later you will be turning that 28'' cage into a 48'' wide cage if its a male. And at least 36'' wide for a female.


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## ColdThirst (Feb 21, 2009)

It has been a learning experience to say the least, at least now its just a bit to big to squeeze into alot of those bad places, but it can still get into plenty of trouble. 

I am just thankful; and this is the point that I am wanting to get across, that the cage was not something that was a learning experience. I said before I ordered the tegu, that I was gonna do this cage right the first time. The cage went a bit over schedule due to the cold weather, but we got it done 6 days after the tegu arrived. There was no wait a year and upgrade, no, none of that, (besides these things grow FAST!), it was expencive but thats what it takes. 

The animal is not the cost, its the time, food and space needed house and feed it. Thats why theres no such thing as a free puppy as the sane goes.

You cant buy a dog and keep it locked in a carrier box all day, the same as you cant let it run around your house all day when your not home. A tegu is no different, and since you can't put a tegu in a pen outside or tie it up in the yard in most cases, you have to have a large pen for it inside your house. 

I'm done now


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