Dezi
New Member
- Messages
- 4
- Location
- Washington
So hi. I am new to this forum. I am looking for general info on how to properly take care of the Columbian Black and White male Tegu my husband and I recently acquired with no planning/research beforehand. Before I get blasted on here for that let me give a little background on Teeg.
The previous owner threatened to drop him off in the local mall parking lot because he is aggressive. What we have been able to piece together so far is the previous owner was feeding him a 1.5in to 2in meatball consisting of ground turkey, ground beef, strawberries and some other random stuff every 3 days. Nothing in between. Teeg is 12 to 14 months old. So essentially he was starving him. His HUGE cage had one ceramic heat bulb. That is all. His bedding was coconut husk that hadn't been changed in 6 months. He wasn't handled correctly and was thrown (literally) back into his tank a lot. So while I realize this is a difficult lizard, I think people willing to take the time to LEARN how to properly take care of him and using the knowledge to do so is a really big step up from the situation he was in.
Now on to what we have done for him so far. Within an hour of him being brought to our place he had been fed a hopper mouse. Couple hours later we fed him a large saucer of Zilla? Omnivore mix. Within an hour of that we had acquired a 50gal tank and cypress mulch. We have had him for about 4 days at this point and have fed him raw chicken, a boiled egg, more omnivore mix, tried crickets (he flinched away from them so that was a no go, and don't know if we will try it again), we have repivite, zilla vitamin spray with beta carotene, and flukers calcium with and without d3 that we have been cycling him through. His tank set up is this. He has an 11x13 glass baking dish with water, cypress mulch deep enough to burrow into, a large flat piece of baked driftwood to bask on with a baked driftwood log under one side to create a hide, a real tropical plant (for humidity and aesthetics). He has a coil uvb bulb, 2 100w daylight bulbs in a dual lightbulb fixture thing, and his ceramic heat emitter bulb for night time. He also has a reptofogger for humidity and a digital hygrometer/temp thing. We take him out and handle him/play/let him explore a few times a day, and bathe him in the tub every other day. Is what we are doing correct and ok? Do we need to change something? Are we forgetting to do something?
The previous owner threatened to drop him off in the local mall parking lot because he is aggressive. What we have been able to piece together so far is the previous owner was feeding him a 1.5in to 2in meatball consisting of ground turkey, ground beef, strawberries and some other random stuff every 3 days. Nothing in between. Teeg is 12 to 14 months old. So essentially he was starving him. His HUGE cage had one ceramic heat bulb. That is all. His bedding was coconut husk that hadn't been changed in 6 months. He wasn't handled correctly and was thrown (literally) back into his tank a lot. So while I realize this is a difficult lizard, I think people willing to take the time to LEARN how to properly take care of him and using the knowledge to do so is a really big step up from the situation he was in.
Now on to what we have done for him so far. Within an hour of him being brought to our place he had been fed a hopper mouse. Couple hours later we fed him a large saucer of Zilla? Omnivore mix. Within an hour of that we had acquired a 50gal tank and cypress mulch. We have had him for about 4 days at this point and have fed him raw chicken, a boiled egg, more omnivore mix, tried crickets (he flinched away from them so that was a no go, and don't know if we will try it again), we have repivite, zilla vitamin spray with beta carotene, and flukers calcium with and without d3 that we have been cycling him through. His tank set up is this. He has an 11x13 glass baking dish with water, cypress mulch deep enough to burrow into, a large flat piece of baked driftwood to bask on with a baked driftwood log under one side to create a hide, a real tropical plant (for humidity and aesthetics). He has a coil uvb bulb, 2 100w daylight bulbs in a dual lightbulb fixture thing, and his ceramic heat emitter bulb for night time. He also has a reptofogger for humidity and a digital hygrometer/temp thing. We take him out and handle him/play/let him explore a few times a day, and bathe him in the tub every other day. Is what we are doing correct and ok? Do we need to change something? Are we forgetting to do something?
