DREWWW615
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- 12
Ok so my tegu started doing the weirdest thing a couple days ago. He's starting to think my hand is food.
Some background information: I've had him since he was a baby and now he's almost a year old. I let him out and spend time with him everyday so he is very used to me and very tame.
So, the first day I was cleaning, misting, and changing his water in the morning as I do everyday and he was sitting under his basking spot. Then, as I was cleaning his substrate, he came over and bit my finger with no warning at all. I was shocked because he has NEVER bitten me or anyone before. I assumed it was because it was the morning/early afternoon (which is usually when he's fed) and I was moving my hand around so maybe it looked like prey? It was still odd though because he knows me and my scent. The next day was even stranger. I wanted to test to see if it really was because he was hungry the day before and didn't even investigate my hand first. So, first thing in the morning I open his cage (sliding doors in the front) and ball up my hand into a fist, just to protect my fingers, and let him smell me. He walks to the opening of his cage, smells my hand, starts digging his nose in between my knuckles and starts doing a few rapid tongue flicks before slowing opening his mouth to bite my knuckle. I see this and obviously pull my hand away so he can't bite. He doesn't like this and begins to follow my hand like, "that is food, give it to me!". I pick him up and put him back in his cage. This is so weird because he knows my scent, yet he still thought it was food. I was scared it's the being of puberty, but he's not showing any aggression at all! And yes, I feed him out of his cage with either a pair of tongs or in a bowl/plate. And once he's out, he's perfectly him. (However, just now today he was crawling on my and trying to burrow under me or behind me as he always does and my head was on a pillow. He tried to burrow behind my neck, again which he does all the time and I felt him flicking my hair and then I just felt him push into my head and something sharp. Idk if he was still just trying to dig and I felt his claws or if he tried to bite. But when I picked him up and put him back on my chest, he licked his lips a few times so I think he tried to bite). It's like he's just ignoring my scent as not being food. Has anyone else experienced this? Is this just a phase? How do I correct it? Thanks!
Some background information: I've had him since he was a baby and now he's almost a year old. I let him out and spend time with him everyday so he is very used to me and very tame.
So, the first day I was cleaning, misting, and changing his water in the morning as I do everyday and he was sitting under his basking spot. Then, as I was cleaning his substrate, he came over and bit my finger with no warning at all. I was shocked because he has NEVER bitten me or anyone before. I assumed it was because it was the morning/early afternoon (which is usually when he's fed) and I was moving my hand around so maybe it looked like prey? It was still odd though because he knows me and my scent. The next day was even stranger. I wanted to test to see if it really was because he was hungry the day before and didn't even investigate my hand first. So, first thing in the morning I open his cage (sliding doors in the front) and ball up my hand into a fist, just to protect my fingers, and let him smell me. He walks to the opening of his cage, smells my hand, starts digging his nose in between my knuckles and starts doing a few rapid tongue flicks before slowing opening his mouth to bite my knuckle. I see this and obviously pull my hand away so he can't bite. He doesn't like this and begins to follow my hand like, "that is food, give it to me!". I pick him up and put him back in his cage. This is so weird because he knows my scent, yet he still thought it was food. I was scared it's the being of puberty, but he's not showing any aggression at all! And yes, I feed him out of his cage with either a pair of tongs or in a bowl/plate. And once he's out, he's perfectly him. (However, just now today he was crawling on my and trying to burrow under me or behind me as he always does and my head was on a pillow. He tried to burrow behind my neck, again which he does all the time and I felt him flicking my hair and then I just felt him push into my head and something sharp. Idk if he was still just trying to dig and I felt his claws or if he tried to bite. But when I picked him up and put him back on my chest, he licked his lips a few times so I think he tried to bite). It's like he's just ignoring my scent as not being food. Has anyone else experienced this? Is this just a phase? How do I correct it? Thanks!
