Hi Everyone, new to the forums and excited to have a community of people with similar interests. I have a roughly 2 year old B&W tegu named Oscar who is about 3 ft at the moment and very healthy. We have had him about 4 months now and built him a custom 8x4x4 enclosure and use coconut husk mixed with a bit of moss to help keep humidity. Its about 78-79 on the cool side of the enclosure and around 95-105 in his basking spot. We use timers to keep the lights on a 12 hour light cycle and a thermostat with a night drop for his basking bulbs that brings his enclosure down to around 76 at night and no cooler than 71 on his cool side at night. We have multiple layers to the enclosure with his hide on the far end sitting on 26"x3 ft x4 ft of substrate to burrow in.
Now that all of that is out of the way, we've been working with him as often as we can working around his enclosure, leaving the door open but not bothering him just to try and get him used to us. He is not aggressive at all in any way but it seems like his training is going backward as he is burrowed more and more and sometimes we don't see him for a few days. He still won't eat from tongs from us so we can't much coax him out. We have been trying to take him out of his enclosure when he's out and just letting him free roam the house. He seems to really enjoy exploring and doesnt mind being near us or us walking around but again he comes out less and less to a point now where we barely see him at all and have no time to work with him. I've read that un-burying them from their substrate makes them lose trust so we don't do that for any reason. Does anyone have any advice for us? He is captive bred and well socialized and very gentle but hides constantly and will not come out even if we leave food in his enclosure and leave.
Now that all of that is out of the way, we've been working with him as often as we can working around his enclosure, leaving the door open but not bothering him just to try and get him used to us. He is not aggressive at all in any way but it seems like his training is going backward as he is burrowed more and more and sometimes we don't see him for a few days. He still won't eat from tongs from us so we can't much coax him out. We have been trying to take him out of his enclosure when he's out and just letting him free roam the house. He seems to really enjoy exploring and doesnt mind being near us or us walking around but again he comes out less and less to a point now where we barely see him at all and have no time to work with him. I've read that un-burying them from their substrate makes them lose trust so we don't do that for any reason. Does anyone have any advice for us? He is captive bred and well socialized and very gentle but hides constantly and will not come out even if we leave food in his enclosure and leave.
