blanc

Hi.

My son, 10.5 years old, has been asking for a bearded dragon for a year
now. He takes careful care of the family dog, and is a loving and
responsible kid.

So, here are my questions. I'd appreciate your answers.

Where should I buy such a pet? PetSmart has them, and the store
employees seem caring and enthusiastic. Bad idea?

About an enclosure... I realize these lizards pretty big. I'd like to
build an enclosure (I have the tools and cabinetry skills) with a
plastic front and furniture-grade plywood tops and sides, 24" deep, 24:
tall, 48" wide. I figures I'll use a non-toxic water-based finish on the
interior to make it more or less spill and waste proof, give it a hinged
top for access. I've been studying lighting/heating/ventilation needs
and I'm comfortable with my plan. What I'm most concerned about is the
fluorescent lighting. Can I use "standard" Home-Depot fixtures with
desert-lizard tubes?

I'm also curious if anyone is successful with Bearded Dragons without
providing crickets. I've read on one web page that it can be done
successfully, but I haven't seen another web page to validate the concept.

Thanks in advance for your time.

jim smith

Find a reputable breeder. Shouldn't be too hard to find.


You will be hard pressed to build an enclosure for what you can buy
one for. Nothing against your ability, but the store bought
enclosures can't be beat for the money. Fixture can be store bought,
just make sure the "desert-lizard tubes" will fit. You must keep the
fixtures as close as possible to ensure proper Vit D absorbsion.
remember you must also provide heat for the little guy too. Over head
heat is better than a heat pad in my opinion. You may want to
consider the new Mercury lights that will provide lighing and UVB.
Kills 2 birds with one stone.

Cricket are absolutely necessary for young Beardies. I personally
think they are needed somewhat throughout the Beardie's life. Others
only feed veggies after about 2 years of age, but I think they need
the protein. You will have to provide crickets for the life of the
beardie in my opinion.

grainne gillespie

LOL! Beardies big? Granted they are not the smallest lizard around, but they
are not big. An iguana is big, beardies are closer to 2ft long and looking
at them I'd say they don't get above 2lbs in weight.

No, no, no, no. Beardies need live food to survive. They almost exclusively
eat crickets up until they are about a year old and then they start adding
vegetable matter to their diet, but live food, crickets, mealworms and the
other bugs that are safe to feed to them make up a large part of their diet

chris mcmartin

I appreciate their enthusiasm, but I don't think I would buy one from
PetSmart. I'd rather see them stick to supplies and other things they can't
kill. There are LOTS of breeders of bearded dragons--search the web and
you'll find plenty. They'll have a wider selection of morphs (color as well
as size) and will often have healthier individuals.

Bigger! Bigger! That's what I consider an advantage of DIY enclosures is
being able to build a bigger cage for the buck. That may be a concern for
you if the finished product won't fit where you hoped it would, though.
I enjoy drawing up the plans to maximize use of materials (little or no leftover scrap).

Yes. I do. Well, I use Vita-Lites on my box turtles.


Do you feed the dog vegetarian food? I don't know on this one. I'm
sure it's possible.
--
Chris McMartin
--
http://www.mcmartinville.com
http://www.mountainboomer.com


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chris mcmartin

It depends on your choice of materials too. My homemade cages are usually
cheaper than store bought. Notice I didn't make any claims as to
appearance, though.


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fr0glet

A 2 foot lizard IS a big lizard. Iguanas are gigantic dinosaurs.


Plenty of beardies eat plenty of other bugs, and veggies, in their
youth. If a person fed a beardie a diet of nothing but crickets, the
animal would die of renal failure eventually due to the very high
phosphorus:calcium ratio of crickets.

Lots of beardies will happily eat dead (non-wiggling) canned bugs,
too. My beardie will eat _anything_ I offer to him from my fingertips.

fr0glet

grainne gillespie

Hmmm, I'd glass a 2ft liz as medium, an ig as a large and the komodo dragon
as a gigantic dinosaur.

I brought my aunts in to the living room where my iguana had been sitting on
the back of the sofa to see him, we found his 2 1/2 ft long form stretched
out on top of the radiator in the classic iguana relaxing pose.
One aunt squealed "oh, he's got huge!"
I took him down off the radiator and place him on the floor and asked if she
still thought he was big. She didn't.

I tend to class my pets size category in relation to human size. I think of
Harvey as small because I'm about 150 times his size. He's just over a pound
in weight.

blanc

Thanks, Jim.

I've priced out enclosures. I'm convinced that I can build a much better
enclosure for half the price of a glass one. I've priced out the
supplies at less than $100 to build a 4x2x2 foot enclosure with a 1/4"
acrylic pane in front. A 50 gallon tank is 3x18x18, and about $80. A
4x2x2 PVC enclosure - at least the least expensive I've seen, is about
$245. And mine will look like, well furniture. I might even make it
three feet tall for climbing (which, of course, will complicate keeping
the lizard lit up with fluorescent UVB...)

If you know of a source for a 4x2x2 enclosure of any type for less than
$150, I'm all ears.

Your opinion on food seems to be the prevailing thought (although, I
guess, some have figured out how to hand feed "dead" food).

blanc

Thanks. I'll try to post pictures when I'm finished. :0)

blanc

Thanks.

I don't feed the dog vegetarian food (he'd eat anything with vegetable
oil on it, though).

There are commercial Bearded Dragon foods available. I've seen one web
site that says only that and fresh veggies, and their beardies are good
to go. I think I'll leave the experimentation to more capable hands, though.