Thread: Help!! lol

Originally Posted by rickmoss95

c'mon really?! how big is the freaking wild...where they live? if you had the temps and humidity correct, you could put ONE gecko in a 300 gal tank! i know you are trying to help Carly, but you are 15, and you dont usually give the best advise. why dont you just learn more, and stop giving people crappy info untill you know what you are talking about! im not trying to be prude, but someone may take this wrong advise to heart and thier animal(s) will suffer.

to the op, you COULD absolutely put a single leopard gecko in a 55. the key is getting about a quarter of the one side around 92 to 95(the warm side) on the ground. as long as your leopard learns where the food bowl is, which wont take long, there is no reason not to do this. dont use loose substrate that could impact the gecko. give it plenty of hides, including a moist hide (i reccomend on the warm side). i also wouldnt use bright lights as this will stress the gecko. i used to keep a trio of cresteds in a decked out 125, and they did AWESOME in it!

I understand and I'm sorry, to you and the op. I do not mean to be ignorant. I also understand because of my age that I am inferior to older, more experienced people here and I'm not perfect. I think I'll be taking a break from this website for a while.. evaluate my knowledge and think things through a bit... once again, I'm very sorry.

Originally Posted by rmallory1991

i have a 55 gallon aquarium, its 4 feet long so i was wondering if this would work:........ would it be ok to put a UTH at both ends and have the cool in the middle?
l
l
l
l
l
l
l_________________________________________________ _______________

UTH heat for 1 foot on left, cool area for 2 feet, then UTH heat on right for 1 foot
Thank you in advance!

This question has at least several answers based on some other factors. How old are the geckos? What are their genders? Is the tank currently divided? If so, is it permanent or can the divider be removed? Do they do well to live together now, both same size and growing at the same rate? Do you have another enclosure available in case they must be immediately separated?

When you have a large display tank that you want to look nice to you, the gecko's needs should come first. There's a lot of very nice accessories to make a big tank look fantastic, while still providing safety and all essentials for geckos.

Originally Posted by rickmoss95

what i meant by the fifteen remark...was simply that being younger one has the exitement and passion to "try too hard" and "help" even if they dont know the correct answer. i started when i was nine, so i have NO problem with young herp keepers, i LOVE it when younger people get into reptiles...i encourage it TOTALLY. i do not like it however, when someone just answers questions to answer them, even if they dont know the appropriate(sp?) answer, as the case with this person on several occations. i have been doing this for 25 ish years, and i dont know it all...i learn more every day...but i dont answer questions i dont know the answers too...i should have elaborated on my fifteen statement a little more, and i appologize for that...but i just think some people dont need to answer certain questions. i am totally supportive of Carly, and im glad she is so eager to help, but maybe better thought out or researched answers are in order here, thats all.

and yes, it would be silly to put a hatchling in a 55 gal, but honestly...if they had alot of tight hides, and could find there food, they would do fine...but i personally would not put a HATCHLING in a 55.

and im not even gonna comment on "the most experienced venomous keeper i know is 16" comment......

I'm sorry but you need to just not post if your going to chew out a kid. The original poster was very vague and she was just trying to help. She gave her best advice, and that's what a forums about.... Trying to help/learn...

This is the second post I've seen today and you have been extremely rude.

Your how old and you're bashing a little girl telling her that she gives crappy advice? Really? Grow up please.

Originally Posted by Alex G

The most experienced venomous keeper I know is just 16.

Isn't it illegal under 18 to own hots? Or am I making stuff up in my head? I know I wouldn't have the cajones to keep hots at 16...heck even 19.

A&K Reptiles
aandk.reptiles@gmail.com
(607)-372-4195

Originally Posted by fl_orchidslave

This question has at least several answers based on some other factors. How old are the geckos? What are their genders? Is the tank currently divided? If so, is it permanent or can the divider be removed? Do they do well to live together now, both same size and growing at the same rate? Do you have another enclosure available in case they must be immediately separated?

When you have a large display tank that you want to look nice to you, the gecko's needs should come first. There's a lot of very nice accessories to make a big tank look fantastic, while still providing safety and all essentials for geckos.

i'm not sure of the age, i got them from the pet store about two months ago.
right now all signs are pointing to both of them being females.
the tank is divided in half right now and the divider can be moved.
They live fine together and lay in the same hide together all the time, the only concern i had was one is growing slightly faster than the other, but i watch and both eat equal amounts.
i have a second tank ready in case anything happens.

And that was my thought, i don't want to make the tank super nice and neglect the needs of my geckos. thats why its currentlyin half because i felt 55 gal was too large for juvenile geckos, especially when it came to them feeding.

If I was going to keep geckos in a 55 as a long term home and have them divided I think it is quite possible to put the UTH in the middle with the divider and have the cold ends on the outside of the tank. Also, having females in a group is also pretty standard with that much room. Just do not put 2 males together, or even on either side of the divider. Also regardless of what sex or how many you put on each side if you plan to keep this 55 as 2 tanks, paint or cover the divider so that geckos on either side cannot see each other.

Jeff

Originally Posted by kevinb

Isn't it illegal under 18 to own hots? Or am I making stuff up in my head? I know I wouldn't have the cajones to keep hots at 16...heck even 19.

A&K Reptiles
aandk.reptiles@gmail.com
(607)-372-4195

In Arizona you may collect non-protected venomous animals with a basic hunting license and keep x number of them. You may not sell them or export them. A "small game" hunting license is what it needed to collect reptiles.

Anyone can hunt in Arizona if you have a hunting license. There are several, kinds of hunting licenses in Arizona. Children under 14 can hunt without a license if they are accompanied by an adult, but they may not hunt big game unless they have completed the Arizona Hunter Education Course.

From http://phoenix.about.com/od/sportsan.../a/hunting.htm

(and I agree, hots are just not for me, but they are this guys passion and he takes excellent care of them as well as exercises great caution with them)

Enclosure Sizes

I'm just copying old posts I made on the same subject.

Originally Posted by M_surinamensis

It really comes down to microhabitat, behavioral needs and environmental control.

Microhabitat is a term that is used to indicate the extremely specific conditions and areas where an animal lives. Habitat is a region or country and broad terrain type... like "Afghan Desert." Microhabitat includes more detailed information like "rocky areas with heavy ground cover to hide from predators and escape the mid-day heat, including some enclosed areas with pockets of higher moisture." It is specific temperatures, humidities and light intensities, it is detailed information about ground cover, hides, holes and basking areas; it is information about what an animal needs and what it avoids.

Microhabitat ties in to the behavioral needs because the animal in question is responding to instinctive dictates which pressure it to look for the ideal microhabitat. The exact second to second needs of the animal change, which is why they will move from a warm hide to a cool one, to a moist hide or out in the open- but those behaviors are all a result of instinctive dictates. Sometimes instincts can conflict with themselves or over-ride one another. The instincts are pressuring the animal to find someplace warm and humid, but the only options are warm and dry or cool and humid and one need will win out. One of the instincts that tends to be quite powerful, especially in small, terrestrial, crepuscular geckos is the need to hide, it can overwhelm almost anything else.

Environmental control is something we are responsible for with captive animals. Supplying appropriately sized hides, a temperature gradient, the proper light intensity and so on. What we provide, the conditions we manufacture, dictate what kind of microhabitat is available for our animals and consequentially what kind of behaviors they display. If we build an environment incorrectly based on the conditions which are ideal for the animal, we can retard certain instincts and behaviors and harm the animal as a result.

Larger environments are not inherently bad... the animals have no problem finding water or food (that's just ridiculous to even suggest)- the problems of a larger environment are often something created by the person who is putting it together as they change the microhabitat. In the exact same way that people often have difficulty maintaining an ideal thermal gradient in a very small enclosure with the tools that are readily available to them, they frequently have problems doing the same in a large one. It is easy to fill a twenty gallon tank with hides and cover to make a leo feel secure- but people often fail to have the same density of cover when they go to a bigger enclosure (feeling some obscure need to leave wide open spaces of nothing). The taller, longer environment gets away from them as they regard either end as an extreme and do not bother measuring conditions across the entire length at even intervals, the height provides a lot of open space which they rarely fill, they sometimes switch to brighter lights...

Essentially, it is not that big environments are bad, it is that they mandate some additional care that owners often seem to skip. Four hides in a twenty long is fine, four hides in a fifty five is not. Two thermometers in a twenty long is perfect, two thermometers in a fifty five is not. If the effort is made to replicate the ideal microhabitat, there's nothing at all wrong with a big enclosure. It just needs to be big and controlled.

Originally Posted by M_surinamensis

A small note, just to add on to that, about space and security...

Appropriately sized and positioned hides make an animal feel secure, their instincts dictate that they remain near to a place where they can be safe from (most) predators. Part of it is the visual barrier, in or down or under or behind... and part of it involves the way that the space is just big enough for the animal and too small for most things that would eat them.

The various glass and plastic boxes we tend to keep them in are restrictive. They have X cubic feet of space from which they cannot escape. Reptiles aren't real... good... at understanding glass, but they are on some instinctual level aware of the fact that they're in a space that restricts them. The enclosure is usually too big to function as a hide, based on the total internal dimensions. Unless we then fill that space appropriately, the animals can be stressed out by conditions which amount to being trapped in a space that is too big to function as a hide and too small to allow for escape.

Big enclosures are perfectly fine, if some forethought goes into how the space is used in relation to the microhabitat that's ideal for the animal.

Responsible Information

I didn't really read that as Rick bashing on anyone, it seemed like he was trying as hard as he could to be polite about it actually... Everyone, old or young, experienced or new, no matter how smart they might be, should try to be aware of what they're responsibly qualified to comment about. They should take some care to make their responses distinct, to differentiate between fact, opinion, preference and conjecture. All of them have their place, if it is made clear what they are. If someone is totally out of their area of knowledge though, they're better off (most the time) just not saying anything, better to say nothing than to guess and risk being wrong. It's not about ego or ranking people as knowing more or less... it's just about recognizing that the best way to ensure that information is solid is to know ourselves, including our limitations.

Age can tie into experience and education, but it is not an absolute. I don't think he meant to imply that it was, either. It was merely a way of trying to gently point out that younger people generally have had limited opportunities to develop their knowledge. Older people have had more chances, though not every older person took advantage of those chances. It all gets filtered through the knowledge we already have, our personal experiences and our innate intelligence, so none of it can be looked at as an absolute and I, also, know plenty of young herpers who can run rings around some older types... but because of those opportunities, they tend to be exceptions to the rule. On the upside though, the younger folks can rapidly learn what the older folks know, then carry right on learning new things when us older types are dead. My past may have been filled with chances to learn, but younger people have an entire future that they can take advantage of.

Young People and Venomous Snakes

It may be legal in some states, but if a minor is genuinely the sole caretaker of a venomous snake that is capable of a clinically significant envenomation, it's still irresponsible. The repercussions of a mistake are substantially higher for the entire venomous keeping community when it is a kid who ends up on the evening news after being bitten. A sixteen year old in the hospital from a snake bite threatens everyone else's legal ability to responsibly keep venomous snakes. I don't like the idea that my permits can be invalidated because some kid was too impatient to wait until they were eighteen. I like it even less when they are too impatient and have been making remarkably poor decisions; like owning venomous snakes without a period of mentoring and practices under the tutelage of an experienced keeper. The idea that a sixteen year old is "the most experienced venomous handler" anyone knows is scary as hell.

Edit: An addendum to my comments about age. I've long felt that anyone who is old enough to be using the internet without supervision is someone who should reasonably be expected to acknowledge the same standards of responsibility and behavior as apply to every other member of the particular community. If they are being supervised, then their parent should be acknowledging those standards and responsibilities. If they are incapable of being a member of the community, just like any other, then they shouldn't be there to begin with. I don't like the idea of having double standards for anyone.

Also, if anyone is going to get banned for screaming at a fourteen year old, it's going to be me. Get your own schtick, Rick! This one is mine!

Interesting, always an educational input.

Cheers

Originally Posted by M_surinamensis

Young People and Venomous Snakes

It may be legal in some states, but if a minor is genuinely the sole caretaker of a venomous snake that is capable of a clinically significant envenomation, it's still irresponsible. The repercussions of a mistake are substantially higher for the entire venomous keeping community when it is a kid who ends up on the evening news after being bitten. A sixteen year old in the hospital from a snake bite threatens everyone else's legal ability to responsibly keep venomous snakes. I don't like the idea that my permits can be invalidated because some kid was too impatient to wait until they were eighteen. I like it even less when they are too impatient and have been making remarkably poor decisions; like owning venomous snakes without a period of mentoring and practices under the tutelage of an experienced keeper. The idea that a sixteen year old is "the most experienced venomous handler" anyone knows is scary as hell.

I don't know him well enough to say the length of time he was tutored and mentored, but I am aware that it happened. He didn't just pick up a C. atrox and declare himself a venomous keeper. He had the entirety of the AHA to mentor and shepherd him. I probably should have edited my post to say he is ONE of the most experienced venomous keepers I know, not THE most.