Getting a Water Dragon

[Vamp523]

Well after researching for the chinese water dragon I've decided to just buy myself a screen cage 6" tall 29" wide and 29" deep. Im going to go down to Tucson this weekend to buy decor for the cage . I talked to some reptile store and they told me to just tape the sides and back of the cage to keep humidity in ect ect. But I was wondering if anyone here got any pic of their cage decor so I can get an idea of what I'll get. Thank you all in advance

 

[spykerherps]

Are those dimensions you gave in inches cage seems quit small for a water dragon. perhaps for a hatchling. for a little bit but 6" tall seems a bit short even for a baby. Is it 6 feet by 29inches by 29 inches? a good size cage for a full grown water dragon would be 3 to 4 feet wide by 2 feet deep by 4 to 6 feet tall. they are semi arboreal and semi aquatic so some hight is good and a place for them to soke is essential. like a kitty litter pan or something similar or more astheticly pleasing is fine but should be easy to clean and rinse out.

 

[beardieman]

man i dont want to sound mean but you havent really researched them at all. a water dragon needs (to live comfortably and be healthy) a 4ft long x 2ft deep x 4.5-5ft high(they are arborreal they need height to be able to climb). the female of this species gets a lil over 2 feet long and the male can pass 3 ft. They need 70-80% humidity, a uvb and a basking light. Basking spot should be around 92-95 degrees F and the ambient tank temp should be around 83-87 degrees f. Now as for food. They can eat most things a beardie can. You can feed them silks, mealies, superworms, locusts, a large variety of roaches, crickets, and many types of greens.
If you have any other questions just ask
sorry if i sounded rude. But that cage you are talking about is way too small. 6inches tall isnt high enough for a gecko let alone a water dragon.

 

[Vamp523]

Doh >< sorry didn't catch that its 6' ft sorry I pressed shift on that one. Im currently breeding Superworm / normal mealies and Giant mealies. I'll just buy crickets since Im not too fond of breeding them. I already bought 2 lamps that can stand since I cant put them on a screen cage because it can burn and damage the screen overtime. The humidity I'll be spraying w/ a mist bottle until I can get a fogger. I'll cover the cage so it dont lose too much moisture.

 

[beardieman]

roaches would be a better choice than crix especially for a lizard that has this size potential. they have more protein and more meat than a cricket. i would say look into getting some discoid roaches. they are very easy to keep and breed. have almost no smell and make no noise. and sorry i thought you meant 6 inches and i was like WTF
sorry if i was rude man.

 

[GoGo]

Dont bother with a fogger unless you do a 2 tank set up where the top is mostly land/things to climb on and basking and the bottom is mostly swampy like w/ water and ruffage. Otherwise a little body of water will just dry up so easily and get too hot.

 

[Vamp523]

Well I have not think of a exact dimension for the pond on the bottom, I'll put it in a tubberwaire or something along that line, it'll be about 12" 12" and 4-6" tall. I'll includes alot of leaves / branches as to seperate the top from the bottom keeping the top kinda open to heat / UVB light (it'll still have leaves ect ect) Bottom I'll keep as a feeding ground / pond area. No worries Brian, I was in a hurry to type it and forgot to check it. As for the roaches... Im actually terrify of roaches, I would rather go face to face with a lion than any kind of roaches. I'll probably just buy them in numbers and feed it to em little by little.

 

[GoGo]

Im sorry I cant find any picture, it must have been on a forum i dont go on anymore, but someone had this AMAZING water dragon setup id love to have ben able to show.

 

[beardieman]

another trick you can do as far as the lighting is concerned is instead of mounting it horizontal across the top you can get a longer uv bulb and mount it verticle so that no matter where the dragon is at he can still get uv light. just mount the end with the wiring near the top so that the wiring isnt in the cage much.

they have fountains and what not that you can use to keep a constant flow of water through whatever you decide to use as a pool for him. you may want to make it a lil bigger than 12x12
just my opinion there. good luck brother
and again sorry bout the a$$hole response at first. i just wanted to make sure that you didnt get a dragon and kill it.

you could do locusts. they have a lot more meat and protein than a cricket.
and they arent roaches
(dont feel bad its amazing how many people to include my wife are terrified of roaches, it was a real hard sell on getting discoids in the house lol for some reason she thought stinky loud annoying crix were less problematic than non climbing non flying roaches)

 

[Vamp523]

Yeah Locust I can deal with, but how will I store them? Do I have to break of their leg so they cant jump? Amd the pool I'll probably make it half the size of the cage so 15" by 15" about. still its depending on how big of a container I'll find

 

[GoGo]

The reason I mentioned how the 2 cage thing was set up was because the bottom was SPECIFICALLY made to be dark and shady and cool so the lizards had a whole cool tank and a whole warm basking tank.

 

[Vamp523]

Yeah I know what you're talking about, I'll try my best to cover like the middle with leaves and branches and give the bottom alot of shades from the heat above

 

[beardieman]

15 x 15 would be great.
yeah as far as feeding them to your dragon breaking the legs would be a good idea just like you do when feeding crix to a baby beardie.
you dont however have to do this while you have them caged up. just keep whatever you have them in dark and cool and they wont be too super active. you feed and water them the same way and dust them the same way as crix. ill see if i can find you someone that sells locusts if not you can always order 1000 crix for pretty cheap there are quite a few places online that they are cheap through. Note with a water dragon you will be going through a lot and i mean a lot of crix a month.

 

[beardieman]

oops sorry i have been missleading you we cant get locusts in the us. that sucks man sorry. they can only get em in other countries. too bad you are scared of roaches they would be the best.
but guess you will have to do nasty stinky crix
be sure to supplement with phoenix worms also due to their high calcium content and soft body. plus it will give him some variety in what he eats.

 

[GoGo]

My leo's hated pheonix worms with a passion. Plus the things climb the god damn glass and plastic!

 

[Vamp523]

Yeah Butterworm and phoenix worm will be a treat sometime because I dotn really wanna spend a fortune just feeding reptiles lol. Im gonna have the cage design and everything first so it'd be like 2-3 more weeks til I will actually have a water dragon probably.

 

[GoGo]

Yargh, if it even likes them.

 

[Vamp523]

Lol I'll try, heck I'll end up having about 10 reptile total so one of them bound to like butter or phoenix worm

 

[GoGo]

Or nottttt.