new females question

[Troy L]

I just picked up 2 female geckos 2 days ago.They are Tremper jungle 66% pos het raptor. Beautiful markings.
They went into the 20L viv that we have setup for our male high yellow gecko. They are all getting along great. The females tend to stick together but they are slowly starting to lay next to the male. My male appitate has not been affected by introducing the females to his habitat. The females on the other hand have not shown any signs of wanting to hunt. The precious owner fed only meal worms. I feed crickets and mealworms. I did put some mealworms in a bowl lastnight and they were gone. Not sure what one of the three got them. How long does it usually take for them to settle in and start eating? The tank is 80-85 on the hot side and not sure about on the cold side. They roam back and forth through out the day. I have an ifared lamp on top and a uth on the hot side as well. Any help would be great.

 

[Dog Shrink]

Couple things wrong here Troy, first you didn't quarantine your 2 new gals away from your curernt male meaning if they were sick with parasites or something else, HE now has it too. Second, it takes sometimes upwards of a week or so before they're settles, but since you have amixed habitat you're not going to know who's eating what, which is another good reason to seperate, so you know that they're all eating. You're keeping males and females together so obviously you're planning on breeding I assume, and good that you know the morphs BUT honestly you have a LOT to learn before you should be breeding leos. The 90 day quarantined is not optional and any good breeder will always quaranteen new stock, even to a seperate room because of airborn issues, before introducing them to their breeding program or another leo. Idon't mean to sound mean, but this is leo 101 stuff hon. Sorry ...

 

[T-ReXx]

Everything Kel said is true. I want to add one thing: you're tank is too cold. Leopard geckos should have a 90F hot spot, 80-85 doesn't cut it.

 

[Dog Shrink]

I didn't even catch that Ted... I was more worried about the quarantine issue.... thanks

 

[Jordan]

And to add, the male is going to be constantly pestering the females to mate (when/if theyre all old enough) this is going to be very stressful on the females. And if they do mate well then they could produce eggs and lay, and are you prepared for that? its perfectly possible that just from the two females you could get over 20 eggs.

And due to the females being stressed they may stop eating, but as they are housed together you wont really know if they stop eating until they have lost a noticable amount of weight.
Also they may not eat much as others mentioned its too cold, and when its too cold they cant digest food as well, so the temps need to be cranked up.

I think they need to be seperated, and observed, learned about, researched etc, before putting them back together, because then youll be more ready for babies and breeding.

 

[Troy L]

Sorry for some confusion. The 2 females come from a personal friend. He is cutting back on animals. I didnt realize that they should be quarantine since I have handled both since he got them. The females are sisters from the same clutch.
As far as the temps go. when the tank hits 85ish they always seem to go to the cold side of the tank and hang out there. I figured if the tank was to hot they would go to the cool side till they needed warmed back up. Is this not true?
I am planning on breeding them in the future. I do realize I have alot of reading to do. I will definatly seperate the sexes until i am ready to breed them. If you have any other advice please let me know.

Troy

 

[T-ReXx]

Leopard geckos need a 90F basking area available in order to properly thermoregulate. Without it they have serious problems digesting their food.

New animals should always quarantined. I do this with animals I get from personal friends and animals that come from complete strangers. I do it with every single new living creature that comes into my house. You have no way of knowing what diseases or parasites might be on these new animals and you risk your animal by putting them together immediately. Not to mention, they will breed there is nothing you can do to stop that without seperation. You also want to watch the two girls for signs of aggression, not all of them get along and even when raised together it doesn't always work out.