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Post by shawnfraser on Apr 12, 2006 0:52:03 GMT -5
We recently took in a water dragon (Physignathus cocincinus) who laid 10 infertile eggs. Rather than throw them out I decided to see if any other lizards wanted to eat them (waste not, want not). The obvious choices were the monitors and the tegu. The first animal I offered the eggs to was a subadult mangrove monitor (Varanus indicus) - it was also the last animal I offered the eggs to, as it devoured them all. This monitor has always been an enthusiastic eater - it demolished 5 large fuzzies the day before the eggs - but the response was surprising. After scarfing down 7 eggs with the eighth one in it's mouth it came after my hand looking for more! 20 or more years ago the late Thomas Huff described "captive stagnancy syndrome" in reptiles. In his words "A condition in which animals in captivity, stagnated by their confinement, altered their behavior, became lethargic and non-responsive." (Huff, T.A. (1995) "Fallacies and Frustrations of a Frog Farmer -or- Pitfalls of the Herpetoculturist"Proceedings of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Canadian Herpetological Symposia, Reptile World, Drumheller AB). The offering of varied food items was one of his ideas to remedy this problem. I am not suggesting offering frogs and lizards to corn snakes alongside the usual mice, but I think this is worth thinking about.
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Post by Ryan on Apr 12, 2006 9:08:44 GMT -5
Obviously with other species you have to be carefull with this, especially snakes with their tendencies to become picky about certain food items but I am a big believer in a varied diet as well. With some of my snakes I've always offered them a wide variety such as Rats, mice, chicks, quail and for my Indigo fish.....both my bullsnake and Indigo will take all of them and go nuts. The Indigo especially likes her fish and birds but I spread out these feedings so it's more like an occassional treat
I want to put this into play with all of my snakes and once I begin producing my own Quail which hopefully will be soon I will have access to the day old chicks that are small enough for my corns and everything else. At the moment I only have one monitor, that being a Sav but I'd really like to test this theory more with the monitors I plan on getting in the future.
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Post by joeysgreen on Apr 14, 2006 6:55:51 GMT -5
Sometimes I find it difficult to vary a snakes diet, with rodents being so easily obtainable, but all my lizards and amphibians get a good variety. Lots of different bugs, many get small mice, and fish, ect.
In addition to diet variety, another large aspect of avoiding this lethargy syndrome is an environment that closely resembles it's wild habitat. Natural vivaria, with access to sunlight and/or UVB lighting have shown immense improvements on behavior for a multitude of species.
Ian
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