Got myself a Leopard Gecko today

[fiveohatch]

A friend of mine bought this guy for her kid awhile back. Being a 7yo, he quickly lost interest. They weren't really taking care of it at all so I took him.

This is my first time having a lizard, so I have no idea what I'm doing. She also said that it's a rare color or something?

I'm going to start doing some research, but if you guys want to give me any tips I'd appreciate them.

Since everyone loves pictures...

 

[PrettyHate]

Hey Lovely looking gecko- he/she looks like a "patternless" to or banana blizzard to me. There are so many different morphs out there now it can be tricky to tell exactly what they are, and everyone will have their own opinion!

The two main things I would change about your set up are:

1. Get rid of the sand and put down paper towel or reptile carpet. When you are feeding your gecko it will ingest some of it's substrate when it goes after it's food and this can lead to an impaction (bad).
2. If you choose it ignore my first piece of advice, for sure follow this one : get a type of tupperware container, cut a hole in it (for the gecko to crawl through) and fill it with moist ecoearth. When geckos shed their skin frequently and if it doesnt come off easily it can get stuck on toes and cut off the circulation.

You can also give it a dish filled with calcium powder and it will lick it right up

Have fun! Leo geckos are awesome and have great personalities!

ETA: They can also be escape artists- make sure it cant reach up to the rim of the tank by climbing on that wood! Also, you probably only need one heat bulb- they dont bask, and dont need it super warm.

 

[fiveohatch]

Thanks.

Supposedly the substrate is safe and won't hurt them if they ingest some, but I still don't like it. I'll look into reptile carpet.

I'm planning on hitting up some pet stores tomorrow and maybe getting a different tank for it. I don't particularly like the way this one looks and wouldn't mind having something bigger (I've got the space). I'm fully expecting to end up dropping a bunch of money tomorrow. I have plenty of tuperware style containers here, so I'll definitely look into doing that. I also have to get crickets. I hated having them around back when I had my scorpion.

The top of this tank is latched, so no worries there. It's just opened up in the one pic.

What temperature should I keep the tank at? Right now it's about 80° on the cold side. It's only got one heating bulb in it now. The second one is just a light as far as I can tell.

 

[bchbum11]

Sand is fine if you feed from a dish. I've kept mine on it for several years with no impaction problems. Babies are kept on paper towels, but graduate to sand at about the 6 month mark. Dish feeding exclusively means you can't really use crickets, but worms (meal or super) are OK for a staple as long as they are gut loaded properly and supplemented with other prey items such as pinkie mice every once in awhile. Wax worms are good as a treat food, but shouldn't be used as a staple. Feed these sparingly.

I'd recommend doing some research on supplementation. You'll need to supplement a multi-vitamin along with calcium, or there are several illnesses which can pop up. There are a lot of conflicting opinions, but the most common theme seems to be keeping a dish of pure calcium without D3 or phosporous in the cage at all times, and to dust prey items with a vitamin supplement (be sure it contains vitamin A) 2-4 times a month. I just switched over to a product called Leopard Gecko Calcium Plus, which is supposed to be formulated for leos and contain the proper levels of all needed supplements (including calcium), eliminating the need for multiple products. It's still too early to draw any personal conclusions, but almost all of the reviews I read on it were positive.

80 sounds fine for the cool end. I'd recommend getting a setup where you can get the bulb outside the tank tho. If you decide to keep that tank, think about switching to a heat pad instead of the light. Too many things can go wrong with an in-tank bulb to be worth the risk of keeping one. I'd also take out the glass pebbles. They look too big to ingest, but will likely make cleaning the cage harder. Also, put a hide on the cool side of the tank, and when you put the humid hide in, place that on the cool end also.

I agree with PrettyHate, looks like a Murphy patternless to me. Also looks very healthy. Good luck with him!

 

[Najakeeper]

What I have found with Leos is that they easily lose toes if the humidity level is not appropriate during their shedding so it is definitely a good idea to give them a humid hide. On top of that, warm baths during shedding also does wonders.

 

[MarkmD]

Nice gecko and cute.

 

[Arachtion]

Nice lizard, they're pretty hardy critters my friend went on holiday for two weeks and a fuse blew at some point or something and the electricity went off, he came home to two dead snakes, a dead avicularia and surprisingly Bob (the gecko) was still alive!

 

[fiveohatch]

Sand is fine if you feed from a dish. I've kept mine on it for several years with no impaction problems. Babies are kept on paper towels, but graduate to sand at about the 6 month mark. Dish feeding exclusively means you can't really use crickets, but worms (meal or super) are OK for a staple as long as they are gut loaded properly and supplemented with other prey items such as pinkie mice every once in awhile. Wax worms are good as a treat food, but shouldn't be used as a staple. Feed these sparingly.

I'd recommend doing some research on supplementation. You'll need to supplement a multi-vitamin along with calcium, or there are several illnesses which can pop up. There are a lot of conflicting opinions, but the most common theme seems to be keeping a dish of pure calcium without D3 or phosporous in the cage at all times, and to dust prey items with a vitamin supplement (be sure it contains vitamin A) 2-4 times a month. I just switched over to a product called Leopard Gecko Calcium Plus, which is supposed to be formulated for leos and contain the proper levels of all needed supplements (including calcium), eliminating the need for multiple products. It's still too early to draw any personal conclusions, but almost all of the reviews I read on it were positive.

80 sounds fine for the cool end. I'd recommend getting a setup where you can get the bulb outside the tank tho. If you decide to keep that tank, think about switching to a heat pad instead of the light. Too many things can go wrong with an in-tank bulb to be worth the risk of keeping one. I'd also take out the glass pebbles. They look too big to ingest, but will likely make cleaning the cage harder. Also, put a hide on the cool side of the tank, and when you put the humid hide in, place that on the cool end also.

I agree with PrettyHate, looks like a Murphy patternless to me. Also looks very healthy. Good luck with him!

I picked up some of that reptile carpet stuff over the weekend and will be re-doing the tank soon. The sand and pebbles are going away. I'm also worried about the pebbles crushing it's feet/toes if they shift while walking. I'm feeling a bit cheap right now so I've been watching CL for a larger tank to come up.

I also got a bottle of the Leopard Gecko Calcium Plus for dusting the crickets as well. I've been feeding them some of the Fluker's high calcium feed and oranges (we have an orange tree in the back yard, makes it easy).

 

[fiveohatch]

Picked up a 30 gallon tank for it today off CL. Now I've got to get to work setting it up and making it look all pretty.

I'm thinking about picking up something else like a scorpion or a centipede for the tank the gecko is in now. I'll have to cruise over to the Vivarium and see if they have anything interesting.

 

[PrettyHate]

One thing I found with leos is that they love to climb if given the opportunity I have lots of sturdy rocks, drift wood and Mag Natural ledges in my tanks. During the day every has their favorite spot to sleep (some in their humid hide, others under rocks/wood, and still others out in the open on a ledge), and at night you can hear them shuffling around!

I use reptile carpet and paper towels for mine. They are pretty clean, and tend to all poop in one corner (that is where I use the paper towels). To clean the tank I use natures miracle - it gets rid of any remaining gecko poop smell.

 

[fiveohatch]

Picked him up for the first time tonight. He was chill considering he freaks out if I just touch him. I'm now comfortable picking him up which is a good thing.

This pic was taken about 3-4 seconds after picking him up for the first time. I handled him for about a minute and all was good.

 

[Kazaam]

You can also use slate tile as underground.

If there's a piece of slate under or near a heat lamp the rock will absorb some heat and the geckos will lay on it to digest their food.

 

[fiveohatch]

Good to know. I'll consider picking up a piece.

He's getting moved into a 40+ gallon hopefully sometime next week and it will be a better setup than he's currently in.

Here are a couple of pics I took of him tonight while bored with my chitty camera.

He knows the sound of the zip lock bag I use for dusting crickets and comes out/perks up when he hears it. It's really kind of cute.

A shot my roommate took of him with his fancy camera shortly after devouring a few crickets (my roommate has an insatiable appetite for them).

 

[lexieboa]

He's brilliant! Iv been so tempted to get one

 

[fiveohatch]

He's smarter than I thought.

I dumped a couple of crickets in his tank earlier tonight and it turns out he only got one of them. I didn't feel like fishing the one out (I don't particularly like touching them), so I decided to try and trick him. I just took the ziploc bag I use for dusting crickets, made noise with it in the tank and he came right out of the hide. The cricket that was in there for hours was eaten in less than a minute.

It cracks me up that he knows the sound the ziploc makes and that it means food.

I also got him into the new tank (it's around 40-45 gallons). He spends most of his time in the two hides but comes out every night and wanders around. He actually has room to move around now.

I also found Plasti-Dip works well for blacking out the sides when sprayed on the outside. It does make the inside kind of mirrored though.