Juvenile Bearded Dragon "Red Phase" behavior

[Austin S.]

Just purchased a 6" for my wife a few days ago, cute little bugger. I will be getting another red out of the same clutch tomorrow.
Just had a funny observation.
We have a home security system, the system comes with an HD in home camera which is linked through my phone. It is in the spider and reptile room keeping an eye on things and noticed the bearded dragon doing a constant slow wave every few minutes. No one is home either, it just looks at the front of the tank and waves, waves at its greens and kale and crickets too. Very weird. We will be moving them into a 75 gal long tank that will be moved into our main living room so they will get use to us.

What do you all think? Time to call paranormal investigators yet?!

Austin

 

[timisimaginary]

the waving is a sign of submission. as the dragon is alone now, the most likely explanation is that it is seeing its reflection and thinking it's another lizard.

also, beardies should be housed in separate cages. especially if they are both males, at some point they WILL fight. i've heard of two females sometimes being able to get along in the same cage if it's large enough, but even then there's always a possibility of fighting or of one dragon dominating the other, resulting in stress and failure to thrive in the dominated individual.

 

[Twentytwenty]

the waving is a sign of submission. as the dragon is alone now, the most likely explanation is that it is seeing its reflection and thinking it's another lizard.

also, beardies should be housed in separate cages. especially if they are both males, at some point they WILL fight. i've heard of two females sometimes being able to get along in the same cage if it's large enough, but even then there's always a possibility of fighting or of one dragon dominating the other, resulting in stress and failure to thrive in the dominated individual.

Males and females shouldn't even be together. I kept my male and female together for a short time, they mated and then he almost killed her. Separate tanks indeed.

 

[Austin S.]

I housed two males from the same clutch together for 2 years and they had no problems. I then acquired a female, made the big tank into a divided one with her on the other end. The males could even see her, but there was no fighting or aggression that took place. Both males mated a few times with her until she was placed into a different tank for laying. Hmm maybe the brothers were secret lovers... :/

---------- Post added 08-13-2014 at 03:19 PM ----------

I know not all individuals are the same and that there is a good 99% chance it wont work, but as soon as I notice any aggressive behavior, they will be separated.

 

[The Snark]

Just something to consider. Some of those security cameras use augmented infra red lighting. While invisible to our eyes, the infra red, just a few watts from an LED source, is darned powerful. An animal that sees in the infrared spectrum can be nearly blinded. Sort of the equivalent of a human being in a room with several thousand watts of brilliant white light shining everywhere. Shade the animal or turn off the camera for a while and see if it acts differently.

 

[timisimaginary]

I housed two males from the same clutch together for 2 years and they had no problems. I then acquired a female, made the big tank into a divided one with her on the other end. The males could even see her, but there was no fighting or aggression that took place. Both males mated a few times with her until she was placed into a different tank for laying. Hmm maybe the brothers were secret lovers... :/

---------- Post added 08-13-2014 at 03:19 PM ----------

I know not all individuals are the same and that there is a good 99% chance it wont work, but as soon as I notice any aggressive behavior, they will be separated.

don't know how many times i've heard this story. almost as many times as i've heard this one: "my lizards have been housed together for years and shown no problems, then today i came home to find one of them dead/maimed by the other one." bearded dragons can live together in peace for years... until the one day when they don't, and then it's too late. unless you are observing your animals 24/7, every single day, you have no way of guaranteeing you will be there to separate them when that day comes. it only takes a minute for irreparable harm or death to occur.

 

[dementedlullaby]

I read that female beardies wave more commonly than males. I have to agree, probably seeing itself as a reflection. My baby (well Juvie now I guess) beardie does it sometimes too.

 

[Austin S.]

I've had both together for quit some time now, seem to be no problems, yet. They do wave at eatchother but that is it.

The bigger problem are our cats. The 75 gal long tank is in our main living room for viewing pleasure, well, so are the cats. The past week has been heck. I even set up a spy cam to view what they do when we are away, horrible idea, because now I want to kill them . We tried the spray bottle, foil, double sided tape, nothing will stop them!! So last night I rigged the two sliding doors that lead to the cat room, they cannot get out now. Poor beardies. BAD cats.

The beardies are about 3-4 months old, once 7 months approach, ill find out the gender of each and go from there. They are fed separately, and both have their own basking area on one side of the tank.

 

[Austin S.]

I'll post a picture of their set up here in a bit.

Anyone know any techniques on getting them to eat their vegies and mix??

 

[Micrathena]

I'll post a picture of their set up here in a bit.

Anyone know any techniques on getting them to eat their vegies and mix??

I know my beardie will stop eating her veggies as soon as I put crickets in the cage, maybe feed veggies and crickets separately?

 

[Austin S.]

Great idea. I'll give it a go.

 

[Austin S.]

Alright. Picture time.

 

[Austin S.]

Continued and a pic of them. Not so red anymore... They both shed recently and the reds gone

 

[Austin S.]

Temps for basking at a stable 109. Cool side temps are a stable 73.

---------- Post added 08-23-2014 at 09:40 PM ----------

How does everything look?

 

[Twentytwenty]

Temps for basking at a stable 109. Cool side temps are a stable 73.

---------- Post added 08-23-2014 at 09:40 PM ----------

How does everything look?

Looks good. 73 sounds low. I believe 85 is good for a cool side. Not positive though.
To get mine to eat greens I just wave it in front of them. One will eat anything in range of his mouth, the other barely eats. The one who never eats usually will eat the greens this way. But beardies seem to have the widest variation between individuals so what works for some won't work for others,

Hope this helps.

 

[Austin S.]

Sorry i should have clarified. Cool side day is close 81 night temps are 73-74. They both refuse to eat greens right now, no matter what i try. Maybe its just because they are babies, well juvies. Ive tried waving it infront of them too. One will eat one piece, the other will run away

 

[dementedlullaby]

The night temps are fine.

Babies/Juvies should only eat about 30% veggies max anyhow. The majority of their diet is still protein for a good long time. As long as they keep munchin' up those cricks/other bugs they'll be fine. Just keep offering it and leave some for them to munch on if they feel like it. Sigh and remove if they poop in it like mine does on occasion.

My juvie has just turned 4 months and does eat a decent amount of greens/butternut squash but every beardie is different. She also goes nuts over peas but I don't offer them all the time. It's hard to get her to eat other stuff that I see adults eating though. You can blanch and freeze some collard greens so you can offer little bits every day and the rest doesn't go to waste. Persistence is the key. I'd expect the one that actually bothers to take a munch to be the more dominant of the two. How much in the way of bugs does each eat? I cut my girl down from three to two feedings recently. The excitement for each meal is ridiculous. She's getting so big, when I got her she was only about 2 months.

Enjoy, they're so cute at this size/age. Little dare devils though.

 

[pyro fiend]

well alot of babies will need weaned onto greens.. some people will make them eat it by only giving them greens for a week..my personal favorite way is puting waxworms [because they are high and fatthey wont care] or lil horn worms in the bowl of alot of greens to make them eat it. eventually they will be sure they are ground up nicely chopped and diced into tiny almost blender servings. [some ppl use a blender] at 6inches i say that a 75 is a bit big for them to hunt ineven if split in half for them theyl need a 55 each one day.. personally i dont condone feeding in same tub if you keep 2 at that age.. as i have had a 2 legged beardie, 1 leg and no tail beardie and a few stumpies from this however living togeather is okay if they are females and then it can still go bad... as for the temps. they seem ok they can tolerate a huge range of temps. so long as its dry and they have some hides your fine

now the waving. has already been discussed. however you may think they are not agressive twards one another but i clearly see it in all lizards. a lizard typically wants as high as can get to uvb and hot spot.. see in your last pic one is off to the side? if you didnt move him hes submitting.. when they are "cuddling" ones showing domminance" also you cant keep track of records as well in a comunity...plus there is not enough hides in there.. there is agression when not seen

 

[Austin S.]

Really appreciate your responses guys!

The fatter one is more than likely the dominant. However, I've seen numerous times where ones on top of the other and a few hours later its the other way around.
I will Def put more hides in there also.
I clean poop every other day, but geeze they can crap. Especially love crapping in their water. (rolls eyes)
I'll try the waxworm salad dish, they are still stubborn as heck when it comes to greens. I've tried, collards, mixed spring, frozen vegies (peas, carrots, and green beans, all thawedout) The bigger guy (one you see towards the very top in one of the frontal pictures) eats like a pig, as where the other one will eat one or two crickets and call it good. They are becoming very use to recognizing the container the crickets are in as when I approach they both jump to the bottom and wait for crickets to be slowly dropped, then they chow down.

 

[dementedlullaby]

A lot of the time when you separate two dragons the one that is less dominant really catches up with the feeding. Two crickets really isn't a lot when they can/should eat 20-30+ in a sitting at a young age. Especially when you dust the crickets, it means that one is getting a lot less calcium/other vitamins. I'd consider splitting them up.

Mine eats around 25 per feeding, twice a day. Sometimes she eats more, plus some other feeders to mix things up depending on the day. I've noticed when it's dark and stormy outside it's like she senses it and eats less on those days. She was getting three times before but now she's a bit older I cut her back. She's a pig. If I didn't order crickets and other feeders online I'd be broke lol .