black throat breeding(help)

ive always been into black throats ive had a few. ive had my male since it was a baby very good looking lots of oranges and yellows so i figured id get him a female. so right around three months ago i got him a pretty good looking girl. shes quite a bit bigger than he is probably by a little under a foot. i introduced them twice they seemed fine both times. so two weeks ago i put them together in a big outdoor cage which is where they will remain. but today i saw the big female(hopefully a female) kind of get to the side of the smaller male and biting the males two front arms. it didnt look agressive at all. it actually looked very soft and didnt even seems to bother the male one bit. so i guess my question is is this mating behavior? is she showing him whos boss? or is this just something thats not a big deal at all. this is my first go around with black throats so any ideas or suggestions will always help. thanks

Are you certain you have a pair? That's always going to be the first question. Monitors are notorious for being hard to sex.

Mating behavior is normally on the part of the male, not the female. The male should be approaching the female, climbing on her, shaking his head in little jerks back and forth near her. She should be fairly passive, or responding by moving away or kicking him.

I've not seen the female mouth the male in any breeding behavior. I'm not saying it couldn't be some sort of breeding behavior.. but it's nothing that I've personally seen.

I would keep a very close eye on any mouthing. It could be that the change in venue(being outside) is causing them to be excited. Excited monitors often act out in aggressive ways. Also, be certain you can keep the temps warm enough overnight, and during cold snaps.

Good luck.

About how big is your male? I have been told by a black throat breeder that females stay a foot or so shorter then males and normally dont reach 6ft and stay usually around 5ft at the most. I have a sexed female black throat that is about 4ft right now and is about 1yr and 4 months old. If you know anyone that can her or even both to make sure would be best. You could have some trouble if you have 2 males trying to dominate each other.