I wanted to give some information on aggression of female tegus. I am new to the breeding of tegus, but it has been trial and error on this. I am ever learning on the habits of the Argentine tegus. I bred two females this year. As most of you know they had a combined clutch of 63 eggs. I knew about the guarding habits of the females, as well as the aggression they show when they are guarding the nest. I removed them shortly after they laid, as to remove the eggs. I was told by Bert that they will attack and kill any other female that gets close to their nest. The females that laid were pulled away from the male as well, it is said that they will sometimes attack them too. So I had these females in their own enclosures for well over a month. All remains of any nests are long gone. I did not know they would need to be separated until August when it is time once again to hibernate. I put them back in one of my large enclosures with my males and new females. Well let me tell you, they are mean. They were fine at first, but fighting soon broke out. One hour after they were put back in with the others, they started the fighting. They attacked anything that moved. Males and females alike. I broke them up and once again put these two females in their own enclosures. I called Bert, I asked him what was going on? He told me that one in nine females would even guard the nest the following spring. I told him that they were put into a different enclosure than the one that was used for nesting. He said it did not matter, they were on guard regardless. He told me to wait until it is time for the hibernation to begin and let them go into the same hole. I am to watch the next spring for signs of aggression. He said he has over 60 enclosures just for females. I might need to build a few more, next year I will have four gravid females.
