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New to geckos

lucille said:
I'm glad to see you reading my post, Chuck.....
Click to expand...

Ho ho ho there ya go. I pretty much read it all, Lucille, even the stuff from the ones I don't care much for.

I have an idea. Why don't you invite Ev for a cup of java over in one of your pink love forums and shower her with some positive reinforcement and praise. You're good at that.
 
OK, sugar; but you got to take a karma IOU, I've given out all I'm allowed for today. :)
Speaking of paper towels, I started using the premium kind instead of the cheep discount kind, I think they are a tad more heavyweight and fit in the tubs better. Do y'all notice any difference?
 
Yea I would avoid the sand until he/she is more than 6 or seven inches long. Other than that toss in a calcium dish and a humid hide and your set. Have fun.
 
If you are worried about aesthetics, I'd go with tile. I have vinyl sticky-tile on the bottom of one of my aquariums (since it weighs FAR less than regular tile)and it looks really nice. Only thing is, once you stick it to the bottom, the aquarium is pretty much stuck with it. But, the geckos certainly can't eat it, plus it is really easy to clean and cut-to-size. I personally think it looks better than sand. PLUS! It's really really cheap! :)
 
Wow what happen to this thread? Well I am glad that you switched over to paper. There is also the option of vinyl tile or slate tile. I totally understand where you are coming from I spent 30$ in sand 40lbs of it. This was before I bought my geckos. I wanted to give it a "natural" look to the tank. If you read about leopard geckos their natural inviroment doesn't involve the sand that we buy from stores. Leopard geckos live in rocks and crevices and whatever sand that is out there is VERY VERY fine as fine as dust. I suggest if u want a good book buy the one Ron Tremper has out now or just get the one written by Robbie Hamper either one is good. Ron's book is more detailed with tons of pictures and Robbie's will cover the basics. So in my quest for looking for a natural habitat I came on to this forum to ask about substrates. I got flamed horribly, forget about it :) so I decided to go with a vinyl tile that looks like a rock. There are pleanty of kinds out there. Oh yeah a quick word of advice about sand. I noticed that leo's that are kept on towels hold a better color then leo's with sand. I have a friend who bought an adult leo and kept his on sand and the colors dulled out so much that can also be why your leo's colors turned greyish if he aint shedding. Well here is a picture of my tank after I just finish tiling it.
Picture064.jpg

and here is a picture of my wallunit converted rack system.
Picture011.jpg
 
i agree on the sand issue but it also depends on what sort of sand you have in the enclosure. never ever under any circumstance use regular play sand, it is way too coarse for the gecko to ingest. if you really want to use sand though i would use repti-sand from zoo-med, it is the finest grind that i have found so far. it can be passed particularly well by larger geckos. any way i would definetly use paper towel for a guy that small, it is the only safe way to correctly house a baby leopard gecko.
 
I do have him on the paper towels. i had purchased the repti-sand. Depending on what i decide later, i may as for more opinons on the sand (when Hektor is older) or more options for flooring.
 
TILE TILE TILE!!! lol Tile is an ideal substrate for these guys! It's easy to clean, very inexpensive (generally less than $2 per tile), hold/transmits heat well, looks good, nothing can get under it, it can't be injested, its more natural than sand, its sanitary.... I'm a big tile fan :) Kudos for taking everyone's advice and getting hektor off the sand. He is a cutey btw.
 
Tile!!!!!

StinaUIUC said:
TILE TILE TILE!!! lol Tile is an ideal substrate for these guys! It's easy to clean, very inexpensive (generally less than $2 per tile), hold/transmits heat well, looks good, nothing can get under it, it can't be injested, its more natural than sand, its sanitary.... I'm a big tile fan :) Kudos for taking everyone's advice and getting hektor off the sand. He is a cutey btw.
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Thanx. Hektor has been shedding lately and his pattern is changing. I wonder how much it will change. Are you talking about the slate tiles or the vinal adhesive kind?
 
ceramic or vinyl mainly (slate is good too...but is porous and more likely to harbor bacteria. I prefer ceramic tile (not glossy....its slippery), but vinyl is good if your tank won't fit ceramic tiles (ceramic can be cut at the store though) as the vinyl tiles can be cut with a pair of scissors.
 
Hmmmmm

I must find a place where i can find my tile. I will look in the phone book tomorrow
 
Im glad to see you switched over. Please do not switch back. There is no sand that is completely safe for leos.

Leos do not swim in 3in of sand like pet stores would like to have you think. They live on rocky outcrops where the dirt is hard and packed down. Sand is unnatural for leos.

If you want a more natural habitat use slate. Its fairly cheap and you can use extra pieces to make caves and whatnot.
 
good going on switching it to paper. much safer. i myself use washed playsand that i sift 2 times after i even open it threw two smaller sifters and i use that in 2 of my display tanks. so far no impaction but i also feed them from a dish. i throw in slate tiles with the sand to make it more realistic. there habitat its not really sand but mostly rocky hard ground. so tiles will be best bet if you want natural in future. good luck with him. and his pattern will change a lot from what you see him as now. his black patterns will fade to black spots. if hes a normal, which looks like it.
 
he is spotting now. he had had some trubble getting the dead skin off his face so i pulled it off and let my goddaughter hold him while i gently rubbed his feet to get the dead skin off
 
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