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Tail and Toe biting! How do I stop them...

A

artfan1

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It seems that after our hatchlings are about 1 week old, they start destroying each other. It's making me sick.

You work so hard to get everything right, then this happens.

We house 4-5 babies in a large Sterilite tub, with sifted sand and a smooth rock under the basking spot.

At the other end is their water, greens, Rep Cal. Then, twice a day, I give them dusted crickets. They are healthy, growing and wonderful but then the damaged tail and feet.

We keep equal size with equal size.

How is everyone else doing it. Are you housing them individually?

Thanks,
Troy
 
I would try housing 3-4 together, and seperate out bigger ones. Don't have anything high for them to climb on, as dangling limbs tend to get bitten a bit more, and feed them more crix/veggies; Also, I would get rid of the sand and keep them on papertowels....
 
I bred beardies for several years, and I never had a nipped baby, not one. I kept 10-12 together and I kept them very well fed. They were rearranged periodically according to size.
From my experience only, I would have a very small percentage of babies that would eat greens at all. The hatchlings were usually 3-4 weeks old for me before they really started paying attention to the greens.
They got crickets 2-3 times a day, and plenty of them. If they ate all the crickets I put in at a feeding, then I'd put in some more until all of them quit eating.
Since I never had the problem of tail nipping, I never had to figure out why it was happening, but I always attributed it to people just not feeding them enough. I think alot of people think their fresh hatchlings are eating the greens when they get hungry and they really aren't.
I provided my hatchlings with a basking area of 110-115°F and at this temperature they have huge appetites.

I agree with Jenn too, get rid of the sand. I kept my hatchlings in bare cages with no substrate at all. This required extra cleaning, but without the paper towels the crickets had no place to hide. A bunch of crickets under the towels still means hungry dragons.
 
Pics of setup, maybe???

I am starting to think my setup might be the problem.

Would you mind posting your setups for hatchlings including substrate, heat and lights?

Thanks,
Troy
 
I no longer have dragons, and have deleted all such pics, but I can describe my previous setup for babies.

I used small sweaterboxes, lined with papertowels, though Clay has a good point about using nothing. I had several of the sweater boxes under one 20gal long screen top to prevent escapes. The heat light was hung a bit above the cages for easy access, and to prevent overheating. I had a small waterbowl, and a coconut hide in there. I kept 3-4 dragons per sweater box, and never had a problem with biting. I had a strip of carboard along one side (longways) of the top, to keep part of the cage cooler.

I fed them as many crix as they would eat at least 3 times a day, and watched each box as I was feeding them. The shy/less aggressive feeders were pulled out and fed seperatly. I offered greens for the dragons as well as any rogue crix to munch on.

I hope this has helped some....

Oh, the temps were 115 for basking, 85-90 warm side, and down to 75-80 for the cooler side.

This setup can be duplicated in much bigger tanks of course, and may be easier to get the temps right in a larger cage.
 
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