[martin day]

ive been thinking about owning a tegu and i had the idea that if i was to ware glove for the tameing down it might be easier and less worried about getting bit or tail whiped
i was thinking of buying two pairs of blue gloves and geting my smell on them not saying that im smelly or nothing ,
im then going to keep one glove in the viv with the tegu at all times so it gets accustomed to the sight of the glove and the smell of me
when i go in the viv to get him used to me by putting my hand near him and rubbing his back i will wear the other pair of the same coloured glove thats in the viv so hopefully when it comes to picking him up he wont be to freaked out
im sure im not the only one to of thought of it and someone else has tryed it if so did or didnt it work

 

[Blazey]

i used a glove with don, the bosc for a while and all it did was make gripping him more hardwork.
just do it with ur bare hands in my opinion, if ur getting a baby, its not going to hurt if it bites u so the glove isnt neccessary essential but u might consider those arm guard things if u dont want to look like a self harmer ive had loads of bosc scratches of Don since ive had him and my boyfriend thinks it looks horrible lol

 

[BELIAL]

you getting a baby or adult?

you really dont need gloves. they will scare any rep more than anything else and to be honest unless they are hawk gloves a big tegu will still pack a punch! you cannot feel the animal properly either through hawk gloves so you don't know how hard you are holding...

long as you handle properly and confidently they are not needed. i have loked after various monitors/tegus (not for a few years though) and would love to say i haven't been bitten but i can't! however it only happened twice! you learn very quickly...

persistance is the key!

 

[Blazey]

and martin, i have now been properly been bitten by don but it wasnt as bad as i was expected.

he bit me cuz he had a small injury though and was a little stressed.

Personally many people often say buy a baby and hold it daily but i held Don a few times a week and bought him when he was over a foot long and he's never been that much of a problem to me. He rarely even whips me with his tail but he never hits me full whack.

On the other hand i could be just fortunate lol

 

[martin day]

it was just an idea since posting ive thought i will just be takeing steps back when it comes to handleing with bare hands as it wont be used to seeing them and mit might think they look tasty ill dith the glove idea i dont mind getting bitten
blazey your not just fortunate i know and so does everyone else on the forum don is very loved perhaps it was just a love bite he gave you
how long have you had him and how big is he now
ive read that you let him roam around your house does he go back to his viv him self or do you have to play catch with him

 

[Razaiel]

I don't go in for excessive handling either (now). The first time I got my bosc I was told to handle him for 15 mins 2-3 times a day and however much he struggled to not put him down as "he would win". Basically a dominance issue. So I tried this for a few weeks and it seemed to work, i.e. he would just sit on me sometimes and go to sleep, that, apparently is the animal "giving up", persistence of this can apparently stress a baby so much it can kill it. The next day he would totally panic on seeing me enter the room and head for his hide and I was always back at square one.

Then I went to reptile rooms and repticzone monitor forums and was told, basically, just leave it alone and let it be. Just let it get used to me fiddling around with viv cleaning duties, water bowl changes etc - just to see me as a source of food and come to trust me rather than seeing me as a big predator that would grab him out of security every time. I was worried that it would never get used to me if I did as they said, but it did actually work. He would come out more in my presence and bask and eat in front of me. Now he will come out and lick me and I can at this time touch him anywhere or pick him up to handle him if I like and he knows I won't hurt him as he's come to trust me. I know he'll never be like a bearded dragon, but then, I love him as a monitor (and I've never been bitten )

 

[Blazey]

he doesnt roam the house as i have a 2yr old brother, but he has free roam of my bedroom and he has a little area where his heatmat and light is rigged up behind the wardrobe where his favourite spot is. he hasnt got a viv at the moment but going to get him a new one for my birthday to leave open for him but he loves behind the wardrobe and being able to climb on the windowsill during the day lol

he's around 28 inches and he was a year old in august. i got him around april sometime i think but may have been later.

 

[Blazey]

Don used to watch Lost lol but i got bored of it so he stopped watching.

 

[Razaiel]

How do you keep Don's humidity up? I wouldn't have thought it would be that possible if he is kept around the room - and the ambient temps have to be pretty high too.

 

[Blazey]

there isa confined area he goes in where the heat stays up pretty well. its not very humid at all as he's never had high humidity. once i gave him a higher humidity and he got a respiratory infection so i brought it down again

 

[Razaiel]

Oohh poor Don My humidity seems to stay at around the 50 mark - my ambients are cool side 80, warm side 90 (sometimes a little more) with basking spot anywhere between 120-135. He pushes it up himself more sometimes when he splashes in his bath and sends the soil all over the place. Mucky bugger!

 

[Blazey]

yeh it took his snotty nose a while to get better lol. he had a big soil pit with his lights rigged over that but he never bothered going in to dig so i put my bed over it and gave him a better hiding place instead as he seemed to prefer hiding under a big fluffy towel lol.

Oh theres my handling tip actually, i used to get don out the viv, give him a little bath, because it calmed him down and because it got his soil off him, and then wrapped him in a towel.

I know it may seem silly but i believe the wrapping him up thing gave him a bit of a sense of security and he settled down much easier, and sticking to this same routine everytime i got him out mustve helped in some way cuz he grew to know the routine in a way.

 

[Razaiel]

They love a soak sometimes Mine got heavy to lift up stairs and into bath and hubby would moan about large lizard claws scratching the new bath tub so I got him a washing up bowl for his viv. He loves it He swims right under the water and gets his head wet too. Can't wait till our Big Viv is finished and he can have an olympic sized pool :lol:

 

[Blazey]

ur bosc was too heavy to lift to the bath? don is nowhere near that heavy! do u know if there is a chart anywhere we're a could see if he's the right weight.

anyway heres a few pics of don, none are that recent, was planning on taking more tonight but he wasnt having none of it lol.

 

[Razaiel]

I love that bottom pic - is that the tail end of a black mouse I can see going down? LOL! Well I guess he wasn't so much heavy really, but strong and the claws dug in - i wear t-shirts always at home, not a good idea when handling savs

I've got some pics but they're on another website - guess I can't link here can I? There doesn't seem to be a gallery area here.

 

[Johelian]

Great advice Razaiel, I cant agree more Tegus are smart, and will quickly learn new ways to deal with different situations. My adult teg was about 10 months old when I got him, and the shop clerk wouldnt try to hold him without a glove. He was also terrified of being bitten or whipped (teg was only about 24" at the time), and so grabbed the tegu by the back of the neck as you would a snake, pressing his head into the ground (luckily, this fellow no longer works at the store, which is otherwise usually quite good). When we brought him home, we always approached him with a low, open hand close to the ground, and didnt pick him up excessively; he was curious, and would eventually come over for a quick scent, after which we were able to move on to holding him more. We have never seen the need to use a glove with him, as he never shows any sign of aggression to handling. I really like the way this seems to indicate that he has responded well to respect and care.

The same went for our young tegu, Orin, who was a demon in the shop and took ages to capture, what with the rolling, whipping and snapping. Since he has come home, he has shown no sign of any of this behaviour; although he does arch his back and huff, just to warn us that hes keeping an eye on us. He never actually follows up on this bluff (its kind of cute actually). Again, the shop method was to try and grab him with a glove; suffice to say, he fought that with all his might.

I think if you get a younger (argentine) tegu, you really wont need the gloves if you take things slowly and sensibly. Possibly when wearing gloves you might become a bit too confident even, and be tempted to push things along too fast because you know you have some protection against any repercussions. Captive bred tegus arent really the bite-first-ask-questions-later lizards that you see in most larger species, which is why they can make such awesome pets. They can hold a grudge though; my Teg loathed the vetinary nurse, who pressed an injection spot once to stop it bleeding. Luckily she isnt at our current practice!

 

[Blazey]

yeh u can link ur pictures on the website, its forums its just a little bit rude to advertise but it doesnt hurt to link some pictures.

it could quite possibly have been a mouse tail, though not black cuz i always feed him white.
he burps like that all the time after his food, he's silly

we also have lizard pictures section where u could post...

 

[Blazey]

i got don when he was a bit older than a baby, more of a juvenile, so i was worried at first when the pet shop said he wasnt handleable and they never got him o7ut, but it just made me want to take him home even more and give him some love and cuddles (and a house he could actually fit in) and he's been pretty good for me since i got him.

i tried a glove at first but it only6 made me lose grip on him and in a way i think he didnt feel familiar with the feel of it so the skin of my hand was much more suitable to him.

 

[Razaiel]

That is such a cute pic I think I'll get a santa hat for mine this year ... :lol:

Actually I don't think I'm allowed to link from the other forum's gallery (even though it's my part of the gallery) - so I won't risk it as I'm currently in 2 competitions there for BP of the Month (which my BP is currently run-away winning) and Herp of the Month (which my sav is in but not winning).

But if you want to you can go to ball-pythons.net forums and look under Site Info you'll see the links to the competitions and my Sav is in it and there are more links from my name to my gallery of critters.

 

[Blazey]

trying to find it lol, everythings everywhere on this website lol


can u PM me the link?!