U. guentheri - Question

[castelnaui]

Hi you uroplatus specialists,

I bought this spring in Hamm from Fred (user: kanopy) a pair of U. guentheri.

They were about 7 months old. Now,they must be about 10 or 11 months old.

When I got them the male was about the same size like the female or even a bit bigger ...

I keep them seperated because of to early egg producion for the female.

My intention is to bring them next spring (February oder march) together.

In between the female is much bigger than the male ... :? !?
Is this normal? Have adult U. guentheri male and female different sizes, are the females normally bigger ...?


Greats & thx for reply
Peter

 

[Protean]

In my groups of U.guentheri, all the females are larger than the males.

 

[mat.si]

Hi!
I have two adult pairs of guentheri and I must say that they are all approximately the same size.

 

[castelnaui]

Thanks you both! Hmm, two different answers ... :? ?!

At least 'monkey' made the same experince ... for me a bit of reason to make me less worries ...!

Regards
Peter

 

[Protean]

but both answers are very valid. don't just take mine as sole answers. matjaz's animals may be older than mine. it may also be because we may have entirely different set ups. I keep a group of males together and a group of females together so it may be because i have more competition in my groups.

what are the age's of your animals?

jason

 

[castelnaui]

But you have males and females in a group, so there should be in both sides competition ... :? ?! But Your right, I take both your answers as valid!

The age is wirtten above: 10 or 11 months.

I guess one reason would be, that the male is with juvis of O. castelnauis together ... Might be that they are a bit quicker than the U. guentheri male, but I usuallly give just more crickets or what ever to feed. The female was at beginning lonely and is now with one O. castelnaui together ...

They will soon be seperated and have their own enclosure, I suppose the size will equalize than ... But I guess as long as the male feed well and doesn't look specially thin I don't have to worry to much, do I :? :roll: ?

Thanks for your help

Peter

 

[mat.si]

That's interesting.
I will weigh all my animals and let you know their weights.

It looks like your male is growing slower than your female for some reason.

Peter, do you think it's wise to keep them together with other species of geckos?
There might not be any kind of physical aggression, but there might be stress involved for either of the species, which causes your male to grow slower than he should.
I prefer to keep my animals singly (specially males) in a smaller enclosure, than keep more of them together in a bigger enclosure. I would avoid mixing different species, if you are not completely sure that they can coexist together peacefully without disturbing each other, even if they don't actually attack each other.
The terrarium is a small closed space which prevents the animal to move away from any possible source of stress (such as other geckos.)
Stress is the reason for many deaths among geckos.

Matjaz

 

[mat.si]

If anyone is interested, here are my guentheri's weights.
There is no difference in lenghts between males and females, but females are a bit more stocky than males and so there is some difference in weights.

cb 2003 pair:
male: 15 g
female: 17 g (she's probably gravid again)

cb 2005 pair (one year old):
male: 12 g
female: 15 g

 

[castelnaui]

@Matjaz

Thanks for your input!

About keeping the U. together with other species: It's not intendet forever! But til now I don't have the impression he's stressed ... :? :roll: !? He's often seen, curious and feeds well, he's hole behavior desn't look from my perspective not stressed, otherwise I would have changed the constelation loong before ...!

But if I look at your weights, I notice that they're as well different in size (generally) ... :roll:
So I'm curious about the weight of mine 10 months old guentheris ...?! So I have then once to stress them for taking the weights ...

As Jason writes he keeps the males and females together ...? I've read as well in books that males aren't aggressive and it would be possible to keep them together ...
Quite parctical ... :wink:

Once more Thx Mat.si

 

[Protean]

I keep my males and females together because of lack of space. The females have no issues with each other however, I have had to separate males because they are too aggressive. Particularly my striped male. He is too territorial and has attacked two other males. I would separate the animals out to individual cages and not mx species.

jason

 

[castelnaui]

Hmm, sorry Jason I did'nt get that all ... :roll: ?! You keep several males together and several females, as far as I understood your earlier post. And now, you still keep the males together or did you seperated them because of their aggressivity?! Or just the one who was so aggressiv?

BTW: I took them out to take teir weight and I noticed that they have still much to grow!

The female is about 11,5 gramm

and the male about 8,5 gramm

Ooops I had very luck! We took each seperat out of teh enclosure, but for a few time then both were out with/on our fingers/arms and so on. Then the males landed there were just the female was and he already showed his hemipenis, then a few seconds later the female was by incidence jumping next to the male and he - of course - was just beginning with mating :shock: ! This was really quite quick going and what I find very estonish was the fact that it happend out of their cage in a more or less stressfull situation ...
Happily I could them quick seperate ...

Ahh, in this oportunity of observation exactly the animal I noticed a thick part on both sides on their neck :roll: ?! The female had a lot more than the male. Is this the calcium reservation ... :? :roll: ?! I supposed it further in their mouth ...

Thanks

Best regards
Peter

 

[mat.si]

Yes, these are calcium sacks.

 

[castelnaui]

Thx!

Found the confirmation of my supposition in another thread about the same question as well at U. guentheri! But really thanks for reply to the same question for the second time! Could have been, that I didn't noticed it ....

In that case I'm quite content, because the female has really big ones :wink:

Best Regards
Peter

 

[the moof]

haha, das hört sich so falsch an. hahahaa. und das am ende, haha, ich muss mich zwar entschuldigen, aber auf english ist das so lustig. lol

i did a quick google search, and found some interesting pictures of calcium sacks in U. spp, and i must say, some pics were quite impressive.

regards,
*the moof*

 

[castelnaui]

Ach ja, jetzt seh' ich's, funny what could be understood with my sentence ... :lol: But you did understand what I meant :wink:

Yeah, it looks very unhealthy if I look on her neck, but indeed it's anything important ...

Regards
Peter

 

[the moof]

jaja, ich habs schon verstanden. es sah einfach lustig aus.

yes, indeed it is important, and nothing to be worried about