Can anyone verify this?

[Limberger]

Here's my story: So after deciding to purchase a crested gecko about a month ago, I have been doing my research diligently.

There is a reptile expo that comes around to my city about every 2 months (the last one being a week ago). I decided that I would buy all the habitat related items (tank, substrate, thermo/hygrometer, fake plants, etc) at the convention that was last week - and I did. I would then buy the gecko itself at the next convention, in mid-November.

I was planning on getting a 18x18x24 exo-terra, however one of the breeders I spoke to said that a 12x12x18 was perfectly acceptable so I bought that one instead. Is this correct?



I am also planning to buy a second gecko In February. Here's the plan:

-If my first gecko turns out to be a male, then I will buy a sexed female and house her in an 18x18x24 ET. The male would stay in the 12x12x18 but would be placed with the female occasionally for breeding purposes.

-If the first gecko turns out to be a female, I will buy an unsexed one. The female would live in a 18x18x24 and depending on the outcome of the sex of the second gecko, it would either join the first gecko in the 18x18x24 if it where a female, or be placed in the 12x12x18 if it where a male.


What the breeder essentially told me was that if I have two geckos, male and female, then I should keep the female in the larger tank to keep her from getting stressed out by the male. The male on the other hand, even if he were a full adult, could be safely kept in the smaller tank and only placed with the female during breeding.

In a situation where both geckos turn out to be female, they would both live in the 18x18x24 tank and I would purchase a third, a male, and keep him in the 12x12x18.

I apologize beforehand if this seems a bit confusing.

 

[ciliatus]

Id say the minimum for an adult single male would be be 18x18x24. I use 12x12x18 for juvies.

Regards

Ingo

 

[PassPort]

I've kept breeding pairs and yearling trios in 12x12x18 when necessary with no visible stress or aggression. I prefer to keep my animals in the ZooMed 18x18x18 tanks. I'll soon be constructing my own tanks soon and the size I've worked out for the cresteds will be 14x16x20. I think that'll be more than adequate for a breeding pair. I might even make the height 24".

My Oedura and Eurydactylodes tanks will be probably end up 12x16x18, but we'll see. All in all I have to build about 40+ vivs and I'll need about 5 different sizes:
small arboreal/small terrestrial (12x16x14)
medium arboreal (12x16x18 )
large arboreal (14x16x24)
medium terrestrial (18x16x14)
large terrestrial (24x16x14)

let me know what you think

 

[ciliatus]

Well you can also keep cresteds in shoeboxes and they might not suffer visibly (for you) from it. But once you have seen how they use larger cages, specially available height... I keep my animals mainly in Setups that are 20x20x30 or even 20x20x40. In the end they are still an arboreal species.

regards

Ingo

 

[cadie]

I use a 22 gallon reptarium (14.5 x 14.5 x 25) per adult crested, which could probably house 1 pair of adults comfortably... but I just prefer to give my cresteds more room since they are semi arborial.

Rule of thumb is 10 gallons per adult.

at least 20 inches tall is what I would recomend to house a single adult. I wonder why the breeder you talked to said male cresteds need less room than females? In my opinion and experience that is false. They should each get the same amount of room as the other. Males can get just as stressed as females when it comes to enclosure size.

hope that helps

 

[ciliatus]

but I just prefer to give my cresteds more room since they are semi arborial.

Hi Cadie,

i am with you in most of your points. But could you please explain why cresteds are semi arboreal?

regards

Ingo

 

[cadie]

Hello Ingo,

I read it in the "allmighty Rhac book" lol page 20 of the American copy

I think they are labeled semi-arboreal because they dont really spend their time in the canopys such as the leachies but more of the shrubs or smaller trees that are under 9 ft.

 

[Hilde]

If given a chance, cresties will happily curl up on the ground in leaf litter. Notice their markings and colours in the wild type. It's perfect camouflage for hiding in fallen leaves and twigs. They do spend time in trees, but they don't stay there primarily. By contrast, gargoyles and leachianus can blend in almost perfectly with tree bark, they spend almost their entire lives up high, venturing to the ground only when they must.

An example of crested gecko camouflage .... find the cresties....

A gargoyle would stick out like a sore thumb in those pictures, even if he was partially covered.

They aren't as hard to find once the leaves get really old, but they still like sleeping in the litter (there are 3 cresties curled up in the first two pictures).

 

[ciliatus]

The "Rhacbible" says they are semi arboreal, but in the next sentence says:

"Our experiments with keeping crested geckos in planted vivaria did confirm Henkel and Seipp's observations that given the opportunity most will spend the day coiled in foilage. If kept in vivaria with no plants, these geckos will hide under shelters during the day and emerge at night."

According to books of Willi Henkel und Wolfgang Schmidt and also by the book of Robert Seipp and Willi Henkel and also by the book of Stefanie Bach, or R. D. Bartlett, or H. Roesler, or W. Schmidt, or Klusmeyer, or Kullmann they are arboreal. They life in rainforests with about 15m tall trees and spend the day cureld up high in the trees under foilage. Henkel thinks this might be due to predatory pressure through R. leachianus. During the night they come down to hunt in lower bushes.

Whereas aurics rather spend more time near the ground in total.

I talked to Willi Henkel myself multiple times about ciliatus and their habitat. He told me, that they are very hard to find, because they spend most of the time so high up in the trees. Very few of my animals sleep near the ground, imho they will dig themselves in the ground if temp or humidity isnt right, except for a few individuals.

regards

Ingo

 

[PassPort]

my animals spend much of their resting time hanging in the leaves of weeping ficus or in between draecenia leaves. occasionally I'll find them curled up at the base of a pothos or buried in leaf litter, or even in the bark substrate. when kept on soil I have found them digging in the substrate as well with just a nose poking out.

my aurics on the other hand do spend much of their time near the floor of the cage, and are normally laying stretched out on grape wood or thick jungle vines. occasionally find one curled up at the base of a pothos or even curled up in the middle of a birds nest fern.

my sarasins are closer to a crested in behavior (obviously) and like to lay in between the large leaves of a fiddle leaf ficus or sometimes a rubber tree (they prefer the fiddle leaf). my animals have ignored ficus or any other trailing vine. they also like to burrow in the substrate, preferring soil to leaf litter. my one female likes to wedge her self into bamboo tubes, but most of the time the par can be found sleeping side by side, nose down on a glass wall of the cage.

 

[cadie]

Hilde, love that naturalistic gecko setup and the cresties seem to like it too those last too pics of yours are super cute!:banana:

 

[ciliatus]

Hilde,

could you post pics of the whole setup?

@Cadie

i see leaves and fakeplants. Does that mean naturalistic for you?

greets

Ingo

 

[PassPort]

Hilde: what sizes are your vivs and how many animals do you keep per viv? I never really keep my animals in harems, normally just pairs.

Ingo: I think I've worked it out to 15x15x30 for my adult pairs, do you think that size will be good? I'd appreciate any feedback, as well as viv pics

 

[cadie]

yes ingo usually decomposing leaves, plants, and soil substrate means "naturalistic" or "imitating nature or the usual natural surroundings" IMO...

ofcourse not the fake plants:roll:... I was speaking more of the leaves and soil on the bottom of the cage

 

[ciliatus]

Ingo: I think I've worked it out to 15x15x30 for my adult pairs, do you think that size will be good? I'd appreciate any feedback, as well as viv pics

Hi,

well that is what i would consider a minimum for a pair, for myself.

Here are some viv pics, but i got to say, i dont keep it as heavily planted as i would like to, and i dont put plants in the ground, just to find eggs easier.

Here the cages in my livingroom, in the 2nd from the left, ciliatus are kept in.

not the ideal plants because a ficus is missing, but ive kept ciliatus also in this setup:

not a new pic of my main breedergroups cages, the plants have grown since:

and finally my outside enclosure during summer:

regards

Ingo

 

[Limberger]

Thanks for the help guys.

One more (unrelated) question:

What is the difference between the Repashy CGD marketed by T-Rex and the one found in the silver pouches, if any.

 

[PassPort]

thanks a bunch Ingo, I'll be starting on my new vivs soon!

 

[ciliatus]

Thanks for the help guys.

One more (unrelated) question:

What is the difference between the Repashy CGD marketed by T-Rex and the one found in the silver pouches, if any.

The Repashy CGD has a new formula which is better accepted by the geckos. Plus Repashy has a Multi-Flavor-System.

@Kevin

you're welcome

regards

Ingo

 

[Hilde]

I don't have pictures of the enclosure handy, and the tank broke, so I had to replace it and re-do it. However, that tank was a standard 35 gallon tank for the 1.2 group. Ther substrate was a thin layer of potting soil and coco-fibre mixture covered with leaf litter. The geckos had a choice of 8 'real' wood branches which were propped at different angles, held in place with silk vines. The middle section of the tank (about 1/4 of the way up from the floor to about 1/4 from the top) was filled with silk plants, the upper reaches and part of one side were almost bare so they could jump around (something they love to do). If I can still find the pictures I took of the tank, I'll post them.