caresheet

[gmmuscle91]

i might be getting a baby leopard gecko and was wondering if anybody knew where a good caresheet for them is online. thanks!

[Jeanne]

http://ball-pythons.net/modules.php?...ewarticle&id=8

When you are in need of a caresheet, you can look through our list.

[Gecko Den]

No offense to the author, but that care sheet has a few bits of advice that you probably are better off not following. I suggest skipping that care sheet and picking up a copy of The Leopard Gecko Manual.

[tigerlily]

Which bits? Why don't you say which parts, so that we can either correct it or maybe we'll disagree?

[Gecko Den]

Which bits? Why don't you say which parts, so that we can either correct it or maybe we'll disagree?

Hi Christie,
Since you asked, based on my experiences and information gleaned from other breeders, I disagree with the following excerpts from the care sheet:

Keep in mind, I read this care sheet as if I was a total Leopard Gecko newbie looking for advice prior to getting my first gecko.

Food: The care sheet calls for crickets to be the main diet and mentions further down in the paragraph that mealworms "may be fed once a month". This seems to imply that mealworms more than once a month are bad for the gecko. This is simply not true, in fact geckos that were exclusively fed mealworms for the first few years of their lives are the ones that have obtained most of the longetivity records. That being said, a variety of food items seem to make happy, healthier geckos. I have had excellent results feeding a varied diet of mealworms, crickets, superworms and silkworms to my geckos. I am consistently complimented at shows on the overall size and healthy look of my geckos compared to other vendors.

I also think the advice on supplementation is lacking. While dusting the food item at mealtime is a good way to get extra calcium and vitamins to your gecko, crickets will knock most of the dust off with in the first couple of minutes. Buying a dozen crickets at the petstore, shaking them in a bag of calcium and feeding them to your gecko is not going to provide your gecko with all the vitamins he needs. The absolute best way to ensure your geckos are getting the proper nutrients from the food item(s) is to gutload the food item(s) prior to feeding it to the gecko. "Baby chicken starter mash" alone is not sufficient for proper gut loading of crickets. I would suggest also gutloading using carrots, kale or spinach, squash or even yams. This also has the added benefit of providing a source of water to the food items.

I won't get into the whole sand as a substrate debate. Personally I don't like to use any of the loose substrates, but that is based on my opinion, plenty of others will disagree.

Breeding. I think it would be important, since the care sheet goes into breeding, to add a paragraph related to quarantining new geckos prior to introducing them into your collection. Also, the section on breeding states" a clutch will consist of 2 to 4 eggs". That is inaccurate, while clutches of one egg are common, especially in first time breeders, a clutch consisting of 4 eggs is unheard of. I have been unable to find an example of a four egg clutch in any literature, and to be honest I'm not sure it is physically possible. In any event it would be such a rare occurance I don't think it should even be mentioned. The way it is stated in the care sheet, beginning breeders would start to think there was a problem with their geckos when they got single egg clutches and never saw 3 or 4 egg clutches. As for the specified dates of "breeding season" there is no real "season" as they can be bred at any time of the year, as long as the females are given a 3-4 month recovery time in between. May also want to mention that one or two copulations is all that is necessary to fertalize for the duration of egg laying as females retain sperm throughout. What is important is to mention that minimum weight for a female to breed should be 40+ grams, 50 grams or more being preferred as laying eggs takes a lot out of the females. While females are capable of breeding at 30 grams, long term the drain on the female from breeding at a smaller size will affect her growth, clutch sizes and how long she will be a viable breeder, breeding a female that is too small also can cause death due to egg binding. Males should be bred no smaller than 30 grams.

I would also mention that it is important to mark the top of the egg when moving it to the incubator. Once the embryo settles into the egg it is important that the egg not be flipped for any extended period of time as the baby can drown on it's own egg fluids. This is especially important if one egg box per female is used in the incubator as hatchlings will often kick around and move unhatched eggs prior to the hatchling being removed from the incubator. Lastly, the incubation temps are pretty good except for the part about incubating at 92 deg. for males. Anything above 90 deg. is asking for trouble and that extra 2 degrees can sometimes prove fatal. At 89-90 deg. I get a 99% male sex rate, so there isn't really a need to take the extra risk at 92 deg.

There you go, as I said, I wasn't trying to offend the original author, I just felt some of the information was inaccurate and could lead to problems for a new gecko owner.
Sam

[tigerlily]

Sam, thank you for taking the time to post that. It always helps to have new input, and keep things as up to date as possible.

[Gecko Den]

My pleasure...