Stunted growth?

laurarfl · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 9:07 am Post subject:

If I take a pic, it looks B/W, but IRL the white is yellowish/green on the head and down the back and tail. It's even more enhanced when she's outside. She has a lot of orange underneath and a bit of orange by her eye. Maybe she's just very colorful!
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Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

Alek · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 5:32 pm Post subject:

That is interesting because my female is almost like a turquoise green on the top of the head it is almost iridescent I will try to get a picture of it also.

teguman1 · Posted: Sat Aug 02, 2008 5:50 pm Post subject:

mines going thrugh one right now hes shedding evry two weeks

laurarfl · Posted: Sun Aug 03, 2008 9:43 am Post subject:

Alek and teguman, how old are each of your tegus?
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Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

teguman1 · Posted: Sun Aug 03, 2008 11:22 pm Post subject:

mine tured 1 on july 4th

laurarfl · Posted: Mon Aug 04, 2008 7:46 am Post subject:

I talked to Bobby (varnyard) yesterday on the phone. We were talking about another tegu, but I mentioned this one with the green. I know the fruit thing is really a hot topic right now, and generally I flee from anything controversial, but I'm going to try a diet change with this one and see what happens.

Right now I offer her fruit with every feeding and she generally takes it. I would say that fruit is probably 1/4-1/3 of the meal on some days, and some days she eats only meat. I'm going to decrease the fruit in her diet, change some of the meats I'm feeding and see what happens to her growth before she hibernates.
_________________
Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

teguman1 · Posted: Mon Aug 04, 2008 3:43 pm Post subject:

its weird mine has that green on the end of his nose but only after it eats

laurarfl · Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 7:56 am Post subject:

Well, I also found out about that green when I switched lights! Under the mercury vapor, she has more greenish-yellow. When I switched her light to a regular white bulb, she looked more black and white. Interesting!
_________________
Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

dpjm · Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 12:41 am Post subject:

Laura,
What about in natural sunlight, does the green and yellow show up there, or just under the mercury vapor? Also, can you explain what the hot fruit topic is?

laurarfl · Posted: Tue Aug 19, 2008 11:06 am Post subject:

Yes, the green does show up in natural sunlight as well.

Feeding fruit to tegus has been sort of a hot topic lately. It was always considered a standard to offer fruit to tegus (except maybe Colombians) at every meal. Some people have cut back on the fruit and some argue that it is not needed at all.
_________________
Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

worldeater · Respected Member Joined: Mar 06, 2008 Posts: 578

i rarely feed fruit just cause groxy hardly eats any of it, and if i mix it into turkey, then she barely eats that! she grabs choice morsels, but the rest stinks up my room while i'm at work.
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1.1.0 Arg B/W Tegu Joker n Groxy
1.0.0 Australian Water Dragon "Spyro"
1.0.0 Red Eared Slider "Turdy"
0.1.0 White Dwarf Hamster "MiMi"
1.1.0 Black&Albino Kingsnakes "Pearl & Hannibal"

dpjm · Posted: Wed Aug 20, 2008 12:25 am Post subject:

That just shows how mercury vapor lamps more closely resemble natural sunlight than incandescent bulbs, at least in terms of the visible spectrum.

My tegu loves fruit, I'll never stop feeding him that, he'd be pissed off. Besides, in the wild they eat around 70% fruit and vegetable matter (T. merianae).

teguman1 · Posted: Wed Aug 20, 2008 3:54 am Post subject:

my tegu loves pears lol he gose crazy when i give him them and then he turns green lol

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one arg b&w tegu oreo
4 dogs ruby, jake, and of corse my rolie
3 rabbits
7 chickens
2 ducks
and 4 breeder rats

laurarfl · Posted: Sun Aug 31, 2008 1:28 pm Post subject:

So, a month later, she is officially a year old and is now 29". She grew 6" in the past month on a diet of whole foods, ground turkey with cod liver oil, scrambled egg offered maybe once or twice, and fruit offered two/three days per week.

She does have a 19" tail, but she is filling out quite a bit, her tail is really fat, and the green is vanishing, even under MV and sunlight. So, now I feel better about her weight when she hibernates.
_________________
Laura R (FL)
0.1.0 Colombian Tegu
0.2.0 Argentine B&W Tegu
1.0.0 Red Tegu
1.0.0 Green Amevia (yet another teiid)
8 other lizards
1 little gator
13 snakes
4 frogs
some bugs
and a partridge in a pear tree

greentriple · Posted: Sun Aug 31, 2008 2:26 pm Post subject:

I asked Tupinambis a Question and here's his response. I'm posting it because I find it to be VERY informative.

"Well, without seeing the tegu, I'd say what you describe is actually natural. Most of these tegus you see in pictures that are large and plump, well frankly, they are obese. Admittedly, many photos of wild tegus I'd describe as skinny, to the point that perhaps they are starving. So it gets hard to tell.

However, the one thing I can tell you is my observations from my research are rather contrary to what most people think of for an active animal. That is, outside of breeding season (about the first 3-4 months post-hibernation), tegus are doing all they can to "shut themselves down". They are hardly that active (sure, they may come out to bask fairly frequently, but that's it, couple hours of basking and they are done for the day) and they hardly eat much. I know it seems logical that they should be building up a lot of energy stores for hibernating, but really, they don't.

For example, from my studies, I divided up the year into five "tegu seasons" based upon the tegus' overriding physiology and behaviour. In central Brazil, it would be different from what you encounter in USA but only in the exact timing, not necessarily the durations. The month of August was when they primarily aroused from hibernation, but they clearly showed different physiology than during breeding season, so I termed this month Arousal from Hibernation. Breeding typically started in September, and related activities and elevated metabolism continued into November, so Sept-Nov was termed Breeding Season or Early Activity Season. December through to about half way through February there was activity, but not a lot compared to the earlier season, the animals generally ate, but not extravagantly, so these months I termed Late Activity Season. The latter half of February through to April, the animals clearly reduced activity, greatly reduced food intake (usually stopped eating all together) and gathered more material for their burrows. I termed this period Entrance into Hibernation. May through July was Hibernation, the animals didn't eat, some occassionally came out to bask. So when we look at this, out of the 12 month year, only 3 months did they eat lots and were highly active, only 5.5 months were they regularly active and ate regularly. For over half of the year, the tegus were either inactive or strangely less active and not eating what one would suspect they should be in quantity. Even when food was available and temperatures were very warm, they simply weren't interested.

All these posts I'm seeing with everyone wondering what is going on, their tegus aren't eating, hibernation season is far off, well, to me they sound exactly in line with what tegus normally do in the wild. In captivity INDOORS, however, they usually behave far far differently"
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