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Beardie rescue

Was my beardie stunted by his previous owner?

  • Yes

    Votes: 1 100.0%
  • No

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    1

Beardiemomma96

Bearded Dragon Egg
Messages
1
Hey guys! This is my first post so bare with me. An ex friend of mine made a post online about not being able to care for two bearded dragons and was wanting to rehome the small one she had for free, I jumped at the offer hoping to provide the little guy with a great home and not just go to someone who will get rid of him again. All of my animals have forever homes with me no questions asked, so i go get the little guy. I know absolutely nothing about bearded dragons at this point but there are threads like this and i dont mind doing research. Upon arrival hes in a small dirty tank that he couldnt even be flat on the floor without being curved in some way. His basking log was small and broken and reattached with screws that were broken loose and barely hanging on. There was supposedly an expensive bulb but when we looked it had no uv rating whatsoever which led me to think it was just a normal white bulb. Now my ex friend said he was about 2 years old. Admitted to me that "its okay if you forget to feed them cause i go a few days sometimes and dont remember". He was being fed these weird little pellets. Well we spent alot of money on him and the petstore was having a dollar per gallon sale so we got him a really big tank (50 or 55 gal i think) and forgive me im not too sure on what the names for the lamps are but its a really long light that was almost 100 dollars. I still get mixed up on which light is the uva and which is uvb but anyways he now has both. I feed him a salad mix of mustard greens, turnip greens, collard greens, and some kale.i read meal worms arent good for them but he really likes crickets so he gets a few crickets coated in calcium powder (about 4 to 6 large crickets a day depending on him) and about two or three bowls full of greens. He didnt shed at all for the first month i had him but with a bath twice a week and misting once or twice a day he started to shed. Do you think he may have been stunted from his previous owners negligence? Any feed back is very appricated. He has river rocks, aspen hay, and a sand mat ( not loose sand, its like gravel almost but its not real and its solidly connected to the mat.) I also turn all of his lights off at night time because i read they ultimately like sleeping in complete darkness so i got rid of the extra red light we had. His nails seem to be staying filed from the river rocks and he is passing poo and urates properly. He also use to glass surf but we put up wall siding stuff so he couldnt see himself anymore. I think im doing okay for a first timer with no experience but im gonna post some pictures and if theres anything you notice i should change please let me know. Also i wanna point out i dont have a thermometer in the tank? The room hes in is always 75 degrees plus his basking lamp. I just sort of guaged it by his skin tone, if he was dark id move it a little closer until i found (what i think) is his happy sweet spot.(happy light colors but no mouth gaping.)

Sorry that this post is so long i just can't help but think his growth was stunted and any advice to make sure his new life is 200 times better is appriciated. Thanks
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PatsyB

Super Moderator
Staff member
1,000+ Post Club
Beardie Club
Messages
9,390
Location
Chicago
He doesn't look that small, have you measured him from nose to tail? Obviously not being in the right conditions could affect growth rate, but dragons genetics determine what size they will be. I have a boy that was under the proper UVB and basking and has a healthy appetite but he is a few inches shorter than the other dragons even though he was kept in the same size tank and same conditions.
 

JasperMoon

Hatchling Dragon
3 Year Member
Messages
67
Location
Northern Alabama
Don’t forget to give him a multivitamin as well as the calcium. We just powder the bugs our dragons eat 3 times a week with a mixture of multivitamin & calcium.

We have stick-on thermometers on the back wall of our tanks, one on the cool side & one on the warm side. On the cool side we keep it at 80 degrees & the warm side fluctuates a bit between 80-90. I bought a hand-held laser thermometer to check their basking spots & those usually stay at 100-110. Of course exact temps at any given time depend on the room temperature. In one of the rooms the temps fluctuate more due to where the room is located. I ended up having to put a second heat light in our 40 gallon tanks cause in the winter time the room temps are usually only 65-68, & drop even lower in the one room. But anyway, just some other suggestions... the thermometers I use are inexpensive. I couldn’t go without them cause my room temperature fluctuates too much. In the summer I’ve had to turn both heat lights off. My daughter’s room doesn’t fluctuate nearly as much but one day when I was checking temps I noticed the cool side was too cool & come to find out one of the heat lights had blown. I wouldn’t have noticed without the temperature gauge.
 

BeardedHippy

Bearded Dragon Veteran
Messages
672
Location
Scarborough UK
I would save up for a dimming thermometer for the basking lamp. These keep your temps at the level you set them to by dimming or brightening the light. Very useful and takes all the guesswork out of it.
 
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