# Newbie with two Beardies



## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Hi all,

Just joined as I've been reading up on Beardies over the past few weeks and bought two females at the weekend.

They're 10 months old and seem to be all nice and healthy! Currently feeding them 5-6 crickets every other day with fresh spring greens and grated carrot every day.

They have a UV light on for 12-14 hours each day and a ceramic heat bulb too. One thing I want to check is night time.. I turn the UV bulb off, and have just been turning the thermostat down to 22c at night. This isn't ideal as I have to do it manually. What options do I have for night time? I'd like to get a timer or something really, although manually is fine for now.

Anyway, a couple of pictures:

























Viv:









The table under it is only temporary, I will be replacing this soon with something a bit taller.

In a year or so I plan to buy a male and breed them, but haven't really even started research on that yet!

Forum seems great from what I've seen so far!

Cheers
Sam


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## gmccurdie (Jun 1, 2012)

:welcome: Nice beardies. Like the one playing to the camera, in the first picture.


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## vgorst (Sep 27, 2011)

As long as your room doesn't get cooler than 65F at night then all heating equipment can be turned off completely at night then turned on (by the timer) in the morning.

Like you've already said you need to research as you can quite easily lose females through breeding. You also have to be prepared to feed and house 20+ little dustbins that don't stop eating, never mind selling them all on! The market is flooded with these guys so be prepared to make a loss. Don't want to put a downer on your plans but make sure you know what you're getting yourself in for


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Cheers guys, I'm not sure what temp my room gets to, bought another thermometer today (so I can have one at each end of the viv) but before I put it in I will test the room temp.

Yeah I know a few things about breeding, that's more of a potential future thing though like I said. For now I'm just going to learn as much about Beardies in general and look after my two as best I can  loving owning them so far!


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## Toggsy (Jul 7, 2012)

If you intend to breed from them then I would suggest housing the male seperately as they can harass the females causing neck injurys through biting.
When mating the male will bite and hold on to the female beardies are not gentle lovers I'm affraid :lol2:
I noticed you said you were feeding carrots daily that's a big no no I'm affraid you shouldn't give carrots to beardies there's a earlier post in this section discussing this.


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Yeah I heard that I'd have to house him separately. That's still a long way off yet anyway.

I read they can be fed occasionally but not daily. They currently have mostly spring greens and a small amount of grated carrot mixed in, I will stop the carrot if it's going to cause problems. Why shouldn't they have it?

Also noticed one of them buried herself yesterday evening for 3 hours or so and she wasn't breathing much, so I moved her, then she buried herself under a log where I left her and she was still there this morning. I think this is normal just wanted to check though.


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## silvermaneuk (Jul 21, 2012)

Hi I read that Carrots are too high in Vit A, which isn't good for them. and thats why they should be a rare treat.

I used this site UK Bearded Dragons Feeding Guide which I found really informative for food guidelines.


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Carrots have been taken out completely now and will be a rare treat as you say 

Cheers for the link to the feeding guide, looks informative, I will have a good read through that later!


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## silvermaneuk (Jul 21, 2012)

Hi, I came across it the other day whilst scratching my own head about what my beardy should eat, as you said its very informative.


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## Jeffers3 (May 18, 2010)

Try feeding them on dandelion leaves and flowers. They love these and they're great nutritionally (and they're free!). Just avoid picking them from anywhere that's likely to have been sprayed with anything and give them a rinse (contrary to popular belief, the British countryside isn't sprayed regularly with Agent Orange).


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## Nitro uk (Jul 21, 2012)

Nice viv there Sam, i'm also a newbie 1st time beardie owner, got 2 of them Rex & Spyro aged approx 9 months, still learning about them now even after having them for around 6 months. 

Jeffers3: Thats interesting I never thought you'd be able to give them dandelions that is good to know! thanks for the tip

Built my own 5x2x2ft viv for mine from scratch to get it how I wanted, pics are here:
Vivarium pictures by Nitro_uk_2012 - Photobucket

James


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## silvermaneuk (Jul 21, 2012)

they love certain flower petals too, that link gives you safe ones.


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## Nitro uk (Jul 21, 2012)

silvermaneuk said:


> they love certain flower petals too, that link gives you safe ones.



Just had a quick look, very informative Thanks!


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Thought it wasn't a good idea to pick things from the wild and feed them in case they have bad bacteria on them or something?

@ Nitro uk - nice viv!! I want to completely re-do mine as I don't like the bark substrate or the cork bark logs (I do like the other big log so that can stay). Want to make a fake rock wall and a few other bits but haven't come up with the design yet.


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## silvermaneuk (Jul 21, 2012)

With dandelion leaves I pick them from my garden as I know there are no pesticides and I give them a thorough wash. I was advised I could do this. Its the pesticides that are the problem.


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

I can feel a dandelion patch growing in my garden... :lol:


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## Revobuzz (Nov 8, 2011)

You can collect dandelions out in the countryside/hedgerows etc as it's pesticides that are the problem. Avoid parks and farms and you'll be fine.

My two loved 'em!


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## Nitro uk (Jul 21, 2012)

SamN said:


> @ Nitro uk - nice viv!! I want to completely re-do mine as I don't like the bark substrate or the cork bark logs (I do like the other big log so that can stay). Want to make a fake rock wall and a few other bits but haven't come up with the design yet.


Sam I watched literally loads of you tube videos of peoples home built viv's and looked on the net as much as possible before deciding how I would do mine, the castle in mine was thought up by my kids!! it's great building your own and saves you a couple of quid too.

James


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## MichaelT (Jan 14, 2012)

You could buy a Habistat Day/Night dimming thermostat and buy a timer and you set it for how long day time then night time on the timer and it sets the habistat into night mode or you can buy a sensor which goes on the window facing outside but these are quite expensive when buying the stat aswell, timer is easier. you control how much you want it to drop before it keeps it at that temp, I Think it goes up to 20farenheit on the temperature drop


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## solid tegs (Apr 30, 2012)

SamN said:


> Thought it wasn't a good idea to pick things from the wild and feed them in case they have bad bacteria on them or something?
> 
> @ Nitro uk - nice viv!! I want to completely re-do mine as I don't like the bark substrate or the cork bark logs (I do like the other big log so that can stay). Want to make a fake rock wall and a few other bits but haven't come up with the design yet.


The way I see it is that when they live out in the wild they would just eat anything they could whether it had been treated with anything and even though these are captive breed they still have that instinct to hunt and find food. Mine have eaten bugs that arent on thier food list when they have been out and something has come along spider and such like one of mine ate a moth too and he is still fine I think its preference for the dragon.
But you have a couple of lovely dragons there keep up the good work.


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## rodgerthealien (May 1, 2011)

Here comes the killjoy!... *imagines jaws music*

You might want to be careful about having them on bark chips is the only thing i was going to say. As you have probably deduced by now.. beardies are not all that accurate when lunging for their dinner! It might be an idea to feed them outside the tank if you are going to keep them on bark, so they don't accidentally get a mouthfull of that!


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## SamN (Jul 17, 2012)

Cheers, already feeding them outside the tank for that reason 

Currently feeding them on the floor but should be getting a second 4x2x2 viv next week to use for feeding and to transfer them to while I clean and re-build my main viv! I'll be getting rid of the bark (and the cork bark logs) as I like the idea of a mixture between slate and sand. One of them likes digging a little and lying in there so I'm not sure I'd want to use slate alone. At some point I will be making some fake rocks so that's another reason for the second viv, to the beardies while I design and make it!


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