Care Sheet for Geckos: Leopard BreedingAverage Rating Given To This Care Sheet Is 3.00 (1=lowest, 5=highest) Last Updated: 10/05/2006 |
Main Category: | Lizards |
Sub Category: | Geckos: Leopard Breeding |
Care Sheet Submitted By: | Led zep |
Years Experience: | 1 to 2 Years |
Species: | Leopard Geckos |
Other Species or Phases this Care Sheet May Cover: | N/A |
Sexing and Characteristics: | Males will have a bulge around their legs and a kind of V-shaped line of pores. Females don’t usually have it, but "Hot" females sometimes are harder to sex. |
Mostly Active During: | Night |
Substrate and Water Needs: | Eggs -
Use moist moss and dampen when the bedding gets dry or the eggs will dry out and die. HatchRite works very very well. You can get it at Petsmart.
Leopards Geckos -
Use repticarpet, tile, newspaper, or paper towels. DO NOT use any loose substrate or your geckos will have a huge risk of impaction and will die from eating it. No loose substrate is digestible even if it says it is on the package. On the back of the back it will say something like not used for lizards under 6 inches and it is not proven or tested to be digestible. Keep a bowl of water in the tank 24/7. |
Lighting and UVB: | Eggs -
Since leos are temperature sexed, different temperatures produce males and females. 80 F produces mostly females and 90 F produces males. 85 F produces some males and some females.
Leopard Geckos -
Leos don’t need expensive UVB lights because they are nocturnal. Just use the night-glo lights for heat.
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Temperatures and Humidity: | Eggs -
80 F for females - 85 F for a mix - 90 F for males
The Humidity should be around 80% - 90%
Leopard Geckos -
The basking side should be around 90 F and the cool side should be 80 F. At night it shouldn’t go down past 75 F. For humidity put in a humid hide, also don’t spray your leo.
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Heating and Equipment: | Heat mat or a lamp that will keep good temperatures. |
Caging Provided: | Eggs -
Incubate the eggs in an incubator, or you can use a container with a heat lamp or heat mat under it that makes steady temperatures.
Leopard Gecko -
A minimum of a 10 gallon tank for one leo. A 20 gallon is OK for 2, but I prefer a 25, 29, or 30 gallon so they have space. If feeding worms,have a worm dish that worms cannot get out of. Have a water bowl 24/7. Have a calcium dish with pure calcium only. You need 3 hides a most hide on the warm side of the tank, a regular hide on the warm side, and a regular hide on the cool side of the tank.
Hatchlings -
I house my hatchlings all separately. Their substrate is paper towels. Water bowls are plastic jar tops or something like that. Their hides plastic containers with holes in them. Same lighting requirements as adults. |
Diet: | Carnivorous |
Description of Diet: | After the female lays eggs, she will have little nutrients and will be very skinny, so give her waxworms to fatten her up. DO NOT USE PINKIE MICE! They can kill your gecko. Feed the hatchlings pinhead crickets or tiny mealworms that have just shed. Also you can give hatchlings fruit flies. The best staple diets are crickets, mealworms, and silkworms. Give a maximum of 3 waxworms a week, waxworms are addictive and make your leo obese. |
Supplements, Nutrition and Usage: | Give them a bowl of pure calcium. Also dust their food with calcium with D3 2-3 times a week and leopard gecko vitamins 2-3 times a week and the rest of the week give them pure calcium. |
Maintenance: | Ok, when you breed your leos, make sure they are AT LEAST 1 year of age and 50 grams each, but older and heavier is always better. Once you have made sure, put your male into the females tank and watch if they breed, it will look kind of like a fight, the male will bite the females neck and then mate with her. After you are sure they have mated separate them and wait around a month long and your female will lay her first clutch off eggs inside of a container with an entrance filled with moss or vermiculite. Each clutch is from 1-3 eggs at 3 week intervals. The average number of clutches is about 6-8 clutches for the females. After she lays her clutch she will be skinny and needing nutrients, so fatten her up! Waxworms are good, but are not very nutritional. When removing the eggs, do not put the on their side or anything or this will kill the embryo that had attached itself to the top of the inside of the egg. Then put them into your incubator or make-shift incubator and wait somewhere around 60 -80 days for your babies to hatch. Eggs which feel very soft or are wet to the touch are most likely infertile. But don’t discard them yet, there’s always a chance they are good! When hatchlings are born try to handle them as little as possible and put them into your already prepared cages.. You don’t need to feed them for about 2-4 days because they still have nutrients and will eat their shed that comes after around 2 days. |
Some Words on this Species: | It is very rewarding to breed leos, but you must be responsible. Also, do not inbreed leos(inbreed means to breed 2 leos that are related to each other. |
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