Care Sheet for Geckos: LeopardAverage Rating Given To This Care Sheet Is 4.00 (1=lowest, 5=highest) Last Updated: 02/25/2004 |
Main Category: | Lizards |
Sub Category: | Geckos: Leopard |
Care Sheet Submitted By: | Roachey56 |
Years Experience: | 3 to 5 Years |
Species: | Leopard Gecko |
Other Species or Phases this Care Sheet May Cover: | Leopard Geckos |
Sexing and Characteristics: | Leopard geckos generally reach around 9 inches in total length, although there is a morph called Tremper giant which averages about 12 inches in length. Sexing a leopard gecko is very easy once they become adults. There are numerous sites which tell you how to sex a leopard gecko. |
Mostly Active During: | Night |
Substrate and Water Needs: | For a substrate the best substrates are: paper towel, newspaper, and cage carpet. I advise against using particle based substrates for your leos because if ingested can lead to the impaction and death of your leo. There is no particle based substrate that will never cause impaction. If using a particle based substrate you MUST feed ONLY mealworms in a dish. And provide proper hides. If it burrows it has bad hides.
Provide a shallow water dish filled with chlorine, chloramine, and metal free water daily. Do not fill it with tap water as that contains all three which are deadly to herps. Use either bottled water or use treated tap water which is treated with fish tank water conditioners. |
Lighting and UVB: | Leopard Geckos require no UVA or UVB. Provide a day/night cycle by having light on for 12 hours and off for 12 hours. |
Temperatures and Humidity: | Tempatures should be 90-92 degrees on the hot and 80-82 degrees on the cool side. Temperatures should be measured at substrate level and can be easily known by using a digital thermometer with probe.
Humidity should be between 20% and 30%. During your leopard geckos shed cycle you should mist your gecko with water once or twice a day during the shed cycle. |
Heating and Equipment: | Heating is most easily done by having an infrared lamp on the metal screen top radiate heat downward, that is the best way to heat cages with colder room temperatures of between 60 degrees and 70 degrees. With warmer room temperature of 70 degrees to 80 degrees it is most easily done with and under tank heater (UTH) that covers between 1/3 and 1/2 of the tank bottom. When using an UTH you should always have it connected to a thermostat with a probe, because most UTH’s heat up to 110 degrees which can seriously burn your leopard gecko. When using a heat bulb you should always have it hooked up to a lamp dimmer switch if your gecko can come within 2 inches of it, i recomend you have the dimmer switch with the heat bulb no matter what. Under tank Heaters are the best heating devices for leos. I suggest using a Human Heat pad/s that cover half the bottom of the tank. Set it to medium and hook it up to a thermostat set at 90 degrees. |
Caging Provided: | Caging is most easily provided for a single leopard gecko with a 10 gallon fish tank with a metal screen top. for mulitple geckos you need a minimum of 150 sq. inches of floor space. |
Diet: | Carnivorous |
Description of Diet: | Feed your leopard geckos every day as much as they will eat.
Leopard geckos in captivity eat mainly three different things; calcium dusted crickets, calcium dusted mealworms, calcium dusted superworms/ kingworms (NOT giant mealworms). For a leopard gecko under 7 inches in length feed as many aproipreately sized (3/4 of the length of head and 1/2 width of head) crickets or mealworms. Until leopard geckos reach 1 year old dust the food source with a calcium supplement daily and a vitamin supplement weekly. IF you do not provide the calcum supplementation your gecko might recieve Metabolic Bone Disease (MBD) which can lead to pain and death of your gecko. After one year of age calcium supplement every other day and vitamin supplement once a week. You can feed superworms after your gecko reaches 7 inches long.
The best diet for leopard geckos is crickets because they are easily digestable. Superworms (after your gecko reaches 7 inches) are the 2nd best food source because every part of them is easily digestable except the head. Mealworms are the hardest food item to digest for leopard geckos due to high chtin content. I recomend feeding a variety of crickets, superworms (once 7 inches), and mealworms with crickets being feed most often. Do not feed more your leopard gecko more than 2 waxworms a week because they are extremely high in fat and are very addicting so your leopard gecko might not want anything else. |
Supplements, Nutrition and Usage: | When your gecko is under 1 year of age:
Calcium dust at every feeding (every day) and once a week dust with a vitamin supplement.
When your gecko is over 1 year of age:
Calcium dust at every other feeding
Vitamin dust once a week.
Some calcium supplements are:
rep-cal
rep-cal+D3
Minerall (best one)
Vitamin supplements:
Reptivite (my favorite)
Heptivite |
Maintenance: | Water change daily. Feces cleaned out immediately. When you get your leo i suggest watch where he poops and then put a small piece of paper towel where it poops so you dont have to touch the feces. I suggest "soaking" your leos on 3-4 layers of wet paper towels once a week for 1-2 hours. Make sure the water is room temp and that the paper towels are wet and there is little "pools" of water on the paper towels.
They need to be handled at least once a week but i suggest every day.
Cage needs to be completely cleaned witha 1:10 bleach to water solution once monthly. |
Some Words on this Species: | Leopard geckos are one of the easiest to care for and most interesting species of herps. These make a great first herp. |
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