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789 Ritt 789 789 Ben Flynn Ritt Field_Herper 789 Field_Herper 789 |
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789 View Profile |
Research Questions
I’ve seen people say feed pinkies only once a week, is it important to feed them a pinkie or can this be dropped and left on insects only? The care sheet here, and I’ve seen in other places, is a debate on UV for ackies. The care sheet says he uses outdoor flood lamps and says they give off plenty of uvb. Everything I’ve read about bulbs and uvb has said that these lights, even halogens give off very little if any uvb past the surface of the bulb. Personally I’ll feel better providing it to them, I’m just wondering if anyone has information about using a regular flood light. Hopefully I can get one soon. There’s some for sale on faunaclassifieds. I plan on seeing if my friend is interested in ordering one now too. I’m off to work on a budget/money planning |
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| 01/04/07 09:21pm |
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Ritt View Profile |
Message To: 789 In reference to Message Id: 1119796 Research Questions
As for food, wild Ackies eat mainly insects and lizards, so they would probably do fine on a variety of insects, assuming the insects are all well fed, such as crickets, roaches and superworms. But why not feed them the occasional pinky? They love them and whole pinkies are pretty nutritious for them, plus it increases variety. Most varanids I’ve seen will take them frozen/thawed too. As far as UV light goes, I’m not sure if flood lights provide UV or not. Some people swear that monitors need UV, and others have animals that are perfectly fine and breeding without it. So whether you provide it or not is up to you as of now, I haven’t heard of any real scientific evidence that it is or is not required. Hope this helps, feel free to ask any other questions. -Eric |
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| 01/04/07 11:09pm |
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789 View Profile |
Message To: Ritt In reference to Message Id: 1119986 Research Questions
I’m wondering if the people running floodlights have a uvb meter and have measured it. For the box size I have to put a litter dam at the front to keep in the soil. I’ve seen an uro enclosure that had buried pvc pipe for tunnels. It was 2 or 3 times bigger around than the lizards. Anyone do this with ackies? Just wondering if they’d use them. Any link about retes stacks? I’ll google it but just in case. I saw the little bit that pro exotics have on their question page. I’ll probably use fiberglass sheets instead of wood. |
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| 01/05/07 12:06am |
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789 View Profile |
Message To: 789 In reference to Message Id: 1120080 Research Questions
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| 01/05/07 11:43pm |
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Ben Flynn View Profile |
Message To: 789 In reference to Message Id: 1121474 Research Questions
Ben |
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| 01/06/07 06:54pm |
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Ritt View Profile |
Message To: 789 In reference to Message Id: 1120080 Research Questions
I haven’t heard of any tests involving measuring of UV output from a floodlight. I don’t know how much a UV meter goes for, but it shouldn’t be too difficult to test UV output of different bulbs. The difficult part is determining how much, if any, UV light the animal needs, hence why there is so much debate about it. I also haven’t heard of someone using a buried pvc pipe with ackies, but most wild monitors, including ackies, are pretty opportunistic, so if they can find an acceptable burrow to hide in, they would take that before digging one themselves. However, burried PVC shouldn’t be necessary, just be sure your substrate can hold a burrow and won’t collapse on your monitor. Even if you do decide to bury pvc pipes, you should be sure your substrate can hold a burrow in case your monitor decides to dig one anyway. Also, you may want to consider if you can put something in the pvc for grip, the insides of those pipes are really smooth. Retes stacks are just a way of replicating rock crevices, so they aren’t very detailed, and the pictures that come up when you google image search for "Retes stacks" (especially the ones from proexotics) should be sufficient that you can figure out how to build them. I haven’t seen any particular plans, as they’re pretty much just stacks of wood sheets with spacers to make crevices, so they can be made using any safe clean scrap material and don’t really need plans. As for a more active forum, Kingsnake’s Monitor forum is excellent and very active. Frank Retes (FR) is very active on that forum. He is VERY knowledgable, and has more experience that almost anyone else when it comes to captive management of monitors. However, he can be very harsh, and tends to have a bit of a "my way is the only right way" attitude. He definitely knows what he’s talking about, so listen to his advice, but don’t take what he says too personally. Hope this helps. -Eric |
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| 01/07/07 03:12pm |
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Field_Herper View Profile |
Message To: Ritt In reference to Message Id: 1123520 Research Questions
Of course, he often admits that he likes to poke fun at academics... Ryan |
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| 01/07/07 05:45pm |
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789 View Profile |
Message To: Ritt In reference to Message Id: 1123520 Research Questions
There is not a single pet shop within nearly an hour drive. There is a UVB meter that is designed to read only the usuable part of uvb band that is $200. A meter for measuring UVC is near that amount, as well as the UV broad meter. These pipes were in with uro’s and they used them a lot and didn’t seem to burrow otherwise. Differn’t animal I know. It seemed like they were all short pieces of pvc with couplers so that it was like rungs on a ladder. Of course I’d make sure the soil would be safe too. I guess it’d be risky unless it’s really big diameter with very slight angle turns to it. I might try that forum. I’m looking at possibly rescuing a savannah in which case i won’t be getting an ackie. Lots of things are still up in the air for me though. Thnaks |
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| 01/07/07 06:43pm |
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Field_Herper View Profile |
Message To: 789 In reference to Message Id: 1123831 Research Questions
As far as PVC piping goes, I firmly believe that they recognize the difference between these artificial burrows and their own. They know what they have dug and that they themselves dug it. They very often recognize these burrows as their main hiding spot (their lair, if you will), rather than some sort of crevice above the surface. Another added benefit of real burrows that the animal makes is that they can choose what kind of conditions that their burrows will have (if you choose to allow a wide range of options, as you should). I also question the safety of the use of PVC piping. If you need to access the animal and they are in true burrows, you can easily dig them out. But if they are in the piping, you must take apart all of the piping and you could easily injure the animal in the process. Just my opinion... Oh, and uros and monitors are not really that different besides diet. They are both burrowers. Uros also share a similar desert habitat as many monitors (but, as far as I am concerned, you could keep a desert monitor/uro in the same caging as an Indonesian monitor and vice-versa, as long as they have a wide range of temperature and humidity options). In fact, I believe that they share some of the very same habitats as some monitors, like albigularis. I am not sure of the ranges of either, though. Ryan |
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| 01/08/07 12:51am |
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789 View Profile |
Message To: Field_Herper In reference to Message Id: 1124450 Research Questions
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| 01/08/07 09:59am |
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