Can you mix different reptiles in the same cage?

I agree...you can keep ONE Male house gecko, and up to nine females...never mix males...at least this is with leos...i believe this pretains to both houses and leos, aswell as beardy's and anoles

 

That is an old myth that has been around for quite some time and actually started with the super worms. By the time a worm makes it into the throat of a lizard it's pretty well chewed up. If you have ever watched a beardie or leo chomp on a mealie there will be no doubt that the worm being alive enough to chew it's way out of the lizard is funny.

 

Correct Stormyva

 

i just said that, stormy!!! well, not exactly . . . anyway, i can see it being possible with many amphibians which do not chew their food, but i would doubt it with most reptiles.

 

We must have been typing at the same time.... looks like georgeman edited his post to remove that though

 

yep. i know how that is!

 

This isn't true. Very simply put, birds live in trees and yet eat ground dwelling bugs. Go figure. Thats nature.

I support this. It is an old wives tail. There are parasites that can do this though. And the tough to digest mealworm does make life any easier for an animal infected w/such a parasite.

Keeping mixed species is a gamble. It rarely works out, especially when you only have generic facts to go on. If you are really familiar w/a species and the specimen you have, the possibility is there but is it really worth the chance?

LOL! I'd say ask my anole but I can't. The frog ate him, and neither of them were competing for the same niche, just a place on the food chain.

Sharon

 

Meal worms dont stand a chance against a gecko

 

So what do I do, feed it mealies? by the by, I found out it is an anole that I have.

 

wait so you do not have a house gecko??

 

I've kept different amphibians and reptilpes in a "community" tank before. I had an 80 gallon aquarium and had 1 clawed frog, 2 green tree frogs, 1 grey tree frog, 2 fire belly toads, 2 fire belly newts, 2 green anoles and 1 Chinese lacerta. I had a small water section changing into a moist section and then becoming drier. I fed everyone small crickets and waxworms. There was also a combination of live and plastic plants and that made it a cushy little place for the inhabitants. They lasted about 6 years with me moving the last survivor into his own 20 gallon tank before he died a few years ago. The only fatality I had when they all lived together was from a house gecko, he drowned... which was wierd cause there was an island and lots of places to get out so no one would drown (I had a spring peeper drown in a water bowl when I was less experienced once, before this, so I took precautions). Each pretty much stayed in thier own little section, and there was a lot of room so that is probably a reason I didnt have many problems. I will probably never do that again though, it was hard work. Cleaning the tank was a pain in the bazoogy. Storing the animals during cleaning was nutso as well, I had to seperate them because they didn't seem to get along in close quarters. When they were fed I had to make sure each one was getting enough food too. The good part was that I was watching my own living jungle.

Don't try this at home, it's not good to mix species, but I didn't know at the time.

 

any food item for geckos should not be larger than its head. if the mealworms are as big or bigger than your geckos head (in diameter), then you should not feed them to your gecko. if your gecko is big enough, then you can feed him/her mealies. because geckos chew their food, i don't think decapitating the mealies would be neccessary. also, crickets should be the main staple for insectivorous herps and you should coat the crickets with powdered reptile vitamins at least once every couple weeks. mealworms, i have heard, are too high in fat and have such low amounts of vitamins and minerals that they should not be fed more than once every week or so.

and sparkpug - that was extremely dangerous. the fire belly newts *alone* have toxins that DO effect other amphibians. have you read all of the posts in this thread about the danger involved in housing different species together?!? although your last sentence leads me to believe that you now know that was dangerous, but 95% of your post encourages people to house not only 2 different species together, but SEVERAL species together. the reason they all seemed to "stay in their own spaces" was because they were too stressed out and scared to move more than 6 inches.

did you know that fire belly toads usually live at *least* 10 years? did you know that gray tree frogs usually live at least 7 years? did you know that clawed frogs have been kept for over 30 years by some people and their average lifespan is 8 years? yet you say the last animal in your enclosure died after only 6 years. african clawed frogs *alone* make the water VERY dirty and the other amphibians are soaking this filthy water (with clawed frog secretions, feces, shed skin, etc) through their skin!

and iguanas and water dragons are the exception to the rule, PLUS they are reptiles! many amphibians (including fire belly toads) secrete toxins that do not effect humans unless in extremely high doses but they can kill any other animal it touches!

 

Hey Bruce you asked, I have a huge jungle aquarium with 2 anoles, 2 asian longtail grass lizards and 1 flying gecho.

 

I also have to put in, with the cross contaminating theory. If you quarintine your animals properly before you put them in with the rest you shouldn't have problems with infecting the other lizards. You should never introduce another lizard to any place without at least 1 month of quarentine.

 

Calm down. I had no problems, and I didn't stop because I felt it was "dangerous" either, it was just hard to keep up. This forum wasn't around in the early to mid nineties when I had that tank either. The pet store where I got all the animals had done it for years too, and I had gotten the idea from Phillipe De Vosjoli's "The General Care and Maintainence of" books too. I didn't get the animals when they were new-borns, I have no idea how old they were. I kept that tree frog singly until 2001. I wouldn't say that they died cause I mixed them. I'd attribute that to an inexperienced herper. Everyone I had talked to said there was no problem mixing anything, back then it was accpeted as an OK thing to do, so I did it, dangerous or not. Remeber, this was more than 10 years ago, things may have changed now.

 

i would attribute their deaths to an inexperienced herper, too . . . one who put them all in the same tank. and you obviously DID have some problems since they were all dead within 6 years when half the species are long-lived species. and you didn't stop because it was hard to keep up - you stopped because everything was dead. plus you should almost never do what petstores do or what they tell you to do. also, i don't think i sounded upset. if i did (or i do now) i do apologize.

and lizardqueen - quarantining your animals before putting them together will help, but it won't solve most of the problems. how does that help keep your animals from poisoning each other? how does that keep them from biting each other? how does that keep them from stressing each other out by just being around? how does that keep them from eating each other? how does that keep them from spreading diseases which they get *after* being put together? how does that keep them from eating each other's feces? how does that keep the more forceful ones from eating all food and leaving none for the shyer ones? and on and on and on and on . . .

 

I sort of wrote my reply "in anger", but edited it a bit when I calmed down. I sort of took your post like you were lecturing me on and on and that you were better than me blah blah blah. A simple overreaction, but I'm sorry for that. My comment that I'd still mix them now isn't true. I wouldnt keep different species together knowing what I do now, but 10 years ago I didn't know much and jumped into reptile and amphibian keeping with no knowledge. I did stop because it was too hard to keep up, but the big reason is that they were all dead, except one. If anything that must have taught me something. I spent a few months researching what kind of snake I wanted, then when I knew I got everything ready, and bought the snake. I also spent nearly a year researching my bearded dragon, and I finally jumped on the bandwagon last December. It's also a whole lot easier having one or two animals instead of a tank full.

P.S. My moms name is Cynthia

 

i'm glad that you have grown and learned - we all have grown and learned since our first herp experiences. what bothered me so much wasn't the fact that you mixed so many species together (although this did really worry me), but that you were encouraging others to do the same. this is a learning community and we have a LOT of members and even MORE people who read threads but aren't members. i just don't want this community (which i really enjoy and learn alot from) to be spreading bad herp practices to newbies (or even people who have had herps before). i'm glad that you've done a lot of research on your snake and beardie. i wish more people would do that. it seems like we have a post every other week saying something like "well i got a white's tree frog - what do i do now?" and it upsets me. and like you said, keeping more than one animal (much less more than one *species*) in a tank is really difficult to pull off, plus the hundred other reasons not to do it that have been mentioned by me and others.

on a side note, when i was a kid i hated my name. i wanted to be stephanie or tiffany or something, but i am SUCH a cynthia it's not funny and i love my name now and realize that it's sort of an unusual name instead of me being just another jennifer or something.

 

I had a room mate that had a mixture of amphibians in a 30 gal tank. He had a Fire Belly, Green tree frog, grey tree frog, chubby painted toad, red eyed, peacock. He kept the tank clean and never had any problems when he lived with me. I havnt seen him in a few months so I dont know of any current status. The only thing that ever happened that i know of, before he lived with me. His peacock tree frog ate his anole. Slightly funny story. They constantly slept right next to each other every night for months. Well one night the peacock suddenly decided that it was big enough to eat the anole, and all that was left was the tale. We always joked about the peacock tree frog taking over the world and eating us.

 

the fire belly toad *alone* could have easily poisoned the other animals. it's stories like these that encourage others to do dangerous things like house different species together. have you read this thread and all of the terrible things that can happen when housing different species together?