get a grip guys no I am not trying to be revolutionary yes this enclosure would be outside and maybe you should charge a dollar for every response, perhaps you would be more contented. or even better, when someone presents an idea...ask questions about it before assuming anything. My credintials? near perfect sat, and IQ, memsa member. decided not to go to college as it was boring as hell. I had a few lucrative ideas and now I have plenty of time on my hands, mostly I rock climb, hunt, fish whatever I can do to be outdoors, when I am not inside I feed my brain...internet, discovery channel, encyclopedias etc. I have been keeping animals of all sorts for as long as I can remember, a lot of abandoned stuf, herps, mamales, birds, fish, you name it. I had a three legged racoon for about 4 years, he was a blast. Even a little Salty that I found in a sewage runoff, dehydrated and something similar to food born illness..comin out both ends if you know what I mean. I stated in almost every other post that niether animal would ever be harmed in anyway, does this spur any questions? no, just more statements. You enjoy seeing monitors in the wild, and hate to see them taken from the wild, can see them out your kitchen window, yet decide to take them out of that envrionment and put them inside your house where they need artifcial husbandry???????????? then you get at angry at me? hmmm. I am sorry guys, I feel as though I have failed at propper comunication again, I am not liking the online reptile world, never seem to have this problem with other forums for some reason; just this one, maybe I should figure out what the deal is, but life goes on. I never claimed to be an expert of any kind, just threw an idea out there and followed through with it, sorry if it made you mad.
One thing I can name right off the bat is that you will be going through lights left and right. Desert heat lamp lights can't tolerate large amounts of humidity. I have been working with reptile since I was 12. I read about other lizards I don't have for fun. So maybe I don’t know as much as you. I know, I don’t know you from a hole in the ground. Both the lizards I had when I was 12 both died dramatic deaths. This was caused from being misinformed. Now I read as much as I can when ever I can. The lizards I have now are healthy. So please don’t do this! Your in for a lot of sorrow and vet trips if you do.
For a 'memsa' member (I presume that's like Mensa, but with a lower entrance requirement?) you have poor reading comprehension. My monitors are not wild caught (they were captive bred - let me know if this needs explaining) so no, they weren't removed from that environment. That was the whole point behind what I was saying. Your savannah monitor will be wild caught. So, you're planning to do this whole savannah/chameleon thing outside. That's even worse. The savannah part of the enclosure is going to need a position in your yard where it can get full sun, for basking. That full sun will bake your chameleon. Keeping monitors outside is a tricky business for a newbie on its own (and as this is your first monitor, yes you are a newbie), combining it with another species is just another problem tacked on that you don't need to face. If you have an outdoor area to house them in, why is the space for individual enclosures such an issue?
reading comprehension is not a problem, dislexia and spelling are (very common actually, you might be surprised to hear names like Thomas Pane, Einstein, De carte, and Chopin) and I know you didn't go catch you lizards, but somone caught thier great grand daddy if you know what I mean. And once again man, this thing is about disscussion, so now that your asking questions..awesome. first, my Cham already has an outdoor space, it is under the roof so it is at least partly shadded at all times, The only real area I have to extend it is out in the yard, perfect for the Savy (nice size pool would be cool) Realy, the only part of the whole system to have hieght would be about a third of the total foot print, this is where the cham would be(have been). so really, I can still have them pretty much adjacent with a little pathway between, or I could lift the cham and extend the savy under. Now, this would only be for a few years until the savy needed something bigger (by which time I will prob have moved anyway and incorporated something new in the yard from the get-go) I was thinking like a river bank on a savanah ya know. High humidity, full sun availability, and some trees, I was going to use a large pre-made outdoor pool with different depths, sink it only half way to allow for containment, then fill it. in the deepest area would be the pool, with a small reverse osmosis fitration system. ( it would be great to have the cham's over-flow of water go to this pool, be filtered, and reused) Currently this space is running at 100-125 F in the mid day sun @ around 75-90% humidity and about a 140gpp; in the shade at midday 80-90 @F 80-95%. The area only gets below 60 degrees at night about 3 months out of the year, and the lizards would be housed indoors. I thought this was well within both species suggested ranges. but if you guys say the sav is going to stalk the Cham constantly then yes, this is a gumby thing I hadn't thought of. Like I said I have seen this done with a beardie, but obviously he did not stalk the Cham. Am I a newbie? yup! But I learn fast and research constantly. oh, and there haven't been any chems in my yard ever, btw just so it doesn't come up
Ok, so far you've guys have kept this under control. But watch yourselves. No more checking credentials or making smart comments about other people's degrees, spelling, or IQs. If you want to discuss monitor enclosures, do that, that part is going fine. But we're walking a thin line and one wrong word is going to blow this thing up. If you disagree, say so, but do NOT explode on other people with lines like "are you serious?" "you've got to be joking!", etc...just say you disagree and move on. No more drama. And I'm saying this as a biologist, lab animal technician, former reptile keeper assistant, former hospital pharmacy technician, and most importantly.....the moderator of this forum. Have a nice day!
were not out of line, at least I don't feel like thier responses are. People are pasionate about the lives they have accepted responsibilty for. I know I have out of the ordinary ideas and I know what is coming when I post them. So I rarely take offense. But I appreciate what your saying, although I do think education can be rellevant; and I am a horrible speller you wanna see some bad stuff go visit rockclimbing.com and pick anythread for plenty of name calling, cursing, insults and the like, seems like it is the norm there, but like I said, heated conversations come when your that passionate about anything, much less when lives are on the line. you have a nice day too!
It was just a warning. I've seen things get out of hand quickly from simple remarks. No one was out of line...yet. LOL But like you said, people are passionate...and sometimes that can cause things to get out of hand quickly. Trust me, I've seen plenty of arguments around here. I welcome heated discussions, in depth conversations, but I find that a little warning in the middle tends to cool tempers before anything bad happens.
Savs are pretty aggresive with animals smaller than they are, I read once that someone was cleaning out there savs cage and it ran into the other room and broke the pet chinchilla's cage open and killed all three of them. I bet the sav would try to find some way to get to the cham, and having kept a vielded cham(a male) I know they hate to see anything at all moving around them, much less something that wants to eat them. I think the sav might enjoy the challenge, but even if he didnt manage to get the cham the stress of seeing the monitor most likely would. I keep ackie monitors and I am a newbie to them so I'll leave that advice to others, check out www.proexotics.com for some husbadry info. Your Idea sounds very complicated, and I think you may find that there are to many obstacles to over come to make it remotely rewarding(like if you wanted to feed/clean the monitor, how do you get to it without bugging the chams cage on top?), and the risks are to many, possible predation and certain stress for the cham, and the rish of dehydration for the monitor. (and why get a sav, they are almost all wild caught, and kinda boring so far as monitors go, why not get a blackthroat or something else that is captive bred)
The honest truth is that it is the girlfriend wanting a Savy. I just started reaserching and went with the idea because she has had one before. Next to a horse or Cow, or Rottie it would be the biggest pet I have had; and I am really in to herps right now, as is my daughter. I had seen this "enclosure" wich was more like a zoo display than anything, and thoght...I could do that easy! (easy is a matter of deffanition as is everything else) So, Zookeepers are not as readily available and open as forums. I have these ideas all the time, run with them as long as they are feasable. Everyone has seen all kinds of animals co-habotate even though they are not supposed to. A lot of times it is a simple matter of speaking the language. My daughter comes into contact with 7 dogs that outwiegh her by 75 or more lbs, she can lay everyone of them down with one hand and a firm voice...when she was 3. Now I am not saying that a Cham and Sav could ever have something like that, but eventually through slow introductioni, they possibly might realize not to mind eachother much. You guys all seem to say f*!# no! each for a decent reason. Though I am arrogant and believe I could in theroy work each of these challanges out; it doesn't make sense to move forward in a production sense. BUT!! it is fun to think about in theroy, I mean a small world can easily be created with all sorts of harmless stuff, but then there is the human in us all that drives us to do "bold" things like venemous snakes, pythins, lizards that have a shooting tongue...
thx for that link man, that is some cool stuff. and exactly what I am talking about, a mini world in there. For the past few years chefs have been developing a new trend of using lateral lines on the globe to design food. The avacado in Sushi is the perfect example, not usually found in Japanese cuizine there are now avacado farms popping up after chefs across the big pond have proven how well it works in the food. Thing is the avacado grow quite well with little to no attention in Japan, as does wasabi at an equal lattitude just aboput across the globe (except where altitude prevents) Now, the point here is that the weather and climate patterns are pretty much the same, along with soil PH, and UV spectre; making food ingreidnets that lend themselves to break cultural boundries. And, as we have seen in the panther chams on hawai the same should at the very least be thought about in animals. (nutrea, horses, come to mind) I first started thinking serriously about this multiple specie space in correlation with this lateral line theroy. Perhaps a Sav is the wrong lizard but the idea I feel is spot on. I have no plastic in my Chams' enclosure, pill bugs, and roaches live and breed (although I still need to sisuppliment thier numbers b/c he eats em so fast) inside the enclosure, everything is automated and I believe is as simillar to a natural environment that can be provided outside of yemen. I litterally can go a week or more without ever opening his cage if I want to. these living enclosures really are the ultimate in how to keep Chams, he is never stressed, has been eating leaf matter since he was about 2 months old (no encouragement from me, just came naturally) and is obviously happier than either of my past two which lived inside on artificial greenery. Croc says Savs are harder to keep outside than in, I haven't done enough research yet to agree or not, but eventually he will be outside if at all possible. n e way thx for the link, way cool stuff, the pond on one side is exactly what I was thinking for the enclosure I had in mind. makes me jealous
