Me and My Yellow-Spotted-Lizard

It seems like our dear sweet dogs get all the attention. Well, I guess they kind of deserve it. Yesterday, I came home to find Trillian in the kitchen, but no Thursday. I looked all over the kitchen and finally turned my gaze toward the doorway to the front room, which had two baby gates stacked on top of each other. I thought, "No way...." and then saw Thursday on the other side.

Yep. Thursday had jumped them. You want to know the best part? They'd eaten a bird the day before which gave them doggy-food-poisoning and she had...well, it came out of the back end on my off white carpet--the carpet that is the reason there are two baby gates blocking the door to that room. She chose that day of all days to show us this trick. The irony is palpable.

The lizards eat, sleep, and poop, so they're not as exciting as the dogs. But I guess it's time to showcase at least one of the lizards. Moirane is a bearded dragon. She is named after one of the lead female characters in The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan. Rand (the male lizard) is named after one of the lead male characters. There's this whole plotline about this very powerful person known as "The Dragon" and it's all very intense and exciting. So thank you, Robert Jordan, for helping us with a quick and easy bearded dragon theme.

These are the lizards that played the role of the yellow spotted lizards in Holes. They had some computer animation and a spray-paint job to help, but they're bearded dragons. If you talk about this with Al, he gets upset because he doesn't like that these sweet lizards are being portrayed as deadly. My argument is that they've been cosmetically altered to portray a fake animal. We can separate media from reality; after all, no one is going to run to Patrick Dempsy if they need brain surgery, right? Plus, if you're going to put two actors in a hole with two dozen lizards, you want the nice ones!

These lizards are very docile and friendly. They have definite personalities. For example, Rand thinks he can fly, so I can't hold him and take a picture at the same time. He also thinks he scares us and has a cute little attitude. Moirane is clingy and shy, and very sweet.

They start off eating about 80% protein (crickets and other insects) and 20% veggies, but as they get older, this ratio will reverse. They love heat, as they are desert animals, and like their cage to reflect those temperatures. They do need a lot of space, so they're not cheap to start raising, but once you have the stuff, it's fairly inexpensive to maintain. So far, we've been through three sizes of tanks as they've grown and will end up with one more even bigger one by the time we're done. You also need undertank heaters and full-spectrum heat lamps.

They look fierce but it's all for show. They're not great fighters or agressive, so the frightening look is all intimidation and no function. Their spikes actually feel like rubber.

They're low-maintenance, but probably not the greatest pets for kids who would want to handle and touch them. They are fine being handled, but not too much. They're speedy, so a flight risk like Rand would be gone in a flash, and young kids may hurt it while trying to catch it. Also, because they poop in their cages, there is a risk of harmful bacteria being transferred from the excrement to the lizard to the human, so careful sanitizing is necessary after handling. A bearded dragon as a child's pet would need to be very carefully monitored. Also, with an average life span of 10 years, they're not a low-commitment pet, either.

So those are our lizards! If they ever do anything exciting, I'll be sure to blog. Just a heads up, we're changing their substrate soon--from millet to "Desert Snow." We consider that exciting.