Biting Tegu

[parapara]

I cannot figure out why my Tegu is suddenly trying to bite my partner.

He turned 2 in July and for the past couple months he's been making occasional attempts to bite my partner (the first couple times he actually did bite, but now we're on watch).

The weird thing is, he's not making moves to bite an iguana that's about half his size, but with whom he seems to get along (although they are always closely supervised when they are out together), and he's never made a move to bite me (even though I do all the feeding). He's actually never made a move to bite anyone but my partner, and only recently for her.

He doesn't seem to be afraid (he's pursuing her in these instances).

At first we thought he was just testing his boundaries, but it's happened so often we don't know what to think now, and obviously we're concerned about when he gets huge. Anyone have any experience with anything like that?

 

[Josh]

That is strange. Could it be from scent perhaps? Have you tried getting him used to the way she smells? How much exposure does he have to her as compared to exposure to you?

 

[N8bub]

I know that sometimes female keepers have issues with male iguanas when the are in their cycle. Are tegus the same I don't know? From what I've read human pheromones are similar to iguana.

 

[parapara]

It's not a "getting used to her" issue. It sleeps in bed with us (under a pillow), and if I had to guess the time split during the Tegu's waking hours I'd say it's probably 60/40 in my partner's favor. He definitely knows her.

I had thought it might be a hormone thing. We somewhat recently got a female Tegu that we keep in a cage on the main floor (our male tegu, the one that's biting is kept mostly on the top floor). They've "met" a couple times, but probably not for over a month, and i can't find a relationship between the bite attempts and the "new arrival."