Buying tegu

[Lutchmom]

Hello! We are thinking seriously about getting a baby tegu but I have a million questions.
How fast do they grow? I don't want to invest a lot of money into a small terrarium if it'll just outgrow it in a month.
I have a room that we were planning on letting the Tegu have, any recommendations on how to transform an entire room?
Is there anything you wish someone told you before you bought a tegu?

 

[Walter1]

Welcome. Good to ask questions. This site has lots of threads that address your questions.

They grow quickly and should be afforded an enclosure of at least 8x3x3'. They tame, but not all are affectionate. All can have grumpy days. I ad ise against free-roaming, although a stringly-secured outdoor enclosure for even part of the year can be great for them.

Be careful who you buy them from and be ready to meet their dietary needs.

 

[AlphaAlpha]

welcome....

They grow pretty fast and will be sub adult size in less than a year.

I have a proper enclosure myself , but if I had the room I'd give it a go,I would be tempted to line the floor and lower walls with pond liner to protect my house. I'd also build some sort of little divide to keep the substrate away from the rest of the house and also ensure you can enter the room without your tegu escaping.

 

[Iron Soldier91]

I adopted Tiberius from Tegusonly.com last year of summer. He was less than a year. I originally do read watch about baby Tegu and enclosure. For a baby one people recommended at least 40 gallon that will buy you some times to built an actual cage. I’m no carpenter but because of great sense of will to give my Tiberius the best of everything, I did it anyway. You can choose plywood’s type, dimension and Home Depot will cut it for u. It is good idea that start with a 5X5X4 with spare extension ready to connect for expansion. I did all that and wasted no materials. My past experience of owning a monitor that behavior and personality it’s all depend on how u raise the animal. Despite u have the Tegu since baby, when it grow up there are time the Tegu will behave like Tegu. I know some people have their Tegus since baby and suddenly became aggressive and sometime lead to biting. We as human need to respect this amazing animal. Knowing when they like to be touch or pet and when you have to give them space. I know my Tiberius when is stressing for whatever the reason and I don’t treat him like dogs or cat. I let him come to me and seat at my lap. Only then I knew he is allowing me to touch him. For me that is great relationship and trust we built together in a matter of 2 months. Tegus love to be around people or pet. As long as they don’t post a threat and Tegus are very capable in defending themselves. As far as substrate it’s all depend what is best and what is easy to access. I live in Az and cypress mulch not cheap nor accessible. I used 100% organic substrate and always keept moist. For the winter I add on top of the substrate a Kiln dried pine shave. It work for my Tiberius. He is familiar with that material even before I adopted him. He have his own humidifier just because Az produces on 35% humidity. For a Tegu u need a humidity no less than 80%. Goodluck