New crested gecko parent needs helps!

[Steffan]

Hello! I am new here! My crestie, Timone (yes, from Lion King), is about 5 months old right now. About a month ago, I decided that it was time to feed the little one some live food, so I bought 5 little crickets to see how he’d react. I placed the bag of crickets at the top of his terrarium and walked away for a few seconds. I came back to his tank and he was perched up on his rock staring at the bag of crickets (good sign to me, right?). Happily, I opened the tank and used metal critter tongs to feed him the cricket. He was on it like white on rice!! Proud dad, I fed him the rest of the crickets.

It seems that since then, he’s become extremely aggressive. The week after that, I wanted to try and see what would happen if I left a cricket in the tank for him to hunt down. Seemed like he enjoyed that too because he was super active throughout the night. His aggressiveness has become even more evident as he periodically head butts the tank. He also doesn’t want to be handled and shy’s away/turns his back to me when I approach his tank to have him walk onto my hand. I originally had a printed 8×11 photo of what looked like a forest and I thought maybe he was thinking it was real so I took it down and replaced it with some plain cardboard.

As you can probably tell, I’ve been playing this guessing game trying to figure out what the little guy wants. He has enough hiding spots and his tanks temp and humidity are fairly consistent with the standards.

Should I just wait and see if he’ll get over this phase? Any advice would be helpful!

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[Zoodulcis]

Wow, this is interesting. I’m going to guess that he is going through an equivalent of a pre-teen phase. His head-butting may be a result of seeing his own reflection in the glass. Try placing cardboard on the inside of the enclosure that’s about 3 inches high when resting on the substrate. See if that makes a difference. If it does, some screening may be in order for the next several months. Also, if handling him is important to you, don’t let up right now. Gently but firmly insist. You might try to sweeten the deal while he goes through a difficult phase by putting a treat on your hand that you don’t allow him to have any other time. Or when it’s the first food item of the day, followed by the rest of the meal placed in his enclosure as usual.

This is what I would do and I hope it helps. Super curious as to what happens in the next couple of weeks with this turn of events.

[Steffan]

Thank you for the response and suggestions! I actually surrounded his tank with cardboard and it seems to have done the trick. I haven’t heard him headbutt anything lately. He has still been somewhat skittish? Anytime I pass in front of his tank and he’s awake, he makes sudden glances left and right. I still haven’t had much success handling him as he ignores and turns his back towards me and eventually goes into hiding. I have been unable to properly clean his tank because of this..

[Zoodulcis]

Glad the cardboard worked. Lots of male animals engage in some seriously damaging agonistic behavior if they think they see another male. I once saw a bull elk go after a sedan in a parking lot as he was strolling by and caught sight of himself in the driver’s side mirror. I thought it was hilarious, but the park rangers were less amused, not to mention the car’s owner.

There is a trick that falconers use to tame a shy bird. Works great for small reptiles too if you have the time and patience for it. Grab yourself some form of entertainment where you can manage the content with one hand. Laptop, Kindle, etc. Then, instead of feeding your fellow in his container at the usual time, sit next to the enclosure with your free hand inside and laying on the bottom, palm up. When you open your hand, it should contain a wiggly food item. Crickets are not best for this. Leave it there for at least 1/2 hour. If he doesn’t approach, remove your hand and the food. Later in the day give him only a half feeding. Try again the next day. Do not move your hand or fingers at all during this session once your hand is in place. Do not stare at him at all. All movements in and out of the enclosure should be incredibly slow.

When he finally takes a food item from your hand, take the win, remove your hand and release any other food items into the enclosure. When he voluntarily takes food from your hand and lingers just a bit, you can elevate your hand a fraction of an inch up slowly, then back down. Depending on how shy he is, this whole process can take weeks. It may be impossible to do it every day, so whenever you can when you know he’s really hungry, give it a go. This process is called habituation and will eventually yield results as his stress response diminishes. This will happen when your hand loses its novelty, becomes familiar, and also becomes associated with rewards and no harm.

If you decide to try this in the next few days, please let us know how it went, plus any observations on how long it took him, any surprises, progress, set-backs, etc.

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