Are bearded dragons good pets?

Question

Are they social? I really m thinking of getting on eversus a ferret. Help. And serious answers here, please, and not jst 1 sentence. Explain and add detail, pleaz. Thanks.

Answer 1

Yes they are very docil and social lizards with a crazy personality, lol. If you decide to get one, I would suggest going to this website: http://bearded-dragons.com/boards/index.php and http://www.beautifuldragons.com
Good and updated info.

I'll write a quick caresheet for you.....

Caging: For a hatchling, I don't recommend having a 10 gallon tank for two reasons. One, sometimes it's harder to maintain correct temperatures. You want to have a basking spot of 110-115 degrees and yet on the other side you want a cool side around 80-85 degrees. Two, the beardie will outgrow that tank faster than a 20 gallon. I recommend 20 gallon tanks until they reach 10-12 inches STL. If a baby is put in a tank too large, it will more may become stressed and overwhelmed of all the excess room. Juveniles One adult can be housed in a 40 gallon breeder (36x18x16) at the minimum. Adults cages need at least 18" in width and 36" in length. Bigger is better though.

Bearded Dragons are not very social. These lizards are considered solitary and should only be housed together for breeding purposes. Keep in mind that beardies only unite to mate in the wild.

Building a cage: A lot of people build their own cages and it doesn't have to be brand spanking new. Some people have even made their cages out of an old dresser, or a few doors. When buying wood, make sure you do not use cedar or pine. These fumes are toxic to beardies.

Caging Accessories: Rocks, branches, and platforms make great additions to your dragons set up. It creates a natural looking enviornment. Your dragon will love a nice looking rock to bask on.

Note: Never use hot rocks. These electrical rocks are very dangerous. Beardies, like other lizards, cannot sense how how it gets under their bellies, like they can on their heads, and the result can end up in some nasty thermal burns. Heat sources that are used above are your best bet. Heat lamps are very natural and pose as the "sun" to your beardie.

Feeding and Supplementing: Babies and juveniles should be fed as many crickets as they will eat in a 10 minute time period at least 3 times a day. This can easily add up to 30-100 crickets each day. Prey should be dusted in reptile multivitamins and calcium powdered supplements. Greens should be offered each day, even if they rarely eat them. That is perfectly normal.

Adults should only be fed about 30 or 40 crickets max per week since they don't need so much protien in their diet and their metabolism is lower. Greens should also be offered daily for adults.

Age Multi-vitamin Calcium
Less than 1 year 4-5 x 7 x
1-2 years old 3-4 x 5-6 x
Over 2 years old 2-3 x 4-5 x


Note: x = times each week. Pre-breeding or gravid females should be 2-3 x of multivitamins and 5-6 times of calcium.

You can offer your dragon wax worms and super worms as treats only. Two or three a week sounds reasonable. Beardies a lot of the time will get "addicted" to fatty foods and not want to eat anything else. Feeding too much fatty foods over a long period of time, such as a staple, may result in fatty liver disease. Adding a variety to your dragons diet is always recommended.

Staple foods include: Collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens, dandelion greens, escarole, endive, summer (yellow) squash, butternut squash, acorn squash, hubbard squash, spaghetti squash, scallop squash, crickets, silkworms, and lobster roaches.

Treat foods include: apples, grapes, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, peaches, mango, cantaloupe, watermelon, cucumbers, grapes, kiwi, kale, oranges, pears, peas, green beans, plums, wax worms, and super worms.

Please check out this page: for a detailed food chart: http://www.beautifuldragons.503xtreme.com/Nutrition.html

Feeding in seperate enclousers- This is a great idea and many people do it. Usually the idea is to feed your dragons into a seperate enclouser to avoid left over crickets in the origional cage and to avoid all the hassells in getting uneaten prey out. You can use large rubbermaid or serilite tubs for adults and smaller suitable size ones for juveniles and babies. Shoe box size tubs work well for both soaking hatchlings and feeding.

Note: Get the clear tubs. These are much slicker than the solid ones so crickets can't grip the sides and escape.

Water Bowls: A water bowl may be kept in your dragons enclouser, but keep an eye on the humidity as it may rise up to dangerous levels in some cases. Generally, beardies are not like dogs or cats and don't drink from water bowls. They get much of their water from soaks and veggies.

Rule of thumb: Prey should be no larger than the space between the dragons eyes to avoid impaction.

Lighting - Heating - Temperatures: UVB light is very important to provide for your dragon. Vitamin D3 is a vitamin that can be stored in the liver for up to 6 months and it helps the dragon metabolize calcium. Much, or any of the D3 cannot be useful unless the dragon is in contact with UVB wave lengths. Having said that, overdosing any kind of D3 drops or D3 supplementation cannot replace UVB light and may cause vitamin D3 toxicity. A dragon without any or much of any UVB light will most likely suffer from a disease called MBD (metabolic bone disease) overtime. The beardie needs to be at least no more than 6-10" away from the UVB light, and if all possible have the light safely mounted in the cage. Screen can block out up 50% of rays. Use a bulb that is specifically made for reptiles and get at least an 8.0 or 10.0 unless you are using a Reptisun 5.0, which is bascially equal to a Reptiglo 8.0.
Heating is very important to. It has been proven beadies cannot digest their food properly if the basking temp isn't at least 95 degrees. For babies the basking temp needs to be around 110. For juveniles around 105-110, and for adults around 100-105. Make sure your beardie has a cool side (the opposite end of the cage) that's around 80-85 degrees. You do not have to use UVA basking bulbs from the pet stores. A regular household bulb works just as well. Indoor flood lights can also be used, and they take up less energy. To measure your temps, I would strongly recommend getting a digital thermometer with probe. These are about $8 at Wal-mart and they measure surface temps, not air temps, which is what you should be measuring basking temps with. Air temps are as much as 20 degrees below surface temps.Temp guns can also be used.

Temperatures: Adults- 100F-105F

Juveniles- 105-110F

Babies- 110


Heat Pads/UTH: The same idea of hot rocks goes for heat pads and under tank heaters. The only acception I would use one on a beardie is if the dragon was impaction and needed some low heating below them to help digestion. You can use these at night on the walls on the tank if your house gets below 65F at night. You can also use CHEs (Ceramic Heater Emitters). These produce heat but no light. If your house does not get below 65F at night, I would not worry about heating. Beardies need to cool down at night.

Substrate- There is much of a hot debate on this subject. I personally stick to my guns and avoid any loose substrate. Childrens play sand, calci sand, reptile bark, wood shavings, reptile blend, reptile litter, etc all holds a risk of impaction and killing your dragon. Sand (especially calci sand) developes into clumps inside the dragons digestional track. Walnut shells, repti bark, etc can cut up the dragons intestines as well as cause impation. Your dragon also might as well be living in a litter box. Loose particle substrates also hold moisture and harbors bacteria, which isn't good for your reptile. Solid substrates look nicer are easy to clean, and are 100% safe.

Safe substrates- Non adhesive shelf-liner, ceramic tiles, newspaper, computer paper, paper towels, indoor/outdoor carpet with no loops, reptile carpet.

Bathing- Bathing your dragon is very beneficial. It hydrates the beardie, aids in shedding, and helps bowl movements. Sick beardies often enjoy warm soaks also. I recommend soaking dragons atleast once or twice a week for 20 minutes. Fill the water up to their shoulders, and if nessacary, lay a wash cloth or towl on the bottom of the bath tub so your beardie will feel more secure in the water. The water temperatures should be "pee" warm or lukewarm, (around 95F-99F...about your body temperature. Some may perfer as low as 88F). If you have a baby or hatchling, make sure he/she can still move around in the water....be carefull not to fill it up to deep.

Note: Never leave the dragon un-attended. Do not add any soap, shampoo, conditioner to the water. The water should remain plain.

Behaviors:
Head Bobbing: This behavior is usually a dominance display usually done by males. The dragon is generally asking the other, "Who is the boss here?" Males do this a lot during breeding season to achieve the females attention. Studys have also shown beardies do this to judge distance or to conquer a new territory.

Beard Display: This display is also usually done by males during breeding season or when a dragon has become startled or threatend. The dragon will puff out his "beard" using bones and flaps. Males will sometimes turn their beards jet black.

Arm waving: Females tend to do this less dominance behavior in response to a head bob or beard display. They seem to be saying, "You are the worthy one, you are the boss, not me." Babies and juveniles will do this in reply to their own reflection. They seem to be saying, "Please don't hurt me, I'm harmless!"

Raised Tail: Dragons will do this when hunting down their prey. It's also done during breeding season to show alertness or acceptance.

I thought I would let you know about some the of behaviors they do. I think it's what makes them so interesting and funny. Like I said, they have one heck of a personality! Bearded dragons are probably the closets lizard you can get to a dog! Ofcourse without the noise and smell and stuff, lol. Here's a quick shopping list:

[] UVB light
[] UVB light fixture
[] Heat bulb
[] Heat bulb fixture
[] Cage
[] Digital thermometer with probe
[] Food
[] Bowls
[] Caging accesories (rocks, branches, platforms, etc)
[] Supplements
[] Substrate


Good luck and I hope this helps! Oh...and when picking out your dragon, you want to look for one who is fully alert with wide eyes. Maybe even one who is walking around, up and about. A lot of the times, when you aquire a dragon from a pet store, they will have internal parasites. So it's always good to get a fecal exam done after you bring your new friend home. If possible, you may want to consider buying from a breeder, one who is somewhat popular. Then, you will be a little bit more at ease that it's healthy.

Good luck!!!!! Make sure you have a herp vet near you so you can take your dragon if he/she every gets sick and for frequent fecal exams.
http://www.herpvetconnection.com

Answer 2

Generally, yes, bearded dragons are fairly easy to take care of. I've had experiance with almost any pet you can think of. We have fostered animals since I was young, including reptiles. I got my beardie about 9 months ago. Love him to death, would never think twice about getting him. But his life has been difficult. Everything started off nice and smooth. He was about six months old at the time, seemed be active and healthy (hadnt yet eaten much but I figured it was due to stress). He came from a friends kid who had grown tired of Tobey. A couple days after bringing him home, I found him very lethargic, still hadn't eaten, so I brought my brand new baby to the vet, only to find he had two different parasites, a calcium deficiency, and mouth rot. Over the months, I have slowly nursed him back to health, but he is currently on liquid food that has to be fed to him, and I have spent lots of time and money. Just be aware of what you could be getting into. This goes for any pet.

Answer 3

I think bearded dragons are the best reptile and one of the best pets in general to have. If you're able to provide the proper temperature, food, and attention to the bearded dragon it will be very rewarding. On of the best parts about owning one is the things that you can do with the vivarium setup. I dont think that bearded dragons are boring at alll, especially juveniles, as they are always investigating new things. Ferrets on the other hand are not one of my favorite pets, and are simply a pain. Although the bearded dragon might a cost you a few more bucks i'm feel its a far better choice.

Answer 4

we have 2 bearded dragons, very sociable and not that hard to care for
email me at [e-mail] ill tell you anything you'd like to know

Answer 5

Okay. So what in the heck is a bearded dragon?

Answer 6

I have a female bearded dragon who I believe is the most facinating creature I have. I own lots of snakes, rodents, hamsters, gerbils, you name it. If you get a bearded dragon start with a baby and hold him or her a lot. That way she is social and will be a lot more fun to have. Not that I don't like ferrets but they have a peculiar smell that, well I think smells a little like a skunk. The thing about a ferret is they are unreliable, if they get out they are gone. If you have any questions, please email me I'm not an expert but I love my reptiles. [e-mail]

Answer 7

I thought dragons did not exist.Wht the hell are these bearded dragons now??

Answer 8

They are social... for lizards. They tame down easily and are very handleable. However they could never be social in the way that a ferret is. On the other hand ferrets are very high maintenance compared to beardies... Both are excellent choices depending on what you are looking for in a pet. I suggest doing a lot of research on the pros and cons of both and decide which one fits your expectations and lifestyle the best.

Answer 9

im not sure what u said ferrets are great pets if thats what u mean. but im also trying 2 see if there good pets i wanna get 1.

Answer 10

they are extremely easy to take care of and they come in some really cool colors. of course the colored ones are more expensive. they're pretty boring for a pet because they spend almost all their time in their cage, but you can take them out. I used to take naps with mine on my stomach. They like to be warm and will lay on you.

Answer 11

I always trim my dragons to have mustaches