Housing Mixed Size Hatchlings

[30secondstobob]

If my second clutch hatches four weeks after the first (the interval they were laid at), can the newer babies be housed with the older ones? I'm guessing there won't be that drastic a size difference whereas the older ones would try to eat the siblings - but do they "bully" them? I saw in Aliza's link, they should not, but what if the age is close and the size difference not too significant. I've seen many times in pet shops babies of different sizes being housed together. I know that pet shops aren't the best examples of doing things correctly, but the babies seemed to enjoy each others company, piling up together in the hot hides. Does anyone keep hatchlings of mixed sizes together? Bob

 

[acpart]

I tend to keep clutchmates together although I will "mix and match" if they start to grow at very different rates. I always keep any undersized or otherwise not "normal" hatchling by itself. The problem with putting 4 week old hatchlings with the newly hatched is that the 4 week olds are hungry and the newborns aren't. I had a really bad experience one year where a several week old hatchling got through the partition of the cage to the newly hatched pair "next door" and took off both their tails. It's a different story keeping, say, a 12 week old and an 8 week old together.
Many people prefer to keep all their geckos singly. As you note, I'm one of those people who have done fine with small groups (which is lucky,since I don't think my living room and dining room can hold any more than the 23 tanks already in there ---well, maybe one more . . .) but I think the newly hatched have special needs in their transition out of the egg and should be kept separately from older hatchlings.

Aliza

 

[30secondstobob]

Wow, 23 reptile tanks in the living room! Sounds like my house with canary cages in the summer! I never thought of it, but tails do probably come off easily and a wiggling tail probably can be mistaken for a mealworm! Great advice as usual. Thank you. Bob

 

[Fencer04]

I'm on the flip side of things and I prefer to keep my animals alone to monitor feeding and if they get sick there is less of a risk of infecting more animals.

It can be a pain though. I just finished building a 72 box hatchling rack. I'm hoping that I'm able to sell or consign most of the hatchlings I get because I don't have a lot of room left for more adult or juvenile geckos. I have room for another rack, I just haven't built it yet.