Reptiles as Pets

Are you bored with normal pets and looking for something different? Have you considered having a reptile as a pet? Do they have cold personalities or are they easy to warm to?

Which reptiles can I keep as a pet?

Reptiles kept as pets include animals such as snakes, lizards and turtles. They have dry skin covered with scales and, mostly, lay eggs.

Lizards, such as Blue Tongues and the Shingle Back Lizard, are gentle, lazy critters. They represent a direct link with the dinosaur era and in that fact alone they are fascinating animals.

While they are interesting pets, reptiles do have particular requirements with respect to their housing and feeding which makes them a bit more difficult to manage than the standard pet.

As for snakes, they fascinate many people, and equally as many are horrified by them. If you are considering keeping pet snakes, then please look before you leap - most will bite and some snakes are obviously dangerous. Keeping venomous snakes as pets is, I think, foolish.

What laws relate to the keeping of reptiles?

Herpetology, the keeping of reptiles and amphibians, is covered by your state Nature Conservation Act or similar legislation. Local Authority By-Laws may also restrict the ownership of reptiles. If you are considering keeping reptiles you must ring the relevant state and local authorities to ensure you are able to keep the animals you are interested in.

What sort of housing do reptiles need?

Careful attention to housing and, in particular, temperature is one of the most important aspects of herpetology. Reptiles are cold-blood animals. This means that they must draw their heat from their environment.

The easiest way of providing adequate heat is to put a 100-watt light bulb in or near their enclosure. The light is best hanging from their enclosure so that they cannot get too close to it. This will prevent the reptiles from burning themselves.

Some nocturnal species that do not tolerate light very well. Such reptiles are best placed in enclosures that are heated from within or below the floor so that the cage is dark.

Place the heat source at one end of their living quarters so that they have a gradient of temperature. In this way they can choose for themselves how hot or cold they need to be, which is what they do in the wild. It is important that you know the temperature requirements of the individual species and, then, that the temperature characteristics of the enclosure are determined to see if they match. If you are establishing the cage in winter, be careful that overheating of the enclosure does not occur in summer.

Reptiles also need humidity kept above 50%.

What about diet?

Feeding reptiles is certainly different from feeding other types of pets. They eat an entertaining array of fare.

First, lizards only need to be fed twice per week. They can become obese easily - especially Lace Monitors which are ‘piggy’ lizards.

Herpetologists usually feed large lizards on rats, mice, chickens, chopped lean meat and dog food whereas smaller lizards eat cockroaches, grasshoppers and the like. Some lizards also eat vegetable matter.

Don’t be too concerned if your lizards won’t each much or anything at all during winter - this is quite common and forcing them to eat can cause harm.

Dr Cam Day BVSc BSc MANZCVS (Veterinary Behaviour) Full-time pet behaviour veterinarian - Last updated 16 November 2012