Eublepharis macularius
This is Sam, the gecko (Apparently it is quite difficult to tell the gender of a gecko until they reach adulthood - basically, if they drop eggs, they're girl geckoes... So TheBoy cleverly named his gecko with a gender-neutral name. He obviously gets his smarts from Mrs. G.) Sam, say hi. At least stop eating your mealworms long enough to - oh, never mind. This is the new G. family pet, who is currently being cared for by TheBoy and is residing in grand style in the gecko equivalent of the Taj Mahal:
GeckoWorld
Y'see, we don't believe in doing anything halfway... We took everyone's advice to heart, and went to the pet store with the idea of looking around, talking to the folks there, and letting TheBoy figure out just what he wanted. The pet store is owned by the husband of someone my wife works with, and she had been in touch with the owner before we went up. It was a toss-up between the leopard gecko and a sulcata tortoise, with the gecko getting the nod - and I am not making this up - because the gecko "looked at [me]"...
We stopped into the pet store thinking we were getting a $20 lizard, which we did. We didn't realize that we would spend more than an order of magnitude more on gear for said lizard... The lifespan of a gecko is some 15 - 20 years, which is great, because we should just about have his house paid off by then.
But if you could see how happy it makes TheBoy, you'd agree it's money well-spent and would be cheap at twice the price...
That is all.
PS: Thanks everyone for your suggestions, ideas, and comments on my pet advice request. Special thanks to Squeaky, whose advice we wound up taking, although interestingly enough after the fact...
7 comments:
How big do they get? Will there be an attack of giant geckos some day?Do you have to feed them every day? What can they do to help President Obama?
Very cool. We went to a "creature feature" at the local science center here and the presenter had an adult Leopard Gecko. They are very neat. They store water in their meaty tails. Make sure to remind everybody about a gecko's penchant for dropping its tail if it feels threatened. This is the equivalent of Mas Ayoob's throwing a pack of smokes at an interloper to facilitate his escape.
Hey Dad, you wanna see happy, buy him a Harley when he turns 16 ;-)
libertyman,
That was one of the first questions we asked - and fortunately, the store also sells adult geckoes. They only get about 6" long as adults, so we're not about to have an influx of giant geckoes.
TheBoy, however, is already talking about getting a girl gecko (he's convinced that Sam is a boy gecko) and raising baby geckoes.
So we may very well be up to our armpits in geckoes...
Andrew,
Interestingly enough, one of the other baby geckoes in the tank with Sam had in fact dropped his tail. We looked around the 'net for information on various lizards, and noted that most species do have some form of autotomy as a defense mechanism.
In fact, the pet store employee pointed out a couple of species that drop really easily, just as something to be aware of.
BillH.
Don't tempt me. I'm already thinking that I should pick up a 1200 Sportster for him now so we can start customizing... ;)
Can he get me a good deal on car insurance? Oh, Gecko. Nevermind.
Yay!
That looks like a really neat setup.
Again, if you have any questions, let me know. I freakin' love my geckos. I think you made a good choice. :-)
Congrats!
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,548561,00.html
WV=publid = Obama likes to call socialism the publid option
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