Blast from the past: Titan the sav

[StudentoReptile]

Here is a photo of the only varanid I ever kept: Titan, a savannah monitor.



This was around abouts 11-12 years ago, when I was working at my LPS. At the time, I housed him what I thought was best, but today, I cringe at the memory!

[SpOoKy]

Cute guy.
Unfortunately there were all too many people like you back in the day who did what was thought as best. The problem then was there wasn't a device that you could type a question in and get an answer!
Another reason there is no excuse to be keeping animals sub-par today. The thought of all the animals who didn't live a full life because we were learning seems like such a waste.

How long did you have Titan for?

[infernalis]

By today's standards, we would call that one heavy dried out lizard.

[StudentoReptile]

I forget exactly how he ended up in my care. I don't remember if it was one of many LPS employee-discount snags, or a purchase from a friend, or what. This was during a long period of my life when I had a habit of going through a lot of herps. The long and short of it was that I had a relatively short attention span for many of the species I've kept; I would get something weird and cool, and get bored with it 6-12 months later, resulting in it being sold or traded for something else. Now, don't get me wrong, most everything had relatively good care while I had it; I would just lose interest it.

Titan was kept in a 80-gallon glass tank with aspen shavings for bedding, a half-log for a hide (which he obviously could barely fit in), and a few rocks for basking. He had a basking lamp and a UVB light, although don't ask me what the temps were because I do not recall. Probably somewhere around 95-100'F basking spot temps, of course, nowhere near as hot as it should be, but then again, in retrospect the cage was hardly large enough for him either. Like I said, today I'm not proud of the way that particular animal was kept; it was simply all I knew to do 11-12 yrs ago with the information I had available to me.

His diet consisted mostly of large crickets, mealworms, the occasional rodent and/or egg, snails, and canned monitor diet. I know, once again, not the greatest feeding regiment, but I suppose it was better than feeding him entirely rodents, which was what most people did at that time.

I had him roughly over a year. If I recall correctly, I think I gave him to a co-worker (who, as it comes back to me, was his previous owner).

You are definitely correct. If ONLY I knew back then all that I know now!

[StudentoReptile]

Originally Posted by infernalis

By today's standards, we would call that one heavy dried out lizard.

I heartily agree, Wayne.
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Here's a particularly humorous story about him though...

Like I said, I rarely fed him rodents. It was only when one of my snakes would eat or something that he would just get the leftovers. Anyway, he hadn't rodents in quite a while. One day he got a left-over rat. Well, that rat must have stopped him up good because he didn't poop for nearly 2 weeks. This is the part where I should seen what was coming...

One day I was doing homework, and this normally lethargic lizard goes ballistic, scrambling all over his cage and standing on his hind legs like he REALLY wants out. I figure, what the heck, I'll let him out on the floor to stretch his legs. Bad move. Titan waddles over to the corner by my bed and takes an epic dump all over the floor. It sounded as bad as it smelled. I can't believe he didn't rupture anything. God, it stank. Somehow by the grace of everything holy in this universe I got the stench out of that room and the stain out of that carpet.

Needless to say, Titan never got any more rats after that.

[infernalis]

Chomper left some epic stink piles on my floors.

There is a stain in my reptile room that will never go away, unless I tear out the rug.

[millertime89]

ROFL! That's one of the funnier stories I've heard about herps pooping.

[jaleely]

oooh my what a vivid picture you paint...lol