#eldrick

'BREAKING: Tiger Woods arrested for DUI in Florida on Memorial Day' . http://www.golf.com/tour-news/2017/05/29/breaking-tiger-woods-arrested-dui-florida-memorial-day?xid=socialflow_twitter_si

No matter where they are, when they get a moment to breathe, Eldrick will absentmindedly trace gentle circles over the back of Dorian’s hand while holding it firmly to let him know that he’s there and always will be.

Here is my bioactive setup for Eldrick. In providing enrichment for your animals it’s really important to give them the freedom of choice in how and where they spend their time. The more complexity and imaginative use of space you can add to the enclosure..... the more varied their sensory experience you can offer, the better your Beardie’s life experience. Please don’t be brainwashed by all those Beardie groups on facebook who make out a sheet of lino, a hide, a basking spot and a food bowl is good enough. It’s really really not. Your animals mental stimulation is a crucial part of its care. Simple, sterile and easy to clean is for mass production breeders who are looking for efficiency. NOT general pet keepers. We owe it to them to give them more. In my set up I have a range of hides incorporated into the cool end, middle and hot end. I have branches both on the floor and spanning the depth of the viv off the floor so he can take advantage of a more 3D use of space. He has a range of substrates....a rockery, the bioactive soil, leaves and wood, so his little feet and belly can experience a range of textures and he can dig, burrow and forage as he chooses and as nature intended. It also means he can access a humidity gradient we deny them in “minimal risk” set ups, which aids to help shedding. I have a colony of Dubia roaches living in there who also aid the clean up crew and I have a wide range of species in my clean up crew. There are so many myths we are brainwashed to believe unquestioningly in the Beardie community. But since learning about bio I have realized most of it is rubbish and Bearded Dragon keeping can be a lot more interesting than keeping the poor thing in a featureless, boring box.

http://www.cliniciansbrief.com/article/environmental-enrichment-reptiles?utm_medium=email&utm_source=Clinician%27s+Brief+Newsletter&utm_campaign=CB+ENL+022615 The above is a fantastic article on enrichment. e.g the provision of oppurtunities for an animal to behave in a species specific manner and be mentally fulfilled as well as physiologically fulfilled. It is well known that a happy animal is usually a healthy animal, so it comes as no surprise to me we see so many recurring health problems and early deaths in our captive bred Beardies. I do not believe many of them are truly happy animals. I believe many behavioural indicators of stress (such as glass dancing) have been normalized as just something they “do” rather than the disturbing stereotyped behaviour it actually is. Ultimately Beardies want “out” so much because their enclosures are generally completely unstimulating places in which to be imprisoned. Bearded Dragons are not delicate little flowers. Yet we keep them in these sterile, substrateless boxes as if the smallest of things will kill them. Mainly due to panic mongering spread around the internet that has very little basis in fact and very little empirical evidence to support it.. The sad part about that is the only reason the common species kept on tile and lino can survive in those featureless, easy to clean prisons is that they are hardy. More delicate species would succumb to stress quickly. We keep them as the breeders keep them... for efficiency. I believe the concept of “risk free” is fraught with cruelty inflicted by people with the best of intentions. There is no such thing as “risk free”, for this method brings it’s own host of problems related to the stressful experience of being stuck in an environment in which it express itself properly in a species specific manner. This is why I have gone bioactive with Eldrick. I have seen instant results and I will advocate it with every breath I have until the dark days of lino and tile are consigned to history as a dark period in reptile keeping. I see these poor reptiles kept in a lino lined tank, with nothing but a hide, a slate and a little branch to occupy their time, or worse stuck in a RUB with no enrichment at all languishing in a state of eternal boredom and I feel sad. The plain ol’ lazy, or crazy stereotyped behaviours that are typical of chronic boredom has become normalized in many species, because we make too many assumptions that reptiles are mentally limited and don’t need enrichment. That is a dangerous assumption and means many people are in danger of finding they were guilty of some real husbandry atrocities as we learn more about the emotional life and cognition of our reptile friends. In his bioactive enclosure, Eldrick is free to Lizard like a Lizard should, all day long. He watches bugs moving around the cage, he can dig and forage for food and has a multitude of things he can climb and burrow under.  He can feel different things in his environment beneath his feet, like slate, wood, soil, leaves and soon real plants. The inverts all have hiding places and are free to act in their own species specific ways, which means if he wants to eat, he needs to work rather than sitting there all day waiting for something to happen. Catering for their physical health means nothing at all if you are not catering for their mental health. Ask yourself why so many people still have problems with parasites, even after doing everything “right” in the ways the lino brigade advocates? Chronic low grade stress and subsequent immuno-suppression is your answer......