Long nails??

[The Bearded Derek]

I started looking at his nails, they're not too long but they're starting to scratch and I noticed his nails (Or fingers, I see his nails) bending slightly. He's currently 3 and a half months old, when could be the estimated time for me to cut his nails if they're not long enough now?

Here's a pic: http://instagram.com/p/cUJtnxyQP_/

[donkeybuff]

Do you have rough things like driftwood and rock in his enclosure? That should file down the nails naturally. The nails should be cut when the toes start bending sideways due to the length of the nails. The time it takes for your skink to reach that point depends on how fast his nails grow and how much they are naturally filed down.

[Lea]

The photo is too fuzzy to see the nails, but as was said by donkeybuff, you can put things in the enclosure to help file them naturally, which would negate a need for trims, which can be a little risky to tiny toes if you haven't got a good hold of your skink. A little sheet of fine sandpaper will do the trick, too and won't cause accidental injury when they use it.

[The Bearded Derek]

The substrate I have in his enclosure is beginner repti-wood, is there any other thing to file down his nails and for how long should he walk on it? I have his basking rock but he almost never gets on it.

[awilcocks]

i have a garden brick in Tili's cage, and a flat shale rock in the other cage and *granted the new guy came to me with horrible nails* they look like they're doing ok...his toes will never be straight again, but i'm making sure tili's never get that bad..bc they just look painful...

[The Bearded Derek]

Mine for some reason has crooked nails. Is it normal/bad for them? Anyway to fix it?

[Richard.C]

post a pic of its toes,they could very well just be the normal shape,at 3.5 months of age nail issues shouldnt have had enough time to develop

[Susann]

If they are bent slightly from the digit down to the ground, that's normal.
If they are bent from the digit to the side then you need to get in the habit of keeping them a little shorter.
Give him something to "file" them down on his own, or get in the unpleasant habit of nipping the very tips of the nails every now and then.

This is Xyla the day after I got her:

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The nails are way too long, and are making the toes turn sideways. If they turn sideways for long enough the toes can become bent like that forever.

This is a week (and a shed) later:

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The way most of the nails are bending is normal, the way the pinkie nail is bending is not.

[trex]

Sorry to hijack your thread bearded derek, but I had some very similar questions, and i didn't want to clutter up the message boards.

From what i am reading on this thread, is it safe to cut a BTS's toe claws with a human nailclipper? How far up should i clip be done? If i remember correctly, there are vascular structures underneath the nail bed.

Will a BTS know that its nails are too long and manually file them down on rough materials? Or is it just an assumption that leaving rough surfaces in the cage (even if there is only 1) is enough to file down a BTS nail because it will occasionally walk over it?

p.s. Susann, your merauke's tummy is so bright red... My jaw dropped when i saw it. Not sure if it is the camera's exposure causing it or if the stomach really is that bright. but WOW, so pretty. Do most, if not all, meraukes have that strong red on their underbellies? Or is it a trait found on almost all the gigas?

[Dakota]

It is just an assumption.. while the rummage through their cage, it happens. They don't actually try to do it, it just happends.

Every Merauke I have seen has red or red and black, but Susann's are high-orange, so color is much much more vibrant than a typical Merauke.

[Susann]

Human nail clippers are fine.
And yes, there is a "quick" inside the claw, just like on dogs and cats. If your skink has light colored nails you can sometimes make out how far down the quick grows. If you have to clip, the safest thing to do is to just clip off the very tip of the nail. If it works the same way as on dogs, if you cut off just the tiniest tip, but do it more often, you can actually make the quick shorten inside the nail, so the overall length of the nails can become somewhat shorter.
It can be a bit scary to cut the quick, so a little too little is better than cutting off a little too much.

No, I do not believe the skink can tell that he needs to trim his nails, and then purposefully go crawling on something to file them down. It's more a case of, if you're lucky he'll happen to crawls over the stone enough to shorten his nails over time ...or at least keep that razor-sharp, scythe-tip from forming. (Maddie gets THE WORST sharp nails; it looks like I've gone 10 rounds with a slasher after I've held her for a minute.)

Most Meraukes have some salmon color on their bellies, but Xyla's can get super red like that. I don't think her belly is super rare-colored, but she's definitely the reddest of my 6 Meraukes right after she sheds. Now, to be fair, the picture is taken with a flash, so that might be brightening the color a bit.

[Sarikazam]

I have a large rock sitting in the middle of my Northern's terrarium, so whenever he travels to far side he has to pass over it. His nails seem to stay at a reasonable length.

Then of course there is filing your skinks nails by slightly lifting the middle of their bodies and letting them "windmill" their arms across a rough surface like pavement or sandpaper. I have only had to do that once or twice and the skinks appear to be a little confused why they are not moving anywhere but they don't seem to really mind. And it helps a bit.