Bathtime! (for babies)

[lalat]

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Soooo allow me try to resist a rant, I was a good lad, I gave up my wild illegal unlicenced eastern bluetongue I loved as much as a dog

so i got a licence and just now returning from a breeder who had wall to wall lizards in his garage
and no interest in my licence, but nice enough of a person, his son too

alas, my naga was a clean skink, smelt of nothing
oomax, not so much

quite plainly , cute as all hell but smells like shes been kept in urine soaked sand, deep fried in urine scent oil and asked for more like oliver

shes 1-2 months old


how do I bath this little bundle of long distance joy?

thankyou

[kingofnobbys]

So you got a little juvenile Eastern BTS …. good for you.

Sand is not the best substrate …. for obvious reasons.

I take it the breeded exchanged licence details ( you'll need them to register the BTS on your permit / licence ). All you need is their AKL no , and their name and the town they are in.

I'd have the little skink on paper towels ( same stuff you in the pantry ) , a few layers of it in the watering , basking and feeding area of it's tub or tank.

I'd do 1/2 the floor out with just paper towels , replace these frequently, the food dish and water dish in that area, I'd have the water dish on top a suitable sized floor tile , the rest I'd put a mix of dried expanded coir peet (BRUNNINGS from BUNNINGS) and course Kritters Krumble , If you have access to gum tree leaf litter and shed twigs and bark they are great to add too ( adds nice texture to the bedding) , for a little BT juvenile , only need bedding deep enough for the skink to burrow through - they love It).
Keep the thick substrate dry for an eastern BT , and spot clean it if skinky soils it by removing the soiled bits..

Provide a VERY SHALLOW & WIDE WATER dish with water no deeper than 1/2 the thickness of the skink . The little skink will soon discover this water dish / bathing pond and will look after bathing itself .
The water dish needs a rough inside texture so the skink can get out easy.
Very young skinks shed frequently , and tend to shed all over all in one go , the very shallow pond will do the trick for helping it get the very itchy shed off itself.

If it's particularly badly soiled (due to the poor husbandry of the breeder who overcrowded the skink with it's siblings , then a plastic food tub like
https://www.decor.com.au/product/tellfr ... ong-2-0-l/
size 74 x 254 x 184 mm worked well for me with my baby BTS and works with hatchling bearded dragons and water skinks , can find these at Woolworths or Coles
or quick visit to the local Chinese for a take home meal and you'll get a few of these http://www.richpak.com.tw/MS-750A.html?CID=8 , washed these are great baby dragon and baby BTS bathtubs.
Please don't bath it in the sink , or the people's bath tub . They are for people not for skinks , and the sound or the taps running with terrify the skink and if it gets away it'll land on a hard unforgiving surface ( tile or lino or concrete ).
I'd bath it on the floor or the bed or lounge or coffee table if it's necessary. Bath water temperature I find that works is 31 to 33 deg C .

[lalat]

Thankyou my friend once again, I did get the breeders licence number eventually, sadly yes. oomox was one of around 20 BTS in a bunnings carrier whatever thier called

sand substrate, apparently they were surplus to requirements and given from another breeder, some had amazingly unique colours but I just wanted a "naga" odd though I cant seem to find many captive BTS with nagas combination of colours

happy to report oomox is now odor free, has her extreme OMGDOGFOOD!! feeding quirks still, trying to kill dogfood with the classic headshake

shoping tomorrow for lights, hides and substrait

[kingofnobbys]

Thankyou my friend once again, I did get the breeders licence number eventually, sadly yes. oomox was one of around 20 BTS in a bunnings carrier whatever thier called

sand substrate, apparently they were surplus to requirements and given from another breeder, some had amazingly unique colours but I just wanted a "naga" odd though I cant seem to find many captive BTS with nagas combination of colours

happy to report oomox is now odor free, has her extreme OMGDOGFOOD!! feeding quirks still, trying to kill dogfood with the classic headshake

shoping tomorrow for lights, hides and substrait

I found my baby bluetongues liked a converted mailing box , all I did was cut a skink sized hole near one end in the back , and I filled the box with shredded kitchen paper towels ( loosely crumpled up in my hand and then dropped in ) , then placed a 5W film type heatpad under a floor tile under the skink's "house" to make a toasty warm home for the skink ( set the thermostat so it stayed no hotter than 32 degC ) . They loved it and it was dead easy to check them when they were inside by simply opening the lid while not moving their house.
Really little skinks like the cardboard tubes the paper towel is rolled on. My water skink Cheakie loved his little tube hides while he was a "kept skink".

My big water skink girls Fluffy and Gutzy love their converted 600mm oblong food tubes and their 400mm round food tubs , I simply lined the outside with black cloth tape and line the part of the lid that goes inside with paper towel , and drop some screwed up shreds of paper towel in ( the water skinks often push these to the skink sized hole in the side of the tub (made with a scissors) to act as door for privacy.
'
Uptake , while the little BT is little , it'll appreciate a nice small confined space to sleep in / hide in so I'd hold off on buying plastic hide or half hollow style timber or plastic hide til Oormax is a bit bigger ( maybe when the home made hide is outgrown ).

The food bash up routine is Oormax trying to soften / break up / kill the morsel of food.

[lalat]

Thanks for the lovely information once again it actually helped answer something,

Im using a clear bunnings tub with a mesh lid at the moment, no UV just yet but ive designed it so its 1:1 with the morning sun while im at work, it never gets too hot because of the eves of the house, im hoping this gives oomox a good dose of UV in the morning, ive converted a bunnings mesh tray thats turned upside down, giving oomox some decent outside time free of bird threat ( we have a growing problem with native noisy miners, even the magpies are struggling)

I think im doing well, atleast I hope I am

oomox hates any box though, no matter how well setup and she'll nose her way under a cutup rag ive put in there to hide all day, it concerns me a little but it links up with what you say about small spaces, its as if she knows im safe

the throws a bit of an anxiety tantrum when put in her box or any box, even the little custom made outside mesh box I made

she calms right down when I hold her, prefering to sleep on the back of my neck or a trowsersnake manuver, the former certainly isnt a small space, she can see all the world on my neck

at the breeders house she was one of 20 in a sandpit, full of hiding rocks and fighting for food

im guessing shes grown up tough and shes scared to be alone

any ideas??

btw, in a slight offtopic
on the way to bunnings I met one of your friends

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the pvc pipe seems to have no purpose, but its having one anyway

[kingofnobbys]

She'll eventually discover the box hides of her own accord.

She's small and so everything is scary to her , and she needs time to settle in.
Being left outside in a tub is going to be very stressful to a little captive bred skink who has never been outside. if she is stressed by it IMO it's best to not force it on her. Hiding is her way to trying to feel safe.

One hour of natural sunlight per week ( NSW in summer ) is sufficient til you get a UV source for her tank.

[lalat]

Ive found a good solution, ive made her a sleeping tub, a smaller box with plenty of holes, enough room to move, filled with coir peet thats been hydrated but dried out

oddly so i notice the pack actually says reptiles now, im sure it never used too

at 2 dollars a brick i got a few

oomox is fast asleep finally

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[kingofnobbys]

I mix it with natural (free) eucalypt leaf litter and twigs and bits of bark (have an endless supply in my front yard) & course grade kritters krumble .
1x 20L bag of KK does both my adult bts' 4ft x 2ft tanks.

50mm PVC water pipes make good hides for little skinks. I know some who have buried hides for their little monitors and skinks that are accessed by PVC water pipe offcuts.