Gigas Breeding

[xxmonitorlizardxx]

I know that alot of people attempt to breed various indonesian species(I'm only talking about indos,meraukes, and keis), but fail to get offspring. From what I know, they try to brumate the skinks before they breed. Now there have been about 10 different people trying to breed them this/last year. And of those people, only one of them(Susann) had babies. That also happened to be that person's first time breeding and they didn't brumate. Could the key to breeding gigas sp be not brumating seeing as they are equatorial lizards, and therefore do not experience great temperature change?

[Susann]

I've been told people have tried to breed gigas both ways, with and without brumation, with the same result: no babies. My success ways purely Andrew's doing, and he did not brumate before sending them to me. Key? No idea, but if I'm ever successful again, I'll let you know if I brumated before

[Niels D]

I've bred Indo's (Merauke and IJ) but I've never brumated them. They stood in a room that cooled down a bit during winter times, so the night temperatures lowered. I think that did the trick. No brumation but a slightly decrease in night temperatures.

[Fatal_S]

Neil, did your skinks live together? It seems almost every successful gigas breeder has to keep their skinks together year-round to get babies. Was so excited when Susann's skinks bred since they lived separate. Question is will it be repeatable.

Susann, updated photos please!

[Susann]

Susann, updated photos please!

Aaaarrgh, working on it... They are big. 4 months old, 200 grams, 17 inches. Will post pics soon!

[xxmonitorlizardxx]

I've been told people have tried to breed gigas both ways, with and without brumation, with the same result: no babies. My success ways purely Andrew's doing, and he did not brumate before sending them to me. Key? No idea, but if I'm ever successful again, I'll let you know if I brumated before

Then neither of you did anything, and you left them alone.
By the way, who are all of these people?

[xxmonitorlizardxx]

Neil, did your skinks live together? It seems almost every successful gigas breeder has to keep their skinks together year-round to get babies. Was so excited when Susann's skinks bred since they lived separate. Question is will it be repeatable.

Susann, updated photos please!

Who are all the people? I only know of 3 successful breedings and I can confirm that for two of them the animals were separate. I don't know about the other.

[Susann]

By the way, who are all of these people?

I do not know names, I didn't ask. When Andrew told me to breed the animals he just sent me, he told me that people, i.e. other breeders he had talked to, had tried it both ways.

[xxmonitorlizardxx]

You need to ask next time HAHAHA

[Richard.C]

Andrew will know the other breeders,but thats not important,i would do the dirunal cycling like i do with my northerns,similar to how python breeders go about it

Overnite cooling during brumation,the natural winter cooling of air temp in cooler climates does the rest,they are tropical animals,wet season dry season inhabitants

The success with prs together year round is probably just an adaptable pr,seperate animals should do fine to if they accept each other,biggest hurdle will be a male frisky enough and a female that submisses to him and of course at the appropriate time

If they were expensive non imported animals,eg australian i reckon there would be alot more success with them

They should cycle similar to northerns

[Niels D]

I kept my animals (T.gigas evanescens) seperated from eachother with a wooden panel. The male figured out how to push the panel aside, which had to take great strength, so I found him in the compartment of the female. Didn't see any mating, so it was a great surprise when I found out the fremale was pregnant. This was in spring 1999 or 2000. I didn't know this is that uncommon though, because I know a couple of people who have bred evanescens as well.

[Jeff]

Meraukes seem to breed well everywhere EXCEPT the U.S. It is weird how some animals are just harder to breed in some locations than others.

I know multiple, competent people who have tried to breed meraukes by keeping them together, and keeping them separate. Some people prefer to not be mentioned by name Monitorlizard. That doesn't mean they don't exist.

[Niels D]

An American newt named Notophthalmus viridescens is bred succesfully in the US, but we Europeans breed them only in rare cases. I've managed to breed them only once allas.