Captain Richard "Lizardhands" Edward

[Edward Lizardhands]

My new indo skink from Outback Reptiles. Pretty sure he's farm bred but he hasn't bit me yet. The nice guys on Ball-Pythons.net are helping me fix my husbandry.
He's being housed in a 36in x 18in x 18in, in aspen substrate, with very weak 25 watt bulbs, low humidity, at least I got temps right but they're provided by a UTH. I'm creating a basking spot and a fluorescent bar for that UV, and switching to eco earth. He's very calm when I pick him up, the maximum of holding time being 5 minutes.
Here's photos of him and the terrarium. I was also wondering what locality he is.

[Edward Lizardhands]

I'm also feeding him 85% lean ground turkey with blueberries, mango (he loves little bits of mango) assorted greens, arugula, spinach, green beans, occasionally squash, rare strawberry slice, and the occasional earthworm. (My dad has a composting thingy (earthworm colony I guess.) Oh yeah and I'm 13. Hi.

[Edward Lizardhands]

I'm really freaked out though, I fed him about 3 meals with cat food because we ran out of the turkey, is he ok? Ugh.......i've given him a horrible life so far...

[JoshChimera]

What are the temperatures? Everything else sounds fine.

[Edward Lizardhands]

96.6 degrees hot(again, not with a basking spot but with a stinkin UTH) and 71-78 on cold.

[lucasrusinak]

cat and dog food is often used so I wouldnt worry. I personally feed my guy dog food for every meal and hes been doing great as are other who use dog food on here.

the basking spot should be about 100 so you arent too far off, and the cool side should be low 70s so youre about good on that too. I do not own an indo of any kind so I wont be a ton of help on how to do it, however I believe you should have a higher humidity for these types of skinks in order for them to shed properly and stay healthy. I think changing the bedding from aspen to something like mulch or something that holds moisture better would help.

[Edward Lizardhands]

Yeah thats what I was thinking. Maybe some peat moss and eco earth for sure. Maybe eco earth and packaged dirt?
In the cat food im just worried about Taurine. The mystery ingredient. Instead of the usual canned cat food, I used these rabbit pellets that we feed our cat instead. I checked the ingredients, it's ok as far as chemicals (there aren't any) and has a TINY amount of fruitn already in it to spice it up.

[lucasrusinak]

Yeah thats what I was thinking. Maybe some peat moss and eco earth for sure. Maybe eco earth and packaged dirt?
In the cat food im just worried about Taurine. The mystery ingredient. Instead of the usual canned cat food, I used these rabbit pellets that we feed our cat instead. I checked the ingredients, it's ok as far as chemicals (there aren't any) and has a TINY amount of fruitn already in it to spice it up.

I would just switch to high quality canned dog food. I use blue buffalo since I only feed one, but thats more expensive than other brands. Many people on this forum have successfully used canned dog food for years.

[Edward Lizardhands]

USUALLY I feed him ground turkey. LLLReptile uses it and they've run ok and its cheap blah blah blah. I might try teh dog food.

[lucasrusinak]

USUALLY I feed him ground turkey. LLLReptile uses it and they've run ok and its cheap blah blah blah. I might try teh dog food.

ground turkey is fine, i just find dog food easier because i dont need to prepare it and it already has some good veggies and stuff in it so I dont have to worry about mixing in fresh ones all the time.