Monitor Lizard can be a wonderful pet!

I have dog, cat, fish, hamster, bird... However, today I would like to share my impression and experience in caring and taming monitor lizard pets. There are many kinds of monitor lizard which can be a wonderful pet: nile monitor, asian water monitor, black/white throat monitor, savana monitor etc..

One of my bengal monitors (which is very impressed me with unusual high yellow morph):

First of all, monitors are bigger, stronger, smarter and more aggressive than most other typies of lizard. It's mean that those beautiful creatures can bite, claw, tail whip and hurt like hell. They also can run fast, hide skillfully and make you crazy. Hence, DO NOT start your monitor adventure with a grown monitor, or even a juvenile one, the older monitors are the harder for you to tame them. I don't say that you can not tame a juvenile or full grown one (I will tell you how to do it at the end of the post) but with them, you have to spend a lot of time and effords. So, let begin with one or two baby monitors ("baby" means they are less than 3 months old).

Secondly, after you choose a baby monitor from a normal or online shop, DO NOT forget to buy at least the basic accessories: tank, basking spot light, flood light, infrared light (for using at night if the temperature in your area can go bellow 25 celsius/77 fahrenheit). Note that you DO NOT have to buy expensive UVA and UVB bubbles for your monitor because flood light is already including all of UV bands. For one or two baby monitor, a 1 cubic meter (260 U.S gallons) tank is suitable. For a juvenile or grown one, you need a tank which width and hight are at least two time larger and its length is at least three time larger than the length of the monitor.

For the purpose of taming and caring the new baby monitors, size and decoration of the tank are very importance. Why? If the tank is too big or it contains many thing that the baby monitors can take cover, your new babies will have less chance to be familiar with your appearance: image, voice, smell, touch... that makes it more difficulties to you to "break the ice". Contrariwise, if the tank is too small or has no thing to take cover, the diversity of temperature in the tank would be reduced. It means that your pets will have less choise when they want to move to a warmer (closer to the heat) or cooler (futher from the heat) area in their tank. This problem even can kill you pets - image you are locked in a small room and you have no place to go when the room's temprature is too hot or too cold.

My baby Nile monitor (in my opinion, Nile monitor is more aggressive and harder to tame than any kind of monitor except crocodile monitor)

Beside the tank matter and the frequency you can show around the pets, the secrect of taming is...food. All of new arrival monitors will refuce to eat food from you hand. Don't be panic. Leave clean water in the tank and NO FOOD. Then, watch the pets' reaction to food outsite the tank carefully (criket, worm with baby monitor or mice, fish with grown one). If they still don't react, continue leave them with water only. When you see that they begin tring to approach the food, it means they can not suffer the hunger any more, feed them by your hand or by a clamp. That is the first but very impotance step of socialising procedure. Note that the older the monitors the longer they can resist the attract of food. You must be spend more time with them.