What Do Lizards Eat

Family of our ancestors, the dinosaurs, lizards are animals of great benefit to many farms that are in production. Surely, in the patio of your house, on some occasion you have come across these nice reptiles.

They are used many times for pest control and there are many species in the world, including the strangest is the flying lizard. Its lifetime is usually 5 to 10 years;  however, in some larger species, they can live up to 25 years.

Some are light green, others are striped in light brown and red, and others are dark brown. Generally, they measure from 5 to 10 centimeters long including their tail, which has a very peculiar and curious capacity.

The lizards are able to break their tail to separate it from the body, leaving it moving from side to side for several minutes. They do this to protect themselves from predators, which stay focused watching how the tail moves, meanwhile the lizard escapes. Sometime later, this tail is born again and a new tail is regenerated, in order to defend itself from a new attack.

Scientists are currently making extensive studies of this wonderful phenomenon of tail regrowth. Because if this system could be implanted in human beings, it would be a great advance in science helping millions of people who have lost some part of their body due to different accidents or diseases.

For example, let’s think of a person who had a motorcycle accident and lost his right leg, if we were like lizards, it would grow back in a few months, and this would be miraculous.

On the other hand, in terms of their variety depending on the habitat, the lizards are especially from hot lands, from sandy and rocky lands, but there are species even in cold areas. As we know, lizards are cold-blooded, so they need to be exposed to the sun to receive energy and vitamins.

They have small nails that are used in nature to dig holes in the sand and make their burrows, in order to protect themselves from predators and the winter cold.

Some people and children take them from a young age and give them a lot of love, keeping them as pets in their homes and in their yards. For this reason, it is important to know these friendly reptiles well, so that you can feed them according to what they eat in nature.

Some children, when they see them in the yard, marry them and kill them, playing with them, and on many occasions they lose their tails. For this reason, we must guide the children so that if they are going to capture them, it is very careful and without scaring them, since when they are left without a tail they are more vulnerable, making it easier for any predator to eat them; In addition, there are many predators for this small space in nature.

They are usually caught by house cats, birds of prey, and vipers that hunt them from behind when they are unattended. They generally eat at night, as they have excellent night vision in their large eyes.

These reptiles are active throughout the year. They move at high speed making short stops in the hottest places and to view their prey. They only go into rest in the coldest periods of winter, where they remain underground in cold times, taking heat from the ground and entering to winter.

When the weather starts to warm up again, they wake up and go out to bask in the sun’s rays to start their journey again in search of their food. On the other hand, lizards  lay their eggs in three different places to protect them; in each cave they lay from 3 to 12 eggs. The time it takes for the eggs to hatch depends on the heat and depth of the caves where the mother deposited them.

If you live alone in your house and need a company, lizards are extremely harmless reptiles and very good companions, especially if you take them as a baby.

Since it is easier for them to adapt to your company and the way you are going to feed it.  If you have no idea how to feed a gecko, don’t worry; next, we explain everything about how to feed and have a pet lizard.

Instructions

1. The first thing you should know is that these animals are said to be used for pest control because they eat a lot of insects.
2. Within this diet, we have to see that the lizards begin to eat at dusk, where more insects begin to come out.
3. Within the insects that lizards eat the most we have: flies, ants, cockroaches, flukes and snails.
4. They also like crickets, worms, earthworms, scorpions, centipedes, mosquitoes, bedbugs, termites, and others.
5. In some pet stores in Spain we can get many of these insects, but they are generally dehydrated.
6. Dehydrated insects do not provide a good diet for your lizard; you can use this only as a complement.
7. We recommend that you kill the insects and try to give them to your lizard alive, so that they can take full advantage of their proteins and vitamins.
8. For this, we invite you to set up an aquarium without water and place an amount of sand about 4 centimeters.
9. You can do this by cutting sheets of glass or a glass-like material that is synthetic called acrylic.
10. These sheets, you are going to paste them by the edges with transparent silicone and you are going to place a metal mesh cover so that your lizard does not get out.
11. Thus, when you put it in, the live insects will not escape and the lizard will be able to hunt and eat them in that small habitat.
12. Place an incandescent lamp on top, so that it produces a little heat and keeps your lizard active.
13. But you must place a thermometer in the aquarium, in order to control its temperature and be able to regulate the distance from the heat lamp.
14. If you catch some cockroaches and place them inside the dry aquarium, you must quickly locate the mesh cover, so that their prey does not escape.
15. If you notice that your lizard does not like cockroaches, you should try another type of insect as some species like other types of live insects better.
16. You should always be aware that your lizard has a small container buried in the sand with water since they dehydrate very quickly.
17. Also, do not forget that you should take your lizard out so that it has contact with the sun’s rays, especially in the morning.
18. The lamp will not provide you with the vitamins that are produced by the sun’s rays, in addition to warming your blood.
19. Sunlight helps the pigmentation of their skin, causing the beautiful colors characteristic of each species.
20. If you are going to put ants on your lizard in the dry tank, do not put too many as the ants are very aggressive.
21. Remember that ants in large numbers can sting to kill your pet and the same if you are going to give him scorpions or other stinging insects.
22. On the other hand, you can place a piece of meat in the patio of your house in more or less 12 hours you will have a number of worms.
23. These worms are a great food for your lizard, as they are harmless and have a large amount of protein that is very nutritious.
24. But you should place them without the meat, only the worms and in a small quantity, since the lizards have small stomachs.
25. Another way to get insects is by collecting a lot of dry leaves in the patio of your house and leaving them in a corner with some wet sand for several days. After 9 days the leaves will be scattered from one side to the other and you will be able to find some cockroaches and crickets taking refuge under the leaves.
26. Put on some latex gloves and take them with a small container. Thus, you will always have fresh food for your lizard.

What do you need:

• Glass sheets.
• Acrylic sheets.
• Transparent silicone.
• Thermometers.
• Metallic cloth.
• Sand.
• Stones.
• Heat lamp
• Insects of different types.
• Meat to produce worms.
• Dry leaves and wet sand.
• Latex gloves.

Tips

1. Don’t give your lizard sewn food because it won’t eat it.
2. Do not add a lot of insects, since they eat little.
3. He is always aware that he keeps his water clean.
4. We recommend that you look for insects far from the city, in remote places, since in urban areas they use a lot of insecticide. Remember that if you hunt several cockroaches or flukes for your lizard’s food and they are contaminated with these substances, your pet will die.
5. Also, try to find termite nests in foreign areas, which are very good for lizards and they like them very much.
6. Locate the nest and only take a small amount each day; so that whenever you come back you can have a supply of these insects.
7. Flies are also a very important food, as they provide them with a quantity of bacteria that lizards need. The bacteria in the flies help them have good digestion and keep their intestines healthy.