My Lacey "Training" Experience

[saximus]

I just thought I’d share my limited experience with training my little Lacey. I thought it might help as a bit of a guide for those who are interested and hopefully to get some tips from the pros on what I might be doing wrong and/or where to go from here. He is just over a year old now and no longer bolts as soon as I walk into the reptile room so I’ve been employing some basic techniques to make dealing with him easier as he gets bigger.
Note, I don’t know if gender makes much difference to behaviour and I don’t know what sex it is but I will just call it “he” for ease of reading.

My first step was feeding from tongs. At first he obviously didn’t like me sticking my hand into the enclosure at all so if he didn’t take it I would just leave the room, taking the mouse with me. After a few days of this he got a bit more bold and took the food. Considering that by the time he ate it had been a week or more since his last meal, I’m guessing it was maybe more hunger than him realising I’m not a threat. However, I carried on with this same routine for a couple of weeks and he seemed to be getting more bold and comfortable with eating in front of me.

Once this little routine was established, I started trying a little bit of target training. I have a white plastic container that I defrost all of my reptile food in so I started bringing that over to the enclosure and holding it up for him to see before feeding. There may be flaws in my experiment here so please feel free to say whether this is a good example of a “target” or not. It certainly seems like a good example though because this worked surprisingly quickly. In under a month he appears to have strongly linked the container with food. I can walk past the enclosure to do what I have to do with my snakes and he just watches me but as soon as I walk up to the enclosure holding it, it’s like a switch goes on in his head. The tongue starts flicking like crazy and what I call the “robot” mode starts where his movement is very jerky (I think monitor owners will know what I mean here). So now, instead of bolting from me to a hiding spot, he sees the container and bolts at me haha. I’ve also been doing this from the same side of the enclosure every time to try to get that door to be the food door.

So now that that has been going well for a couple of months, yesterday I tried my first attempt at physical contact. I put on a thick glove (some may say this is false protection I know) and went in from the other side of the enclosure. I moved my hand very slowly towards him and I was really surprised to see he came straight to me. The concern here is that while he wasn’t in “robot” mode, he was tongue flicking like crazy. I also noticed the eyes seemed a bit dilated but I don’t know if that was feed mode or excitement/fear. I moved my hand around slowly and tried to manoeuvre it under his chin but he backed away so I just stuck to letting him explore it at his own pace. I was really wary of overdoing it so this whole contact only lasted maybe a minute or two.

To the experienced people, is there any behaviour or action I should look out for or be particularly wary of as I progress with the physical contact? Was yesterday’s experience a little win or actually just him checking whether my fingers were edible? Are any of the things I’ve done so far maybe unnecessary or even detrimental?

Sorry this out to be a lot longer than I expected so thanks to anyone who read the whole thing.
Cheers
Dan

 

[reptalica]

Great thread Dan. Should be made a sticky. Whilst we all know that each and every lacie has it's own personality and level of tolerance I think we can all be greater for the knowledge that has been provided by Dan.

 

[imported_Varanus]

Sounds like "He's" progressing nicely Sax! . Another "technique" you can try for an interactive afternoon is firstly to monitor proof your reptile room, then open the enclosure door and allow the animal to explore the room if he so chooses. That way, you can just go about your daily routine and he'll approach you when he feels comfortable rather than any forced interaction in "his space". A word of warning, though, eventually they'll feel comfortable exploring further and will take over your whole house! You'll find yourself setting up basking shelves in the loungeroom instead of book cases.

Just be wary of the repeated nosing in the same spot, rapid tongue flicking and dilated pupils when he's lounging about your person (as mentioned in another thread).

Lacies are just THE BEST herp companion, huh?

 

[reptalica]

Loved the bit about dilated pupils IV. My Boyd's Forest Dragon do that a lot especially when live food is present. You see their pupils enlarge then shrink and so forth.

I will have me a lacie one day, however, as always the common sense approach wins out. Housing is an issue. What's a smaller, more manageable monitor in the interim??? Black headed monitor? Storrs? Ackies?

 

[imported_Varanus]

Loved the bit about dilated pupils IV. My Boyd's Forest Dragon do that a lot especially when live food is present. You see their pupils enlarge then shrink and so forth.

I will have me a lacie one day, however, as always the common sense approach wins out. Housing is an issue. What's a smaller, more manageable monitor in the interim??? Black headed monitor? Storrs? Ackies?

JMO, but no other monitor can really prepare you for a Lacie and you're likely doing the "interim monitor" an injustice if they are merely a prelude to owning Varius. Wait until you have the room, then get a lacie hatchling would be my advice. I had Spencer's before Lacies (can be skittish), Ackies and Gillens. I'd recommend Gillens out of those 3, they really dont like any handling, but are active, can be kept in smaller facilities and aren't aggressive toward conspecifics (unlike Ackies can be), especially if you buy them as a group of related animals. JMO, of course.

 

[saximus]

Thanks for the kind words Reptalica . Thanks to you too, IV. I was hoping you’d come along in this thread.
I’ve had Ackies and Black-heads and I don’t think either of them give you any idea of what a Lacey is like, even when it’s small. I would probably personally suggest gouldii or spenceri. Both are a bit bigger but not as big as a Lacey. Gouldii are supposed to be a bit more skittish but they’re quite different builds so it depends what you like.

 

[Umbral]

I'm just starting to feed my Flavi with a glove to get him used to my hand, after reading this I realise I might just be teaching it that hand = food

 

[the_brad]

Loose the glove, if it bites you while it's still small, good! it'll learn quick that there's no point and will probably never try again. Plus you look like a woman

 

[Renenet]

Interesting info on this this thread.

Just be wary of the repeated nosing in the same spot, rapid tongue flicking and dilated pupils when he's lounging about your person (as mentioned in another thread).

What's the best thing to do if they start to do this?

 

[Umbral]

Loose the glove, if it bites you while it's still small, good! it'll learn quick that there's no point and will probably never try again. Plus you look like a woman

Body without tail is about a foot long and would easily take a good hold of a finger. I realise if I lose one I have 11 more (Live in Cessnock these things have to be expected.) but I kind of like having all 12.

 

[Jr.HerpKeeper]

One day I will own a Lacey....

 

[imported_Varanus]

What's the best thing to do if they start to do this?

Personally, I've found distracting them (through distant movement or sound) is the best way to go rather than anything physical. By distant, I mean not within striking distance as they may percieve movement as a food offering.

 

[phatty]

Body without tail is about a foot long and would easily take a good hold of a finger. I realise if I lose one I have 11 more (Live in Cessnock these things have to be expected.) but I kind of like having all 12.

So you don't have thumbs


Sent from my GT-I9210T using Tapatalk

 

[Umbral]

Nope like I said, Cessnock just the 12 fingers.

 

[reptalica]

Interesting info on this this thread.



What's the best thing to do if they start to do this?

Tell him u need a toilet run.

 

[Illium]

For anyone with the experience of both, what would people say has the best overall personality and human tolerance, lacy or perentie?
Will be building an 8m x 5m enclosure outside over the next year but still undecided on what will end up in it.

I personally fell in love with the beautiful specimen I had the opportunity to see at the Illawarra reptile show this year, but living in Sydney the lacy makes more sense for an outdoor enclosure.

 

[Albino93]

I for one am going to follow this thread, its been interesting and will act as a good learning guide.

Do u have any updated photo's of him Sax?

 

[Nellynake]

Following this thread as well, great info. I will be getting a lacie soon and want to know the basic on getting it "used" to human interaction, this thread seems to have covered it so far .

 

[tahniandshae]

great thread. I don't have any monitors just plenty of pythons, but I love the intelligence of all the lizards and their ability to learn

 

[crocdoc]

I'm going to be the odd one out here, but my monitors' pupils contract, rather than dilate, before they bite something. The pupil goes from being large and dark to a pinhole. Sure sign of trouble if you're handling one rather than feeding it.