young EWD help & questions!! age, diet, taming, etc.

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mayamaya

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I've had my baby eastern water dragon jamba since february. I never knew his/her exact length back then but I recently measured its length roughly from snout to vent (not incl. tail) and it was 6cm. Approximately how old could this be?
Also, how do I get it to eat fruit & vegetables... Im kind of worried because the only things its ever accepted are insects like flies, small grasshoppers and now just small crickets. It will eat around 2-3 crickets per day, (if im around its enclosure a lot it will sometimes eat less in a day from not being comfortable around me yet, and maybe more if im not around much that day). its taken tiny little bites of some apple before but thats it. &how often at that age do I powder the crickets with calcium & vitamins? right now i just do it about 3 times per week. But everyone says something different. I want it to be a healthy amount but at the same time avoid "overdosing" as I heard too much supplementation can be dangerous. With the cricket feeding, I havent hand fed or anything yet but when I put a few crickets into the enclosure, what could I possibly do for the crickets to be together in one place not being about to wander off into the rest of the enclosure but at the same time my dragon can still reach them? I cant put them in a bowl because they'll obviously jump out, but is there anything else at all which I can do? Its just annoying when I throw them openly into the enclosure, they always hide/sit under the rocks in the warm area (until I take the uneaten ones back out at night) preventing my lizard from spotting & catching them which gets really annoying because there would be random days where it would only find 1 or none to eat! & I dont want to take all the good furnishings out just because of the stupid crickets (-_-) and putting him into a smaller container with only paper towel & the crickets for an hour to eat them would be even worse because he wouldnt eat them from the stress of that anyway...
& shedding. I have not witnessed him shed his skin yet at all, is this normal for his age? does the stuff look as intense as the shedded snake skin you randomly see sometimes? lol.
aaaaand one more thing, how on earth do you tame / hand raise these crazy little creatures? haha. I really want my EWD to be comfortable around me, so it can be active, swim, bask, eat, run around in the heat without hiding in its little hideout whenever i enter the room and stay in the same room for a while. I know its healthy because it DOES eat, it is active (even though still a bit paranoid lol), it defecates normally and is in great shape. Its just too scared still. I want to be able to let it climb on my hand etc. too instead of having to holding it awkwardly because its so small and squirmish. It doesnt bite & has never tried to bite me though which is a good thing, just really shy and paranoid.
It also would be great if someone could tell me what age/size you can determine their gender at! because I know they all look very similar at my one's age. Although I have been seeing its belly start to develop a red shading since the past month or 2.. which I thought was quite odd for such a young one.
Anyway I'll attach photos to this & you can tell me what you think. Oh & sorry for all the Qs, Im not some idiot who isnt taking proper care of my dragon lol. Everything's fine, I just like to double check to make sure that everything's right & healthy for my animal :) Soo yeah, it would be great if someone could help me & share all this info!!
Thanks
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They won't eat veges when they are little so don't worry too much and apple is a little too hard at that age as well. They are also very shy and it will take patience to get him used to you, don't push it, just get him used to you being around. Some never get hand tame so be prepared for that. Don't worry about leaving the crickets in with him just put some gut load in there in a bit of egg carton. It is fairly impossible to tell sex at that age, even the red chest doesn't tell you much. My girl was sold to me as a boy because of a red chest when she was young and it has only been in the past year or so I have worked out she is a girl, she is 4 now. He/she is a lovely little thing, I love water dragons.
 
Ohhh ok, yeah I did hear that they are fussy eaters when they are young and mainly insectivors but yeah. as long as its healthy I guess! Thanks for your help! I dont really mind if it wont ever like getting picked up or whatever, just as long as it will finally realize that I dont want to attack it or eat it or whatever they think that makes them go nuts lol, and that im just here to give it food & a good home. Ahh anyway I dont really blame it since it is quite small at the moment! Would you be able to guess how old u think it is? by the looks and size of 6cm not including the tail. Ive had him for a little over 3 months now, but Im guessing he's 4 or 5 months old because he has grown a bit and his head doesnt look as big compared to his body as it did before. And Juveniles are bigger than him so Im guessing hes still a "hatchling"? lol
Thank you :)
 
Yeah, probably about 6 months maybe, I have some Gippsland babies and they are still tiny and I have had them since Febuary, they do grow slower than EWD but I found when I had a EWD hatchy before they do tend to grow slower than say beardies.
 
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