Baby Crested Gecko

BABY/JUVENILE CRESTED GECKO CARE

Housing

We keep one to two baby crested geckos up to 10 grams in a 6 qt shoebox sized container.  After a gecko reaches 10 grams, we will move it to a 16 qt Sterilite container.  Generally, baby/juvenile crested geckos should be housed separately, but you can house small babies of the same size together.  If you are housing babies together, make sure that you provide enough food for all the geckos so there isn’t any bullying.  You should separate the babies at 3-4 grams because the bigger/more dominant geckos will bully the smaller/less dominant one for food.  A benefit to housing baby/juvenile crested geckos separately is that they eat better without competition.  When they eat better, they grow faster.  You should never house two or more males together, they will fight to the death!

Decorations & Substrate

For baby and juvenile crested geckos, we use paper towels because it makes it easy to see their poop and they’re super easy to clean.  If you see your gecko’s poop, you know they’re eating, which is one of the most important things when keeping babies (juveniles usually eat more out of their food dish so it is easier to see if they ate or not).  You can also use coco fiber or sphagnum moss for substrate in your juvenile’s enclosure (we don’t recommend using loose substrates for your babies because it is very hard to see your gecko’s poop and, although unlikely, there is the risk of your gecko getting impacted).

As for decorations, you can use numerous things.  You can go the simple route (paper towel, fake plants, egg crates/cartons, pvc pipes, pipe insulators, etc.) or create a more naturalistic setup with branches, live plants, ledges, cork bark etc.  You can also make a humid hide for your gecko if your room/house is too dry.  A humid hide will help with shedding as well as making sure the humidity level stays ideal.  A deli cup filled with loose substrate (e.g. coco fiber) serves as a great humid hide.  Make sure you cut a hole in the lid so that your gecko can enter and exit the humid hide.

For larger enclosures, you can use a variety of branches.  When using anything from outside, make sure you disinfect the item(s) with a 10% bleach solution (1 part bleach to 9 parts water; if you have a large sink or container, use that to disinfect the item(s) in.  Next, pour the bleach and water into your sink or container and scrub the item(s) to get all of the dirt off.  After your item(s) have been scrubbed, soak the item(s) for 30 minutes or so.  Next, remove the item(s) from the bleach solution and let them sit for 15-20 min in the sun to dry.  Finally, after everything is dry and doesn’t smell like bleach, your item(s) can go into your enclosure).

Temperature & Humidity

For optimum health, we recommend keeping them between 74F-76F.  Baby crested geckos are very susceptible to heat, and temperatures over 85F will eventually kill your gecko.

Ideal humidity for baby crested geckos is 60-80%.  You can achieve this by misting once a day, or once every other day.  You also want to make sure that the enclosure isn’t too wet, or it can cause shedding problems, respiratory diseases, as well as causing mold and fungus to grow in your tank. That being said, don’t worry if your hygrometer says it is 99% after you mist your gecko's cage.  As long as it goes down to about 50-60% at some point during the day, there is no need to stress out.  Having a digital hygrometer will help with monitoring your enclosure’s humidity.  You should also have a digital thermometer to monitor your temperatures.

Food

At Reptile Rack, we feed our baby/juvenile crested geckos Pangea gecko diet and live mealworms.  Repashy’s MRP (Meal Replacement Powder) is also a good choice, however, we noticed that most of our crested geckos don’t like Repashy as much as Pangea.  We feed a variety of Pangea flavors every other day as well as dusted mealworms once or twice a week.  You can also mix other diets together to give them a better taste if you have picky geckos, or to offer a variety.

Along with Pangea diet you should also offer insects, ideally once or twice a week.  Your geckos will grow faster and larger when being fed insects.  The most recommended feeder insects for crested geckos are mealworms, dubia roaches, and crickets.  Some people believe crested geckos can't digest mealworms' exoskeletons; however, this is completely false.  ACReptiles and Supreme Gecko have proven mealworms to be very nutritious and safe for your crested gecko to eat.

All feeder insects should be gut loaded and dusted with calcium that has D3 (D3 is essential for the geckos to be able to absorb the calcium).  Do not use calcium with D3 if you are going to provide a UVB light!  This may cause calcium overdose which can kill your gecko!  For calcium without D3, we recommend Rep-Cal Calcium without D3.  To gut load our insects, we use Repashy Bug Burger and veggies (usually carrots).  We use Repashy Calcium Plus for dusting the insects before feeding.

Providing Water

Providing  a water bowl for baby and juvenile crested geckos is useful if you live in a drier area and want to make sure your gecko is staying hydrated.  Crested geckos will lick water off the leaves and sides of the cage after misting; however, if you do want to provide a water bowl, bottle caps or small salsa cups work great.  Water bowls can also be helpful if you’re leaving your home for a few days or if you are temporarily unable to mist your gecko's cage.  It is very important that if you do offer water bowls, to clean or replace them every few days.  Soiled water bowls can become a breeding ground for harmful bacteria if they are not cleaned frequently.

Handling

Baby and juvenile crested geckos are easy to handle.  The best way to handle baby and juvenile crested geckos is through a method called hand walking (or hand jumping if you gecko likes to jump).  Hand walking is simply letting your gecko walk from hand to hand.  Hand jumping is the same this as hand jumping, but instead of letting your gecko walk from hand to hand, you let it jump from hand to hand.

When you first purchase your crested gecko, you need to let it get accustomed to its new enclosure for a week or two.  After that, you can handle your baby/juvenile crested gecko every other day for 5 minutes or when needed (note: when needed not when you want to!).  Baby crested geckos can get overheated much easier than adults, or even juveniles, so don’t handle them for more than 5 minutes at a time.  When your gecko gets to be in the 15-20 gram range, you can start handling it everyday, just make sure to put it back in its enclosure when it begins to feel warm.