Re: [Gecko] Sphaerodactylus notatus "drowned" (?)...please advise

[Racodactylus]

That's pretty interesting.  I really feel that you should not have soaked her for these reasons.  She's a rather terrestrial tropical species, you could have sprayed her down and got similar results.  Also, Spharoedactylus rocket around at breakneck speeds; I'm even afraid to open the door to my S. elegans cage.

My breeding pair of S. elegans are kept in a Doug Barr cage that measures 16"h by 12" square.  The substrate is a mixture of peat, cypress mulch particles, and wood land soil from the hardwood forest behind my house.  Ficus and beach leaves complete the substrate, and offer numerous hiding spots and small puddles after a misting.  There's also a ficus and some pothos going crazy in there, the ficus is starting to expand against the top because it can't grow any where else!  The little S. elegans enjoy basking between the leaves, and stalking crickets from the pothos stems.  If you had leaves on top of the substrate, the little girl could just walk around and soak herself.  They also have some cork bark slabs for egg laying, and hiding.  I found quite a few eggs laid inside the nooks and cranies of strangler figs when I was in Key West. The whole cage could be self contained.  Snails, slugs, spring tails, "moss mites", and pill bugs! frolic in there.  I'll probably not find the babies from the eggs incubating in situ until they are sub adults and begin to venture out more.

The lose skin is really weird.  Maybe the water had something to do with it?  I've never experience anything like that with Spharoedactylus.  I was really rough when I caught these S. elegans, diving on them, pinning them, pulling them out of rocks, but none of the 6 I caught shed any skin or tails!

And more about soaking animals.  I've found it better to put some towels in a delicup and saturate them with water.  This way the animal is never submerged or could be submerged, and can lick water off the towels if hydration is the problem.  I do this with the UAE Hemidactylus I breed.  It appears the only time they are thirsty is the week or so after hatching.  I've never seen the adults drink, and they never drink after the soaking!

--Daniel