thanks everyone for the advice. i can for sure eliminate the 'more than one male/stress' possibility. i've had these geckos for over a year now and they were all mature already when i got them and have been sexed....just one male and 7 females was the original count and no aggression between any of them. i knew that going to the vet was the only sure way to find a cause but free time is short these days. but i bit the bullet and skipped all my bio classes today and drove to the vet with all five remaining tokays and the recently dead (yesterday) one as well. since all the live ones show no signs of sickness, the vet took a close look at the dead one. he said that a quick look under the microscope showed no signs of bacteria. things that may have been off from normal were a lighter than normal coloured liver and slightly darkened lungs. i will get the pathologists results by next tuesday at the latest (longer than usual because of the easter weekend). the vet recommended a thorough cleaning of the cage in the meantime which i will finish today before putting the geckos back in. as an interesting/humourous side note: while at the vet, one of the females escaped. so i of course went and caught her. but as i was putting her back into the container i loosed my grip and she swung round and grabbed a chunk of skin on my thumb....20 minutes later we (three vets and myself) managed to pry open her jaws with a probe and free my incredibly painful thumb wound. not even gaseous sedation would make her open her jaws...she just hung like a rag doll from my thumb until she came to. what a strange experience...remember to wear gloves when handling wild caught tokays!!!!! thanks for letting me share, nathan
_________________________________________________________________ Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com ########################################################################### THE GLOBAL GECKO ASSOCIATION LISTSERV WebSite: www.gekkota.com Archive: [EMAIL PROTECTED]/ The GGA takes no responsibility for the contents of these postings. ###########################################################################
