Crested Gecko Care

A Species Thought to Be Extinct: What It Means to Keep a Crested Gecko (and other reptiles)

Keeping a crested gecko means caring for an animal believed to be extinct as recently as the 90s. They were rediscovered in 1994 in New Caledonia, a small collection of islands off the coast of Australia, to which they are endemic (found nowhere else in the world). Small populations of these animals are indigenous to the main island, Grand Terre, and the Isle of Pines (Ile Des Pins, as this New Caledonia is a French territory).

Too often, reptiles are thought of as disposable pets – animals that are trickier but cheaper to care for than a dog or cat and animals whose early deaths are (unfortunately and far-too-frequently) considered fairly inevitable rather than a failure of proper husbandry. Crested geckos are actually a rather hardy species that can live up 10-15 and possibly 20 years (obviously, results are just coming in on that one).

Why am I writing all this? My argument is simple: if you keep or are considering keeping crested geckos, take them seriously as living animals, not just accessories. It’s true that these creatures can be living art, but always remember the living over the art. They deserve proper care. Proper care, of course, requires proper research. Proper research requires you to to determine the reliability of your sources.

I don’t want this to sound like a composition class lecture, so I’ll switch to story mode for a minute. It is, unfortunately, a sad story, but an important one for anyone new to the hobby:

I purchased my first crested gecko in 2004 at a reptile expo in Hamburg, PA. This was before crested geckos were so widely available in pet stores, or at least in rural Pennsylvania. I spent night after night researching the species and its care (I’ve always been both a researcher and an insomniac, long before I went for my doctorate). In fact, I’d spent night after night researching reptiles in general because I was trying to find the perfect one that fit my circumstances and interests; my mother wouldn’t allow me any animals that required  UV or heat lamps, which she worried would inevitably burn her house down. I also didn’t want to be found out with an animal not allowed at college, but I in no way write this as any indication that you should keep contraband reptiles in a college dorm; I am very wary of providing reptiles to college students because they are very likely to have them taken or to give them up within the following few years, as college students are at a very transient point in their lives, and I like to know where my animals go). I settled on a crested gecko because I loved their adhesive toes and tails, because they were a nocturnal species that thrived at room temperature, and because I trusted their personalities over that of the (admittedly beautiful) Tokays. I’d read about Allen Repashy’s Crested Gecko Diet and gut-loading crickets (more on this later) and felt prepared for a crested gecko.

In fact, with the information I’d researched at the time, I probably was prepared to care for a crested gecko. I wanted a red flame crested gecko at the time if I could afford one (this was before I’d ever come across the many beautiful red harlequin geckos I’ve since seen in many breeders collections, and even available geckos). I still hadn’t done enough research to know that most hatchlings look red for a while (for more information, read Anthony Caponetto’s short and effectively documented piece on the Crested Gecko Color Change Sequence, and don’t let the fact that the gecko whose color he chronicles undermine his main points) or that my baby was faaaar too young to be even tentatively sexed as a “probably female.” Nor did I have enough confidence in the research I’d done so far to question the vendor I bought “her” from when his information conflicted with what I’d read. Initially, I wanted to show him that I knew something about this animal –  to show him that I would properly care for it, and asked if he had started them on the Repashy or similar diet and introduced crickets to them yet. when he told me that raising a crested gecko on fruit-based baby food (no citrus) was fine so long as I dusted it with calcium powder, I thought, who was I to question a breeder based on a bunch of stuff I’d read on the internet. After all, this was 2004, and information on the internet was treated  with even more suspicion than it is today. I did not come from a technologically savvy family, and so we’d only had a computer for about three years and still had dial-up internet service, so I didn’t even have that much experience in researching on the web. Who was I to question him?

The fact of the matter was that I was the keeper of another life, and as the keeper (or potential keeper, if you’re still in the consideration or shopping process) you always must research and question and have the confidence and desire for your animal’s health to engage in a discussion on information contrary to yours. Sometimes, there are plenty of fine answers. Sometimes there are no ideal answers. Sometimes, however, there are some definitely problematic practices that you need to question not only for the sake of your animals but for the sake of the animals someone else is keeping or even selling, and thus teaching, to others.

My failure to bring up my research, to engage in discussion, to question, to trust this source of information, and to fail to continue my research process beyond his word as an “authority” on the matter because he bred and sold led to the unfortunate and very preventable death of that gecko a little over a year later.

Always ask your vendors what they are feeding their stock before buying; you will want to know if the animal is being cared for properly and also if you may have trouble introducing it to a new diet. With crested geckos, this is particularly important because they tend not to like the taste of Repashy and some other commercially-produced mixes, and you may have a hard time getting them to eat it if they’ve been eating something tastier.* Know what your potential pet is already eating before taking him or her home.

Diet and Nutrition

Some people use baby food to help fatten breeder geckos up. Others use it as a treat or something to help improve the flavor of Repashy and other gecko mixes. I would hesitate to do this because geckos used to that sugary goodness don’t always want to return to a more nutritious but less tasty diet. They aren’t bombarded with discussions of nutrition in the news, magazines, and health class, and there is simply no explaining the matter to them.

These points aside, the baby food diet is still a piece of misinformation that floats around, whether on the net or from people’s mouths. Baby food simply does not provide these animals with the balance of nutrients that they need, though it does provide then with far more sugar than they should have. Ideally, you will not even feed them an all-Repashy (or other commercially-produced) diet, as these animals eat not only rotting fuit (with the products simulate) but also insects (though primarily frugavores, insects much up about 25% of their diet). The activity of hunting provides your gecko with exercise, stimulation, and a chance to use his hunting instincts and is also greatly entertaining to watch (though some, especially babies, will prefer to eat alone, and you should give them that opportunity if needed; I leave the shy ones alone in a dark room for at least ten minutes to take care of business).

When I got into crested geckos, I lived about five miles from the exact middle of nowhere, and buying crickets was tough. When I graduated from college, my first job was in a small town in central PA that was 45 minutes from the nearest pet store. In both situations, I was grateful to own a species that could live primarily on the Repashy meal replacement formula and could feed my cresties even on days that I could not secure live prey. Without live prey, however, geckos do not grow as fast or as much (this may not bother you a lot if you’re keeping one as a pet, but if you are considering breeding or selling at any point, it’s important to know that you will more easily attain a safe shipping weight and safe breeding weights by feeding live prey in addition to your staple diet).

Some people use Dubia roaches. It would be easy for me to simply say, “but I use crickets.” This might, however, imply that crickets are superior to Dubia roaches. In all actuality, I have simply never tried Dubia roaches. This brings me back to my point about care and research; if you’re reading content that says one choice is better than another for your gecko (or another reptile, or even for you or for your life), you should probably get convincing reason why it’s better before following it as gospel.

So then, why have I not tried Dubia roaches? As I’ve told you, I have lived in places where even crickets were difficult to come by. I have so far not lived near a constant source of Dubia roaches; have not wanted to get involved in having Dubia roaches constantly delivered to my house; and have had no interested in keeping a roach colony in my house to consistently feed my geckos. If you have strong feelings about Dubia roaches, I’d love to hear your comments. My partner is interested in starting a colony of them when we move back to Illinois (though I suspect my landlord won’t like that – if you are a renter and keep roaches, I’d love to hear from you).

Whatever prey you feed your geckos, make sure it is purchased for the purpose of feeding and not caught in the wild, as such insects will likely deliver pesticides and insecticides to your gecko. Gut-load your insects before feeding. Crickets don’t actually have all that much nutrition in and of themselves, but they are a great vehicle for nutrients. “Gut-loading” is the process of loading your crickets with nutrients (preferably 48 hours) before feeding them to your reptile. You then calcium dust the crickets (you can put them in one of the plastic bags they are so often sold in, shake in some calcium dust, and shake them all up a bit) before feeding. This is important because crickets (and a lot of other feeders and even fruits) have a poor Ca:Ph (calcium to phosphorous ratio), and phosphorus can bind the calcium that your gecko needs. Make sure that you are both providing calcium to your crickets to eat and dusting them in calcium (no phosphorus) before feeding them to your herps. Moon Valley Reptiles has a very in-depth information on feeder nutritional analysis and is one of my favorite sources for crested gecko care. They have a wonderful page explaining the desire Ca:Ph ratio for fruits you might want to feed your gecko as well.

An effective way to gut-load your crickets is to feed them the same stuff you feed your geckos; feeding crickets the leftover Repashy (BFG, Clarks, etc) that your geckos haven’t finished is a great way to get the nutrients they should be getting through the crickets, as well as a productive use of food that would otherwise go to waste. Note: if you try to mix the gecko diet fresh for the crickets, you need to make sure that it is not to watery; though it thickens over time, crickets are very skilled at drowning and will drown in overly watery gecko food as well as water dishes.

The pet store, vendors at reptile expos, and a number of sources online will tell you that the alternative to this is water crystals that provide crickets with access to hydration (and extra calcium) without the risk of drowning, but it’s important to note that these crystals dry up. While this might superficially seem like a minor inconvenience in hydrating your crickets, it can become a much bigger problem for your reptiles or amphibians eating them, as the dried up crystals, once reintroduced to the water your pet drinks, can expand and kill them. Crested geckos, frogs, chameleons, and others have been found with water crystals in their stomachs, having never had direct access to the crystals themselves.

Crickets can be properly hydrated through fruits and veggies (just make sure you are checking up frequently to clean bad fruits and veggies out. I’ve found that sweet potatoes and squash are easy to work with, providing a lot of moisture and easy clean-up. I dip them in calcium and CGD, make sure there is wet CGD available, with calcium mixed in, and mist the cricket tank at the top vents so that there are water droplets available but so that the tank will not get damp enough to invite unwanted bacteria or fungi; keep track of dying feeder insects and the plants we feed them is hard enough cleanup.

Remember, crested geckos are active at night and so may prefer to eat 1) later than you might otherwise feed them and 2) without a brightly lit audience – though mine have generally been pretty voracious when it comes to live prey. Start with just a couple crickets, no wider than the space between their eyes. If your gecko is not biting, even after some time alone at an appropriate evening feeding time, remove the crickets so they don’t chew on him. Some take a while to get used to live prey.

For young geckos especially, it’s safest to feed crickets on paper towel or newspaper rather than natural substrate so that they don’t accidentally ingest their substrate. If that sounds overly nit-picky to you, you should watch my geckos eat; every one I’ve fed on natural substrate has always ended up with mouthfuls of it when they dive for crickets. Natural substrate, of course, has its benefits (besides looking better). I’ve tried meeting in the middle with some geckos, housing them on natural substrate and putting them in a feeding tank to eat, but it really will depend on the scale on which you keep geckos, as that’s a more time-consuming process (I was living alone in rural Pennsylvania for a while with not a lot to do). Hatchlings and young geckos, at the very least, should be kept on something they won’t accidentally ingest.

For your first month or so of feeding the gecko, it’s actually a good idea to house your gecko on paper towels, newspaper, or butcher paper anyway, rather than a natural substrate, to keep track of their poop. Sometimes it’s hard to tell if they are eating from a Gecko Diet mix, but if they are pooping, they are eating.

Offer a shallow water dish (shallow water levels will prevent both geckos and crickets from drowning). Your gecko will probably not actually drink from the dish but will get most of its water from licking water droplets off its surroundings – and off itself! Crested geckos do not have eyelids, and you will frequently see yours lick its eyeballs. It’s important to mist your tank to give your gecko water to drink and to keep its humidity levels high enough for it to shed. Keeping a dish of water in the tank will also help to keep humidity up so that you do not need to obsess over misting; you do not want the tank so damp that bacteria and fungi thrive. It’s important that your tank have at least some level of screening for this reason; that ventilation is crucial in allowing the humidity to cycle so that your enclosure can dry out enough to keep bacteria and fungi at bay.

Too much constant humidity can also cause skin lesions and other health problems for your gecko. Think about going in your family’s bathroom after someone took a steamy shower and didn’t turn on the fan; you wouldn’t want to live in there, and neither does your gecko. Try misting lightly in the day time and more heavily in the evening to allow humidity levels to cycle and aid with shedding.

If your gecko is in shed, provide a moist hide for him to use; I’ve often used the deli cup I purchased the gecko in (this is common at reptile shows; it might not be in pet stores) with moist paper towel. If your gecko’s pads are not sticking to surfaces, he has shed to lose, and you should up the humidity. If you can tell that he has shed clinging to his toes or the tip of his tail, you should use a damp cotton swab to help remove it. This is a delicate business, but if the skin remains there, it can cut off circulation to your animal’s toes, which could cause him to lose a toe.

* The same can be said of bearded dragons who have not been introduced to greens early enough, even though they eat a higher ratio of crickets early in life. Later, they will need to eat a higher ratio of plants, and the switch from moving prey can be hard if they haven’t been introduced at an early age. The problem also appears to a smaller extent in snakes, some of whom have to be convinced to switch from live to f/t (frozen and thawed) prey and can be a huge problem in species with less readily available diets; I’ve seen an Eastern Hognose that failed to ever eat a single mammal while in a friends’ care, and feeder toads can be harder to come by)

Heating and Lighting

As indicated earlier, I first discovered the crested gecko because I was a high schooler and my mother wouldn’t let me keep a reptile with lightbulbs. I settled on a crested gecko because it is a nocturnal species with no UV requirements that thrives best at your room temperature – in fact, too much heat is one of the greatest dangers to the crested gecko. Never take a crested gecko you’ve purchased at a store or show directly into the hot car that’s been baking in the parking lot; make sure to crack your windows on the way in and hit the AC before taking your new pet for the ride home. When buying online, never take the chance that your delivery person will leave your gecko in a hot car or even your front porch. Responsible breeders do not ship their geckos in dangerous temperature and will include cooling packs if temperatures are anywhere near the danger zone. With that said, don’t feel embarrassed to ask anyone mailing you a crested gecko to mark their package with this or a similar message, courtesy of JB’s Cresties:

Seriously, don’t overheat your gecko. If your house is freezing in the winter and you need to provide some extra heat, consider a heat mat, or  consider a low wattage red infrared bulb for the cold nights so long as you are checking the enclosure with an IR (infrared) temp gun to keep accurate readings of the temperature levels (I suggest infrared for the light bulb because the red light will not interrupt your gecko’s day/night cycle and for the temp gun because it is the most accurate method of temperature measurement; never rely on those stickers that light up in different colors for different temperatures, as they have been found to be off by ten or more degrees at times. They also cannot measure specific parts of the tank, which is something you’ll find helpful if you do keep a diurnal basking reptile that needs a specific basking point temperature as well as an ambient temperature gradient).

Housing and Substrate

My first set-up was not pretty – the substrate was paper towels – but when you stick around herps long enough, you soon find that most substrates can actually be a danger to your pet, as they can accidentally ingest them without being able to properly digest them. Don’t be embarrassed to start off with a small and sterile set-up if you have a hatchling or juvenile so long as your gecko has some structures to climb and places to hide and feel safe. In fact, even when purchasing an adult gecko, it’s a good idea to start off a little simple so you can get a good idea of how much the gecko is eating (and pooping, which is a good sign that it’s eating if you can’t tell directly).

This is especially important when purchasing new geckos, which will require a stage of quarantine before meeting any roommates (and by roommates, I mean girls with other girls and possibly one male. Males should not be housed together, and females should be given a break from their male company for at least part of the year; even if you don’t intend to breed them and hatch the eggs, if the geckos do breed, egg production sucks a lot of calcium and other necessities out of female geckos, and they need some time off, especially as they can retain sperm for months after insemination and continue producing eggs after their gentleman callers have moved out.

Also, all of my cresties have been messy eaters who will grab a mouthful of substrate when grabbing a cricket, which can cause impaction, especially in smaller geckos.

But what is impaction? What substrates are safe? What size tank is big enough? What about for housing multiple geckos?

All important questions!

Unfortunately, all this writing is wiping me out, so consider this page still under construction. More fortunately, there has been more material written about this than you could ever hope to read, and so it is here that I encourage you once again to research multiple sources of information about your gecko’s (or future gecko’s) care. Below, I’ve embedded a few care sheets that I personally would recommend from established breeders I respect, but there is a lot more information out there.

JB’s Cresties Basic Care from jbscresties.com

Anthony Caponetto’s Care Sheet from ACReptiles.com

Greg’s Care Sheet from heresyourgecko.com

And if you explore the site further, you’ll find even more useful information in  the previously cited MoonValleyReptiles  website as a resource