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Yes.. I have relied on the "anal scute" method for years. And it holds true "most" of the time.

The female is over 11" and the male is just 10"..



You can see his tail pulled up to the right ( near his left hind foot )..



Yours both appear to be NW South American.. based on the absence of red on the head. So Anj the largest one is a female!

At almost 8" a male will start to develop the concave plastron.. seldom before. The exception is the Southern / Brazilian.. aka 'cherryhead'. Mine at 7" had all of the signs.. look at the plastron colors..



Now the smaller one??? Time will tell.. the anal scutes are saying male.. watch the tail! There will be a lot more length on the tip of the tail on the male.. than the female which has barely none.

Get them set-up in as big as you can.. hot and humid.. low light and animal protein for their D3!

Have we learned anything?

Terry

Funny thing, the bigger one has a slightly concave plastron They will be setup in a 4ft polystyrene stock tank for now, I will probably pickup a 6ft poly stock tank for them next week. Im going to cover 2/3 of the tank and just have a regular fluorescent bulb on one end. The room is heated, its the snake room and stays at an ambient temp of 82-85 so I dont think I should provide anymore heat for them correct?

JustAnja Wrote:Funny thing, the bigger one has a slightly concave plastron They will be setup in a 4ft polystyrene stock tank for now, I will probably pickup a 6ft poly stock tank for them next week. Im going to cover 2/3 of the tank and just have a regular fluorescent bulb on one end. The room is heated, its the snake room and stays at an ambient temp of 82-85 so I dont think I should provide anymore heat for them correct?

Anja the concavity runs the length of the plastron.. not the width.

Get us a close-up on that little one's tail? So far the more I look at it the more it looks female.. which they do until almost 8" for the Northern's.

Those temps are fine.

Terry

JustAnja Wrote:Yea they both have some thick growth rings but Im sure it can be evened out.

BTW.. the only thing you can do about the carapace is make sure it doesn't get any worse. There is nothing you can do to "even" it out Anj.

Terry

I'm glad to here of your rescue. I hope someone with your knowledge and skill come to the rescue of the sulcata and plated lizard. 40 gallon tank ??? I hope it was at least a long. Then at least the lizard w/o torts would have minimal room.

Hey Anja, what's the girls email? (PM me). I'll tell her that if she can't find another home for the Sulcata, I'll take it in for now until I can find one...

Is the plated still available? Where in Wi are these?

cvalda Wrote:Hey Anja, what's the girls email? (PM me). I'll tell her that if she can't find another home for the Sulcata, I'll take it in for now until I can find one...

Here is the new ad Kelly. I did offer to try to find placement but she really didnt say anything.

http://chicago.craigslist.org/nch/pet/528674667.html


She is in Gurnee, IL

I brought the Plated home with me, I will be looking to place it in a new home soon most likely.

Redfoot NERD Wrote:

JustAnja Wrote:Yea they both have some thick growth rings but Im sure it can be evened out.

BTW.. the only thing you can do about the carapace is make sure it doesn't get any worse. There is nothing you can do to "even" it out Anj.

Terry

I know Terry, I mostly just meant keep it from getting any worse which would in time make it look a little more evened out with new good growth

Here are more tail shots of the little one.

If you still have the plated in Feb or March I can give him a home. My house is being rebuild and the place I'm staying at doesn't have room for another 40 long. If someone else can give it a good home go for it.

Itort Wrote:If you still have the plated in Feb or March I can give him a home. My house is being rebuild and the place I'm staying at doesn't have room for another 40 long. If someone else can give it a good home go for it.

Thanks I will keep that in mind.

OK these two are all setup, only thing left to do is cut a piece of showerboard to cover 2/3 of the setup. It has a small piece of shelving over it right now to make a dark area. The dark end is covered in wet long strand sphagnum moss. The base of the enclosure is sand/cypress mulch with 2 bricks of bed a beast on top of that. The *sunny* end has a large area of oyster shell over the bed a beast. I am using a regular household fluorescent bulb in the lamp over this end and it is aimed towards the end of the tank so its not shining back on the dark end. The big girl has been grazing on the oyster shell so she must be lacking in calcium. They seem to like the setup I think. This is a 4foot/50 gallon polystyrene stock tank.











I can fit.....really I can!







And I just checked on them and they are all settled in and what not...lol

Looks GREAT Anja! Where'd you get that cool hide?

cvalda Wrote:Looks GREAT Anja! Where'd you get that cool hide?

I have 2 of those and they came with 2 of my Hermanns. Ive seen them somewhere for sale, I will have to think about where I saw them and let you know.