The Beginnings

 Last Saturday, Jonathan and I brought home a baby bearded dragon.  I named him Mario, after the video game. He was about 4 1/2 inches when we first got him.   He was five weeks old on the 19th, and has already grown almost half and inch!  The first few days we had him he was still adjusting to the new environment so he was a bit shy, but now he's super friendly and can't wait for us to play with him.  He loves to go outside and enjoys eating small crickets, mealworms, and diced sweetpotatoes.

Mario is the sandfire morph, I think, which means he has a lot of tan, tannish-green, dark brown, and orange patterns. We have found that if he's sad, sleepy, scared, or cold that his colors darken and his underside becomes spotted/striped black and white (you can see if in the picture below of his belly pressed up against the glass).

He started pressing his belly against the glass right before bedtime.  We didn't know why he was doing this but then we figured he was trying to cool off by resting against the cold glass.  One misting later he was much more comfortable and he hasn't done that since.

He found his food bowl! Unfortunately, he doesn't eat a lot of veggies yet (babies are more insectivorous than omnivorous) but hopefully he will when he gets a little older. Right now he just likes crickets and mealworms with the occasional waxworm as a treat. I have been able to get him to taste small bits of sweetpotato, banana, and chard.

Mario really enjoys his basking rock!

I measured Mario again on the 16th and he was about five inches long from nose to tail.  We measured him again yesterday and he was already 5 1/4 inches!  He shed for the first time on Wednesday and he keeps rubbing his face on his rocks so we think he might start shedding again next week.

Here he is on Jonathan's finger, they have become really good friends :)

Here he is enjoying his new basking rocks.  I found two of them that make a little cave when you stack them.

Sometimes Mario will just sit on his basking rocks for hours, soaking up the warmth. Isn't the cave just awesome?

We really enjoy having Mario in our home, he is such a handsome little lizard. He is super friendly and loves to be held. We usually take him outside to play 2 or 3 times a day. He loves to watch TV, whenever we turn it on he climbs up on his log and will cock his head to watch the characters.