Quote Originally Posted by Lixra View Post
Very interesting read!

My husband and I have two Water Monitors; a 1 year old female (sulphur morph) and a 5 year old male. You definitely can see the wheels turning when these guys look at you! They're also the only lizards I have ever seen that actually use their feet in a cognitive fashion. Our big male will actually use his front feet to lift things up to look under to see if it's somewhere he wants to crawl into.

That being said, the biggest benefit to this (for us anyway), is that they both know the difference between our hands and a rat, which as far as I'm concerned is a definite bonus!
Hi Coleen,

Thanks very much...interesting observation concerning their hands. Recently, Black tree Monitors have been observed using their hands to extract insects from crevices; enrichment activities have been designed around this at zoos; please see this article: Reaching out for Enrichment in Arboreal Monitor Lizards « AAZK. I'll be posting a new article on monitors (general) soon.

I've been feeding many monitor species in zoos for decades, ranging from Storr's to Komodos - please take my word that they will bite your hand in time! Movement, distractions, scents all come into play, really has nothing to do with length of time in captivity, aggression, etc. Please use a feeding tongs, cuts can be deep, and serious infections are common. Best, Frank