Ohagi's Log (1): The First Four Months, From 24 g to 35 g, Everything That Happened
The articles on this site are sorted by topic: humidity, shedding, food. But the actual four months weren't sorted at all. I weighed him the day after a shed, changed his food that same week, saw him sit in the water dish for the first time on a hot day. I wanted to keep things in the order they actually happened, so here it is, start to finish.
Every photo was taken on the day its caption says. I'll add to this every few months.
May: Pickup, and a week of doing nothing
We went to the shop "just to look." Someone on staff brought out three geckos, and my kid picked this one. The card read "Normal het Oreo Zulu 50% Ghost." Weighed on the spot: 24.2 g.
May 11. The card. This is the day-zero record
That evening. The crumpled newspaper is there to pull some humidity out of the hide. The light-blue hide is at the back; thermometer and water dish already in place
For the first week I did nothing but change the water. First feeding on day three or four. He hid almost the whole time, and even though I knew that was normal, I was a little anxious. At that point the substrate was bark chips. He stayed in the 24 g range all of May.
June: The first whitening, and a substrate change
I looked in that morning and his head was still brown but everything below the neck had gone cloudy white. First time I'd seen it. I thought he was sick, looked it up right away, and learned it means a shed is coming. At this point the substrate was wood pellets.
June 7, morning. Head keeps its color, body goes white. This is what the day before a shed looks like
The shed itself happened overnight, inside the hide, and by morning there wasn't a scrap of skin anywhere, because he eats it. That's how I learned "no evidence of a shed" means "the shed went fine." To be honest, my notes aren't clear on whether he shed right after this June whitening or not until July. Let's call his first shed "June or July."
A different shed. Eating the skin. Startling the first time you see it
By now he'd figured out feeding time, and he'd lean out the door the moment he saw the cup. Mealworms are supposed to be a "treat" food, and they get the biggest reaction out of him by far. By then the substrate had already changed to desert soil (bark chips → pellets → soil; I wanted to see him dig, and soil holds humidity better).
June 13, night. Reacting to the mealworm cup, coming out the door
July: He comes to the door. 26 g. A scrap of skin on a toe
After misting, I opened the door and he put his hands on the edge and leaned out toward me on his own. I took thirteen photos in a row that night. I think he'd figured out "door opens = food." It was the first day I felt he'd settled in with us.
July 2, night. The fogged walls are from the misting a minute earlier. Coming out toward my hand
Day 54. Weighed in his box of bark chips, box subtracted: 26 g. Two grams in two months. At the time I worried he "wasn't growing." Looking back, it was the normal settling-in plateau.
July 4, 26 g. The box-and-all method. He wouldn't sit on the scale directly yet
The morning after a shed, there was a scrap of skin left on a back toe. By the book: lukewarm water in a shallow plastic tub, and soak. Ohagi wanted out almost immediately and was in for well under five minutes, but after I lifted him out, the moment he moved his foot the skin slid right off. The lesson that night: it's not the minutes on the clock, it's whether the skin has softened (the stuck-shed article has the full story).
July 21, night. The start of the soak. The skin hasn't softened yet at this point
August: The growth spurt. 30 g, 31 g
Four grams in a month, up from July's 26. By now he'd sit on the scale directly. My kid steadied him. August was when his feeding settled into "three large crickets every three days."
August 6, 30 g. On the scale directly now
One gram in five days. From behind, the tail was visibly thicker, and this is when "weight shows up in the tail" clicked for me.
Around August 11, 31 g. The tail is nothing like it was in July
I kept the room around 77°F (25°C) with the AC all summer. This was also when I first saw him leave the hide and stretch out on the floor on hot days, and sit in the water dish on top of the hide (the summer article has more on that).
A hot day. Sitting in the dish on top of his hide. Startled me the first time
September: 35 g, and the hot-day water dish
About four months in, day 125. From 24.2 g to 35 g, 1.45 times his arrival weight. Shedding every two to three weeks, with two sheds between late August and mid-September. Food unchanged: three crickets every three days. Calcium once a week on a cricket day.
Daily life at this point looks like this. He sleeps in the hide during the day, with his face sometimes poking out of the entrance. At night I open the door, he comes to look, and if I offer a hand he climbs on by himself. He has never bitten me.
Four months in. Even his face is a size bigger than when he arrived
Four months in a table
| Date | What happened | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| May 11 | Pickup | 24.2 g |
| June 7 | First pre-shed whitening | — |
| June 13 | Comes out for the cup. Substrate now soil | — |
| July 2 | Comes toward my hand when the door opens | — |
| July 4 | Weigh-in | 26 g |
| July 21 | First soak (skin on a toe) | — |
| August 6 | Weigh-in. Sits on the scale directly | 30 g |
| Around August 11 | Weigh-in. Tail noticeably thicker | 31 g |
| Around September 13 | Weigh-in | 35 g |
Three things these four months taught me: No growth in the first two months is normal. Once he settled in, it came fast. And the thing that changed most wasn't his weight. It was the face at the door.
• Primary source: my own dated photos and notes on Ohagi, May–September 2026
I keep Ohagi, an African fat-tailed gecko, at my home in Japan. Every photo here was taken in my home. Written from my own notes and photos, with AI helping me put it into English.