Their markings are similar to that of the Nile monitor, although their patterns are uniformly bigger and bolder than the delicate patterns of their slenderer cousins. The tail is long, thick and muscular near the base, tapering to a whiplash at the end, and keeled along most of its length. The stocky, muscular limbs have long digits tipped with large talons.
#Baby argus monitor for sale skin#
The neck is long (although not as proportionaly long as that of many other monitors) with a distendable throat pouch when not distended, the skin of the throat pouch hangs in folds about the neck and throat. They have a massive triangular head with a distinctly bowed lower jaw. The ornate monitor is a stout beast, with powerful, robust proportions. They are also good climbers, diggers, and runners, however, and by no means confined to a watery existence. Ornate monitors take readily to water, they are probably semi-aquatic in lifestyle, living close to streams, ponds, lakes, and river banks in their jungle home.
Like all monitors, they love eggs, and will crack eggs in their jaws, hold their head up, and let the juices dribble down their throats. The head of the ornate monitor is among the most powerful and robust of any monitor species, they undoubtedly use their jaws like nutcrackers to break open snails, clams, and crabs for the meat inside. They are predators and scavengers, eagerly eating most any source of food that is vaguely meat-like, from rats and snakes to crabs, insects, and clams. I have written a web page here explaining the difference.Īlthough no studies have been done on the ornate monitor in the wild, they are probably a typical semi-aquatic large monitor in many ways. It is obvious to anyone who has worked with both varieties, however, that they are very different animals. Until recently, they had been considered a subspecies of the Nile monitor, resulting in much confusion. They are an African forest monitor, living in the impenetrable deepness of the Congo rain forest of Western Africa. Ornate monitors are a species little known to science, yet well established in the pet trade.