Recommend me a substrate for my Monitor

[Ghillies]

Gonna do the whole recommend me a substrate for a Young mertens im acquiring soon, ideally something it can’t drag into its pond often and if so easily scooped out.

Was thinking playing with bio active but unsure, maybe later on, other wise I’m leaning towards sugar cane mulch because it’s easy to get locally (not close to a Bunnings unfortunately 3hrs+ away)

Also thought of a coir/sand mix but I feel like a lot of it will end up in its pond...

Cheers.

 

[timothyng1998]

Bio-active means soil will be thrown into the pond once the monitor digs and moves around, a wet monitor would also stick to some dirt which brings more soil into the pond whenever it dives back in. sugarcane mulch or any mulch will gradually breakdown in the pond once it ends up in there, which means youll need to keep on top of scooping substrate out of the pond.
I think decent sized gravel would work, heavy enough that it wont get kicked around much, and easy enough to scoop up from inside the pond.

 

[Ghillies]

Very aware anything loose is going to end up in the pond, just a fact of life with having a semi aquatic lizard.

Also thinking a appropriate bark mulch of some sort which would be a tad heavier than sugar cane. Either way will probably require scooping regularly.

The breeder keeps their adults on fine sand which wouldn’t look so bad if it ended up in the pond.

 

[Ryan-James]

Smooth gravel, river sand or those clay balls would all look good and not matter so much if they end up in the pond, I suggested clay balls because the bulk of these float making removal easier.