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When it comes to lizards, leopard geckos are one of the easiest geckos to breed in captivity.  They are admired for their gorgeous, unique patterns and their outward appearances can be changed easily through breeding creating even more unique and sought after specimens. 

Breeding first begins by making sure that you have a sexually matured male and female leopard gecko.  So, how can you tell the difference between the two sexes?  When it comes to leopard geckos, it is easy to tell which ones are male and which ones are female.  Turn the gecko over and look at the under side.  Male geckos will have two pronounced hemipenal bulges behind the vent on the tail side.  You can also tell if it is a male because it will also have pre-anal pores that will be in a "V" shape just above the vent between the hind legs.  Females will not have the hemipenal bulges behind the vent but they may have pre-anal pits rather than enlarged pores.  Be careful when sexing a female that is obese she may appear to have bulges but it’s just fat. 

Before leopard geckos can breed, they should be full grown adults of the right ages and they should be healthy.  Male geckos should be at least 8 months old and should weigh a minimum of 45 grams.  Females on the other hand, should be at least 1 year old and weigh a minimum of 50 grams.  The actual mating for a breeder is as easy as just putting the pair within the same enclosure.  They may mate right away or it could take some time.  The best thing to do is to leave them together for a couple of days.  Once they are placed together, the male will become aggressive toward the female.  He will start biting her and if she is not receptive to mating she will bite him back.  Although it might look like they are fighting, it is actually normal behavior for leopard geckos.  The male will also shake the tip of his tail back and forth very quickly which might be loud at times.  If the pair still have not mated after a couple of days that they are together, separate them and try again in a few days. 

Breeders need to supply their female with a suitable container for her to lay her eggs in.  You can use a humid hide that is filled with moist but not saturated bed-a-beast.  Within four weeks of a successful mating, the female will lay the first clutch of eggs.  One clutch normally consists of one to two white oval eggs.  Leopard geckos have been known to lay about eight clutches a year with each clutch being laid in two to four week intervals.  After the eggs are laid they should be removed and placed in an incubator.  Amazingly, the sex of leopard gecko babies depends on the temperature that the eggs are incubated at.  Of the eggs are incubated at a lower temperature, about 80 degrees, the clutch will be female.  If the temperature in the incubator is higher, around 90 degrees, the clutch will be male.  Incubating leopard gecko eggs at around 85 degrees will result in a clutch that is a mix of both sexes.

Sometimes it is possible to come across a healthy leopard gecko in a pet store.  But, do you really know what you are buying?  Some leopard geckos are imported from their natural habitats, the hot, rocky parts of Asia, into the United States.  This is not good because leopard geckos that are born in the wild should stay in the wild.  Going to a breeder to buy a leopard gecko is a better choice.  Purchasing your leopard gecko from a breeder ensures that you are going to be purchasing a lizard that is healthy and of good stock.  The breeder will also be able to give you an accurate age of the lizard and with an animal that can live up to twenty years, this is very beneficial as well.  But finding a leopard gecko breeder is not always easy and ensuring that they are reputable is a challenge as well.

In order to purchase the best leopard gecko possible, you must first be familiar with what you are buying.  Handle the gecko before you buy it and make sure that you look it over well.  It is very important to be able to tell the difference between a healthy and an unhealthy leopard gecko.  A healthy leopard gecko will have clear eyes and a clear nose and vent.  They will be active and alert with a full body and tail.  Leopard geckos store their fat in their tails.  This is what they rely on when food is scarce.  If the gecko has a full tall, most likely it has been well fed.  The leopard gecko should also have healthy looking skin.  Once they are home, they should show a healthy appetite, eating regularly.  A few red flags of a non-healthy gecko are swelling, bumps, sores or abrasions on the skin.  You should also make sure that there is no paralysis of any of its limbs or tail.  There should also be no mucus in the lizard’s mouth or nose.  Other signs of an unhealthy leopard gecko are that it might be lethargy, have labored breathing or abnormal feces.

When handling the leopard gecko, it should be friendly.  Good breeders take the time to tame their geckos so they will be friendly when they are purchased.  An unfriendly leopard gecko is a good indicator that this breeder is more interested in dollars and cents and a good turn over rather then supply pet owners with the longevity of a good pet.  Make sure you find out what sex the leopard gecko is before you purchase it as well.  Each gender requires different care needs.  If the breeder has not taken the time to sex the lizards, they are most likely not offering their animals the best care.  Plus, a knowledgeable leopard gecko breeder will have no problem identifying the sex of each lizard.

A good way to find a leopard gecko breeder is to go to a reptile show.  Reptile shows have become quite popular.  Very knowledgeable leopard gecko lovers, breeders, suppliers, and more attend reptile shows.  It  is reasonable to think that you will be able to find the right leopard gecko for you including the kind of color pattern that you are looking for.

Since 1991 when the first designer leopard geckos hatched, there has been a huge interest to breed these lizards with new and exciting color and pattern mutations.  Leopard gecko variations include the leucistic, high yellow, and albinos.

When referring to albino leopard geckos, there are three different strains the Tremper, Rainwater (Las Vegas), and Bell.  All three strains of albinos are recessive traits.  Meaning, if you were to breed a Tremper albino with a Rainwater or Bell albino, all of the babies would be normal looking but not albino.  Recessive traits are the result of a mutation of certain genes that control a specific part of the development of the animal.  These traits are usually discovered randomly, so there is nothing that can be done to increase the probability of discovering a new recessive trait.  This kind of specific breeding depends a lot on luck.

Typically, it is very difficult to tell the differences between the three strains of albino leopard geckos.  Sometimes, it is an educated guess as to which strain an adult albino leopard gecko is.  The most common of the three albino strains in leopard geckos is the Tremper strain.  They were the first of the albino strains to be seen.  A lot of times these albino geckos are actually brown and marketed as the “Mocha Strain”.  They can also be bright white or pink in color.  Eye color can range from slightly lighter than a “normal” non-albino leopard gecko eye, to bright red.  The color of the body as well as the eye color can differ in geckos incubated at different temperatures.  Typically, a higher incubation temperature leads to a leopard gecko that is darker in color. 

Rainwater albinos are the next most common of the three albino strains.  It is thought that they are pinker then the other strains but that is not always true.  It is the Bell strain of albino leopard geckos that is still relatively rare.  They often have a high contrast, with “pink” areas that are a lot of the time much darker than other albino strains.  The eye color of the Bell albino leopard geckos is the reddest of the three strains.  While the red eye color of young animals often changes as the animal ages to the normal beige color in the other albino strains, the Bell albino eye color has a tendency to stay red or pinkish even in adult animals. All three strains of albino are sensitive to bright lights, and will close their eyes tightly if exposed to them.  Plus, many albinos will not feel comfortable eating during the daytime because of their sensitivity to light.

As leopard geckos continue to gain in popularity due to their easy to care for nature, the possibility of different color variations will grow.  It is possible that many more dominant recessives will be realized in the next few years.  The breeding of mutations with mutations will accelerate the rate of variation making these already unique animals even more unique.

In the late 1970’s when leopard geckos that were caught in the wild were being imported into the United States into the pet trade, very little was known about the species.  Actually, leopard geckos in the wild can be grouped into several different species and subspecies.  Without this knowledge, the imports that were meant for the pet trade were bred together without care to these different species resulting in a lot of genetic variability in future leopard gecko generations.  

“Morph’s” in the leopard gecko world refers to a difference in color, size, and/or genetics compared to “normal” leopard geckos.  The differences in color, pattern, etc. are often genetically based which means that these traits can be passed to future generations through selective breeding.  Most of the morphs started out as a genetic fault or a mistake that make them different then the other leopard geckos.  In the wild these geckos would stand out and would be easily picked off by predators.  Today, there are many different leopard gecko morphs available.  Some of these morphs include the recessive morphs like Murphy Patternless and Blizzards and dominate morphs like Enigma.  There are also complete dominant like Macksnow, co-dominant like the Giants, combo morphs like R.A.P.T.O.Rs and poly genetic morphs like S.H.T.C.T. 

The carrot tail is a trait that has been popping up in many different morphs.  It is mostly seen in Albey’s Tangerine line and in the R.A.P.T.O.Rs.  It is also seen in Murphy Patternless leopard geckos but most of all in the Tangerine and the Hypo morphs, in all three of the albino strains (Tremper, Rainwater, and Bell) and can be seen a little bit in the Blizzards.  Carrot tail leopard geckos are leopard geckos that have a more than average amount of orange pigment in their tail.  The orange pigment is typically at the base of the tail but some geckos may have up to 90 percent of the tail covered.  In ordered to be classified as a carrot tail the leopard gecko has to have a minimum of 15 percent or one fourth of the tail colored in orange.  The amount of orange coloring varies from just a small band at the base of the tail to a solid orange tail seen on some extreme cases. 

The carrot tail trait is line bred.  This means that two leopard geckos that have the carrot tail trait in common are bred together, their offspring will most likely be carrot tails as well.  In order to have geckos with more carroting then the previous generations, the geckos with the most amount of carroting should be bred together. 

Another line bred trait is the carrot head.  The carrot head trait is characterized by orangey spots on the top of the leopard gecko's head and is usually exclusive to Tremper Albinos.

It is possible to breed your own carrot tail leopard geckos but before you attempt breeding keep in mind the amount of time, space and resources needed to maintain the breeders and their babies.  Consider questions like what you will do with the babies if they don’t sell right away.  Is it possible for you to house and take care of them?  These are just a few of the questions you should ask yourself before attempting breeding leopard geckos.

Part of the ease of caring for a leopard gecko comes in the food that should be provided.  Adult geckos can be fed every other day while baby leopard geckos should be fed everyday.  These lizards are insectivores meaning they mostly eat insects.  In captivity they can be offered crickets, mealworms, superworms, silkworms and small cockroaches as a staple diet. 

As a treat you can offer your leopard gecko an occasional pinkie mouse.  One that is only a few days old will be small enough for them to handle and only to full grown adults.  In fact, pinkie mice are a wonderful choice to offer breeding females.  You can also offer them waxworms as a treat.  Waxworms should be especially offered sparingly because they can become addictive to geckos.  They are chocolate in the leopard gecko world; fattening and generally un-healthy.  In order to avoid choking, the prey that you offer your leopard gecko should be no larger than half the width of the gecko’s head.

Part of understanding how to feed leopard geckos is knowing how much to give them to eat at one time.  You should only feed them as much as the gecko will consume at the time of feeding.  It depends on the size of the leopard gecko.  You might offer your gecko anywhere from 4 to 8 crickets at one time. It is not good to leave crickets running around the leopard gecko’s enclosure for a long length of time.  It can cause the gecko to become stressed out and hungry crickets are known to nibble on the gecko.  Mealworms, superworms or anything else that can be contained in a dish on the other hand can be left within the cage without putting the gecko in danger.

Another part of keeping your leopard gecko healthy in regards to feeding it, is making sure that you gutload all food items for 24 hours prior to feeding it to your lizard.  Gutloading is feeding the crickets or other insects a very nutritious, high quality food prior to feeding to your lizard.  Offering your lizard a healthier insect in turn makes a healthier gecko.  You can offer the insects things like fruits, vegetables and grains.  They also offer commercially made products that come in a powdered form and can be offered to the prey. 

Along with gutloading, you can offer your leopard gecko calcium and vitamin supplements by sprinkling the prey with powdered supplements before you feed them to your gecko.  Calcium and vitamins are very important to the overall health of the leopard gecko but make sure that you offer the crickets to your gecko right away after dusting before the cricket can clean itself off.  Dusting is also a good way to enrich the diet of baby leopard geckos and breeding females.

Water should also be offered to your leopard gecko and kept fresh at all times.  Stagnant water is a breeding ground for bacteria which can lead to illness in your gecko so the water should be changed regularly.