Meet Falafel! Also known as The Waffle, That Handsome Lizard, and sometimes just, “Hey You!” or “Hey! Stop that!”. Falafel is a quince monitor, also known as the yellow tree monitor. We purchased him from a local pet shop in February of 2017, where we estimated he was about three to four months old.
Tiny Waffle
Baby Falafel was adorable, skittish and wary of people. You had to get a really good grip on him when he was not in a cage. He would sit slack in your hand until he thought your grip was loose enough to make a quick getaway, and then he would make a break for it. I was terrified of bringing him home because I thought a good sharp look might snap him in half, or otherwise we might lose him under a piece of furniture or something. We took a lot of guidance in getting started from Arcticrobot and his website at varanusmelinus.com.
We brought Falafel home in a little plastic container and started him out in a 20gal long glass reptile enclosure. We gave him a few inches of substrate to bury in, trying to find a balance between him being secure and us not losing him in it. We started him out on a variety of bugs.
Slowly, Falafel started to get more accustomed to our presence. We tried to get him used to our hands being nearby, and started doing short handling sessions. As soon as he was able, he loved being out and exploring the house (this started out as the end of one room). We would let him sit on the windowsill and he clambered all over the blinds.
Our waffle grew quickly and loved climbing, so it wasn’t long before we moved him to a larger Exo Terra enclosure, 36x18x36 and made him a stand out of PVC that we wrapped with rope. It is important to note that we learned not to leave the PVC feet open at the bottom, because one day we thought he’d “escaped” and really he had just learned to climb all over the inside of his 2” PVC.
From there, we went to a tall Cages By Design enclosure, modified to have PVC for its walls. However, this proved to be too tall to manage Falafel's humidity correctly, and the height caused other problems for us as well. Eventually we moved him to a large wooden enclosure we built ourselves, 7.5'x3'x4' (wxdxh) and installed a pond with moving water.
Bugs and Meats
I must admit that Falafel outgrew his love of bugs a lot sooner than I hoped he would. I have a very vivid memory of offering him this giant juicy cricket, and it bounced over to him, and he looked at it in an interested way, and it…walked about an inch out of his reach and he couldn’t be bothered with it anymore. We were also offering him meat, and he took to that readily and soon dispensed with the bugs.
Offering Falafel meat ended up being a pretty cool way to bond with him. We would get a plastic fork and offer him a bit of meat on the end, and he would come up to us and grab the meat. Most of the time he would just sit nearby and finish the meal, so he was better positioned to take more. When we had rodents, we offered them off tongs and so had the opportunity to engage in this same positive interaction.
When Falafel grew bigger and hormones started kicking in, he would be a little more aggressive with grabbing meat off the fork and we had to stop using a fork because we were worried he’d hurt himself. Instead, we started target training him to come when he heard the sound of a fork butt being tapped on the floor. When he came over, he would be rewarded with a plate of food. This was effective in redirecting him when he wanted to explore other parts of the house. (It didn’t work forever if there is no food!)
One of the coolest things about this is that he seemed to differentiate between different sounds—a finger tapping on the same floor might not bring him over. On the other hand, I did see him run over when I was just banging out a bowl over a trash can. Some noises are just interesting and worth an inspection.
Showers and Hormones
Another thing we did throughout our time with Falafel was showers and soaks. Since the humidity in his bigger 4’x3’x6’ enclosure was always a struggle to maintain with a high basking temperature and extra height, we supplemented with humidifiers, soaks in a tub, and showers. When our waffle was a baby, he would sit on the shelf in our walk-in shower and stretch out under the shower head. When he grew older however, and started showing signs of puberty, this was also a condition that seemed to elicit hormonal biting, so we stopped standing at the shower and interacting with him while it was running. (Tub soaks continued to be fine). However, since Falafel got into everything, if he went over to the walk in shower and—well, walked in—I would turn it on for him and he’d just sit in the bottom of it as long as he wanted. This was a pretty peaceful compromise. Sometimes we'd open his enclosure door for some time out and go straight back to that bathroom, and I wondered if he was remembering each time that there was a shower in there.
Once Falafel figured out how to get up onto the countertop and discovered the sink, he started climbing into it on a regular basis. He would climb in and we'd turn the water on for him, and he could sit, and soak, and interfere with us doing the dishes.
Falafel’s hormones were a bit of a challenge for us, but he’s never been the biting, crazed maniac I feared when we first decided to get a monitor lizard. When Falafel was about a year old he started out by strutting around and wiping his butt on things. He would arch his back around a table leg, or a box, or pretty much anything. Sometimes he would evert his hemipenes (that’s how we found out he was a male!) while doing this. I think it was also around this time that he would express his displeasure with things by sitting up and lashing his tail slowly back and forth. He would lash his tail at to new objects, the dog, the dog when she had to wear a cone, and various other things. Generally we were able to scoop him up and remove him from the thing, and he would be fine. When he was in his enclosure and did this, he’d stop once the offending thing moved away.
Always, though, when he was afraid, Falafel would rather run (FAST) than bite. Bites we’ve gotten have been accidental grabs for food and hormone-related bites, and in watching for hormone signs and using tongs and plates, we were able to largely avoid these. He has a great personality and his desire to explore things makes him confident and outgoing.
Exploring Waffle
Falafel’s desire to explore things also made him rather like a raccoon. We'd try and get him some time out of his enclosure every day. As he grew, Falafel explored more and more, and he learned to climb our grocery cart, cabinetry, kitchen trash can, and a variety of things we never thought he’d be able to reach. If we ever thought “he’ll never get up there” about something, fast forward a few months and he’d find a way to get up there.
One of Falafel's favorite things was trash cans. He could climb into and knock over the smaller bathroom cans, and he usually got the time between me hearing the THUNK to me fishing him out to find out whatever interesting things were in there. He was a good motivator in us regularly emptying trash cans.
I was really pleased with the amount of growth and bonding we had with Falafel over the last few years. When we could, we liked to take him out on his harness and work with him outside. We did it a few times but eventually the weather would be too hot or too cold and we had to start over the next year. When he was younger, Falafel quickly outgrew his harness and we had to wait to buy another one. One of our goals with him was to get him comfortable enough to practice recall on a harness outside as well. I would never, never let him outside without a harness, but if he ever did get out, I wanted a shot at having him back that didn’t require me to run faster than he does.
In late 2024, we made the very difficult decision to rehome Falafel. It is one of the most difficult decisions we have ever made. We wanted to be able to travel, and it is difficult for most people to house-sit for a monitor lizard. We didn't want to leave Falafel for more than a few days at a time--he is an active lizard, and needs lots of enrichment and exercise. It really does take a village--particularly with exotics. You either know someone who can watch them, or you don't go anywhere. It's not something a lot of people consider when getting a reptile.
We didn't realize just how difficult rehoming Falafel would be. Without the kind support of NKS Reptiles, we may not have been able to do it. Even in an enclosure familiar to him, it was months of work to acclimate Falafel to his new home and people. Our visits seemed to help, but his confidence was broken. It took a long time to build it back again. We were overjoyed the first time we saw him come out of his enclosure on his own once more.
We had Falafel for almost 8 years, a good chunk of his life and ours. He was a huge influence on our lives and our identities as reptile people (he even inspired our logo!). We were proud to be his owners for 8 years. We won't be the same without him.
I hope that in his new home at NKS, Falafel will continue to thrive and have new experiences and fun times as the curious, boisterous lizard he is. I hope he will continue to be a good reptile ambassador for others, and encourage people to learn about and protect these amazing, intelligent animals.
