Explore this further at reptilecentre.com.

As with any enclosure, running it for a few days before an animal moves in lets temperature and humidity settle properly, and any questions about whether a setup suits a particular species are best checked against a care sheet or with a vet experienced in reptiles.

That said, there's a clear line between normal settling-in behaviour and something that needs attention. Prolonged refusal to eat beyond what's typical for the species, laboured breathing, unusual discharge, obvious injury, or any behaviour that seems more than ordinarily distressed are reasons to contact a vet experienced with reptiles straightaway, rather than waiting to see if it resolves on its own.

Substrate is another area worth checking line by line. Some kits include a starter bag suited to the enclosure's intended species; others include a generic substrate that may or may not suit the animal actually being kept. Hides, water dishes and basic decor are the items most likely to be missing from a kit altogether, on the assumption that a keeper will add these separately based on preference.

Keeping insectivorous reptiles and amphibians means a recurring need for livefood, and running out partway through the week is one of the more avoidable stresses of reptile keeping. A livefood subscription is built to solve exactly that problem, delivering feeder insects on a fixed schedule rather than leaving a keeper to remember and reorder manually each time stock runs low.

Bringing a reptile home for the first time is more involved than picking an animal and a tank. Before any animal arrives, a keeper needs the enclosure itself, a heat source, appropriate lighting, the right substrate, and at least two hides, plus a stable water dish and some basic decor for enrichment. Getting these right, and getting them right before the animal turns up, is what most new keeper mistakes come down to.