routine

Callista · Jan 5, 2017

I (finally) get my beardie this weekend, so excited!

But before I got him I wanted to check if this routine is ok for him (he's an adult, very big, but I have no idea of his age, I'm adopting him from the reptile rescue centre):
Lights on at 6 am, off at 11 pm.
Every day: a salad with ingredients from the beautifuldragons food list, given to him between 7 and 9 am.

Dubia's every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday (or is that too much?), given to him in the evening (before 8 pm, so he has time to digest before lights out).

I will give him as much dubias as he'll eat in about 10-15 minutes.

How often should I dust his dubias with calcium? And with vitamins? And if I dust, should I dust all the dubias he'll eat? Or just a couple?

And on an onrelated note, how often should the UVB tube be replaced? I have a Reptisun T5 HO, and the box said to replace every year, but here I read every 6 months...

I really want to do right by him...

CooperDragon · Jan 6, 2017

I'm glad you're able to give a good home to a dragon from the rescue center. Your routine sounds pretty good but I do have some suggestions. The lighting schedule is quite long. I'd bring that down to maybe 12-14hrs of daylight unless your schedule requires the longer day period.

A nice big salad every day using the list on beautifuldragons is a good idea. I do the same for my adult dragon. That should be the primary food source though so try for about 80% overall diet to be a nice variety of greens and veges. I offer dubia roaches every 3-4 days, all he wants to eat, all dusted with calcium or multivitamin every time. I usually switch to the multivitamin every 3rd or 4th meal but not on a strict schedule. The time of day usually varies a bit but as long as he has time to digest under his lights for a few hours, the feeding time should just be what fits into your schedule.

If you have a T5 bulb then it should last at least a year. My Arcadia has lasted much longer than that but it's better to replace every year unless you have a meter to check it's output. The 6 month replacement you've read about is for the older T8 bulbs.

kingofnobbys · Jan 6, 2017

CooperDragon":797w22lb said:
I'm glad you're able to give a good home to a dragon from the rescue center. Your routine sounds pretty good but I do have some suggestions. The lighting schedule is quite long. I'd bring that down to maybe 12-14hrs of daylight unless your schedule requires the longer day period.
<<< I use a 16 hr day cycle for all my pet lizards - works very well for my skinks and beardies.

I feed my adult Rex and my two adult bts George and Mildred some live insects daily, dusted LIGHTLY with either calcium or calcium + vitamins daily. They also get greens and some veg daily.
Currently Rex gets about 1/2 - 2/3 the insects daily that each of my yearlings Peppa and Toothless get ,all my lizards are on now on ONE live insect meal per day.
ie today Rex got 6Lg + 3Med crickets + buk choi greens (essentially an entire leaf), while Peppa and Toothless each got 12Lg crickets + some buk choi.

A nice big salad every day using the list on beautifuldragons is a good idea. I do the same for my adult dragon. That should be the primary food source though so try for about 80% overall diet to be a nice variety of greens and veges. I offer dubia roaches every 3-4 days, all he wants to eat, all dusted with calcium or multivitamin every time. I usually switch to the multivitamin every 3rd or 4th meal but not on a strict schedule. The time of day usually varies a bit but as long as he has time to digest under his lights for a few hours, the feeding time should just be what fits into your schedule.

If you have a T5 bulb then it should last at least a year. My Arcadia has lasted much longer than that but it's better to replace every year unless you have a meter to check it's output. The 6 month replacement you've read about is for the older T8 bulbs.

Callista · Jan 7, 2017

Thank you both for answering my questions. Tha lights went on at 7am, not six, my mistake. I adjusted the schedule so that it's lights on at 7am and off at 9.30pm.

I'll also feed him dubias only twice a week, as much as he wants to eat in 15 minutes. I've heard that beardies can get grout when fed too much proteine, I really don't want that to happen...

I'm going to pick him up in a few hours, and I'm excited and scared (to do something wrong) at the same time...

kingofnobbys · Jan 7, 2017

Callista":1uvfo0xq said:
Thank you both for answering my questions. Tha lights went on at 7am, not six, my mistake. I adjusted the schedule so that it's lights on at 7am and off at 9.30pm.

I'll also feed him dubias only twice a week, as much as he wants to eat in 15 minutes. I've heard that beardies can get grout when fed too much proteine, I really don't want that to happen...

I'm going to pick him up in a few hours, and I'm excited and scared (to do something wrong) at the same time...

My adults Rex and the BTS only get a small number of live insects daily - I think if the insect feeds are small, the lizard will get regular doses of dietary calcium , insect proteins and insect fats .

I'm sure Rex, Mildred and George could eat a lot more insects each day than I give them, probably 2x - 3x as many. The adults are still hungry when I stop feeding them the insects .

Some people have claimed they feed their adults up to 10 superworms per feed .... :shock: .... I never give mine more than 4 supers at a time.

Callista · Jan 8, 2017

I got him yesterday (named him Sarkan), and so far he hasn't shown much interest in food, except for two small bites of salad he took from my hand. I'll have to see how much he'll eat once he's settled in...

Callista · Jan 9, 2017

So I gave Sarkan his first dubia meal. He was VERY enthusiastic. As soon as he saw them, he jumped out of his tank (I've never seen him move so fast) and into my lap. Luckily I was sitting close! I put him back in his tank and started feeding him. I have to admit, the roaches freak me out. I'm trying to get used to them, but I'm pretty sure I didn't stop saying "ewww ewww ewww" until I was done...

Sarkan ate 13(!) adult roaches. He's a big boy, but it looked like he was really stuffing himself at the end (he continued to eat the dubia's as soon as I dropped them in his tank, but it took a while to swallow them, like he wasn't sure he really had any more room in his stomach, if that makes sense?)

I measured and weighed Sarkan yesterday, he's 45 cm (about 17,7 inches), but he's missing his tailtip. He is 435 grams. I have a feeling he could stand to gain some weight, so I'm glad he ate with so much enthusiasm, I just hope he will feel the same about his salad soon...

Gormagon · Jan 9, 2017

Sounds like things are going well in your new adventures!

You said you have the T5 HO, did you get the 10.0 T5 bulb to replace the 5.0 T5 bulb that comes in the unit?

Callista · Jan 9, 2017

Gormagon":1xqmtv4a said:
Sounds like things are going well in your new adventures!

You said you have the T5 HO, did you get the 10.0 T5 bulb to replace the 5.0 T5 bulb that comes in the unit?

I don't think I understand, I bought the bulb, not the unit.

This is the bulb I have:

Gormagon · Jan 9, 2017

Ok, that is the good one. The t5 units "aka fixtures" that zoomed sells, comes standard with a 5.0 bulb. This is why I was asking, sorry.
It's all good!!!

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