New to Beardies seeking advice

Hello everybody! My name is Julie and I caved in to my son's pleas to get a bearded dragon! I stepped out of my comfort zone and we got our baby Spike a few weeks ago who quickly won the heart of a dog person! Now we have so much to learn and I am so happy to have found this board.

These couple of weeks have not been easy but so much fun and I have a few questions to start with...
1. Terrarium - We purchased a Zoo Med’s 40 Gallon Bearded Dragon Starter Kit and a few extra accessories. What are we missing? What should we buy?

2. Temperature question (temps measured with the temp gun) - the temperature on the basking rock is anywhere between 100-105 F. Temperature on the hot side is about 98-101, cool side 78-85. I think it might be too low with the AC running as Spike now climbs on the very top of the vine close to the lamp and spends more time there then on the basking rock. Is he too close to the lamp? I am concerned it he'll freeze when the lights are off


3. Open mouth question - please don't laugh as it is something new for us. Spike sits with his mouth open for an extended periods of time. Is this normal?

4. Feeding - we have tries veggies, fruits, worms, and commercially packaged foods with no success. He only eats life crickets. I would eventually love to switch him to salads and Bearded Dragon food. Any suggestions on how I can do that?

All advice and suggestions are highly appreciated! TIA

Hi Julie, welcome to the site!
Spikes a cute little dragon! I'm a relatively new Beardie dad, but here's my understanding:
Basking with their mouth open(gapeing) fills the role of 'panting' for lizards, It usually means they're at their ideal temp and are just cooling off to stay at that level. As far as shifting him to a vegetarian diet, a healthy dragon should always get some % of insect protein, most of what I've read says 80% insect for little guys, shifting to 80% plantmatter as adults. I had success with Stilgar, my little one, by offering him little strips of dandelion green by hand before offering him his morning crickets(which is when he's at his hungriest). He started off taking reluctant bites, but he eventually accepted that plants are food and now enjoys eating some of the salad in his bowl pretty much every day. Hope this helps!

P.S., I'm not sure what worms you are referring to, but while Phoenix worms are a great feeder, other commonly available worms like wax and mealworms are high in fat and in the case of mealworms can be genuinely dangerous, particularly for young Beardies, something that my petstore certainly failed to mention...

Hi. You said you bought the kit. More than likely you have a coil/compact uvb. Those are no good. They start out strong, but face fast. I'd replace it with a reptisut5 t5 10.0. Also yes he needs bugs and those commercial pellets are junk. I would feed those to the crickets.

Hello from one new reluctant (but more than in love now) Beardie (formerly only dog lover) owner to another. Spike is adorable! This site has the best advice/support that I have found anywhere. The best advice I got was replacing those lights that comes in the kit with the Reptisun T5. Made a HUGE difference in him. He is more active and an elephant is jealous with the amounts he eats. Never gave my Biggie mealworms, everything I read here scared me on giving them to a juvenile, however I did switch from crickets to Dubia Roaches and he has been loving them and refuses all other bugs now. He eats his greens but mainly right now as he is growing still is pretty much still bug crazy. Have fun and enjoy.

EddyRancid":30fkwp6v said:

Hi Julie, welcome to the site!
Spikes a cute little dragon! I'm a relatively new Beardie dad, but here's my understanding:
Basking with their mouth open(gapeing) fills the role of 'panting' for lizards, It usually means they're at their ideal temp and are just cooling off to stay at that level. As far as shifting him to a vegetarian diet, a healthy dragon should always get some % of insect protein, most of what I've read says 80% insect for little guys, shifting to 80% plantmatter as adults. I had success with Stilgar, my little one, by offering him little strips of dandelion green by hand before offering him his morning crickets(which is when he's at his hungriest). He started off taking reluctant bites, but he eventually accepted that plants are food and now enjoys eating some of the salad in his bowl pretty much every day. Hope this helps!

P.S., I'm not sure what worms you are referring to, but while Phoenix worms are a great feeder, other commonly available worms like wax and mealworms are high in fat and in the case of mealworms can be genuinely dangerous, particularly for young Beardies, something that my petstore certainly failed to mention...

Click to expand...

Thank you for taking the time to reply! The worms were the mealworms recommended at LLL Reptile & Supply where we purchased Spike. I will try offering Spike greens in the morning and see how this works out. I don't want him to be a vegetarian but I want to eventually be done with live food (I don't do well with bugs ). It was cool to learn about gapeing as I haven't heard this term before!

destiny1998":2ffik8gw said:

Hi. You said you bought the kit. More than likely you have a coil/compact uvb. Those are no good. They start out strong, but face fast. I'd replace it with a reptisut5 t5 10.0. Also yes he needs bugs and those commercial pellets are junk. I would feed those to the crickets.

Click to expand...

Thank you for taking the time to reply! Yes! You are absolutely right, it came with coil/compact uvb. I ordered the Zoo Med Reptisun T5-Ho 36" Terrarium Hood today and will replace the coil/compact uvb with a Zoo Med 100 Watts Nocturnal Infrared Incandescent Heat Lamp that will keep our baby warm at night.

Lorilyn":2cqqhb7v said:

Hello from one new reluctant (but more than in love now) Beardie (formerly only dog lover) owner to another. Spike is adorable! This site has the best advice/support that I have found anywhere. The best advice I got was replacing those lights that comes in the kit with the Reptisun T5. Made a HUGE difference in him. He is more active and an elephant is jealous with the amounts he eats. Never gave my Biggie mealworms, everything I read here scared me on giving them to a juvenile, however I did switch from crickets to Dubia Roaches and he has been loving them and refuses all other bugs now. He eats his greens but mainly right now as he is growing still is pretty much still bug crazy. Have fun and enjoy.

Click to expand...

Thanks for taking the time to reply! That's exactly what I am doing next. I actually ordered the Zoo Med 26054 Reptisun T5-Ho Terrarium Hood, 36" and the Zoo Med Nocturnal Infrared Incandescent Heat Lamp 100 Watts today. I absolutely CAN NOT do roaches! I can barely handle the pinhead crickets! I am just hoping we can eventually switch to anything but live bugs.

No problem, hope the info helps!
I'm not sure how you currently do insect feedings, but one thing I highly recommend is a "cricket keeper". It's basically a plastic specimen box with black tubes, it's great for gut-loading bugs for your dragon, and allows you to tap crickets into a feeding container with minimal interaction with the insects themselves. I've found mine to be really convenient.

I would recommend against getting an infrared heat light- beardies can see the same color spectrum as us(if I remember correctly I believe they actually have more cones in their eyes than us), so they don't do well trying to sleep under a bright red sun. If the tank is too cold at night a good option might be a ceramic bulb that will produce heat but no light!

I totally understand the bug thing. Crickets were not easy for me and I fought the Dubia for months and refused to even consider them. Till I was buying the pet store out of crickets cause he was eating 60 or more a day and at 16 cents each my bank account was crying. The Dubia are actually easier for me. I have the cricket keeper too. It helped with not having to touch the bugs. And the die rate was so high and his consumption rate kept increasing with the crickets sooooooooo my son talked me into trying the Dubia. He went Godzilla on them. I still don’t touch them they are only 8 cents a piece, I order them on line and they don’t die out. And he eats about 30-40 a day. It’s amazing how fast they grow and with that growth his appetite kept growing. LOL And as far as I know they will never be strictly vegetarian I believe their bug to salad ratio changes from 80% bugs to 80% salad but I don’t think that happens till they are much older. The experts here can help you more with that

EddyRancid":2qdxaikh said:

No problem, hope the info helps!
I'm not sure how you currently do insect feedings, but one thing I highly recommend is a "cricket keeper". It's basically a plastic specimen box with black tubes, it's great for gut-loading bugs for your dragon, and allows you to tap crickets into a feeding container with minimal interaction with the insects themselves. I've found mine to be really convenient.

I would recommend against getting an infrared heat light- beardies can see the same color spectrum as us(if I remember correctly I believe they actually have more cones in their eyes than us), so they don't do well trying to sleep under a bright red sun. If the tank is too cold at night a good option might be a ceramic bulb that will produce heat but no light!

Click to expand...

Shoot...I didn't know! Do you by any chance know where can I get the ceramic bulb?

Lorilyn":88sbtpcl said:

I totally understand the bug thing. Crickets were not easy for me and I fought the Dubia for months and refused to even consider them. Till I was buying the pet store out of crickets cause he was eating 60 or more a day and at 16 cents each my bank account was crying. The Dubia are actually easier for me. I have the cricket keeper too. It helped with not having to touch the bugs. And the die rate was so high and his consumption rate kept increasing with the crickets sooooooooo my son talked me into trying the Dubia. He went Godzilla on them. I still don’t touch them they are only 8 cents a piece, I order them on line and they don’t die out. And he eats about 30-40 a day. It’s amazing how fast they grow and with that growth his appetite kept growing. LOL And as far as I know they will never be strictly vegetarian I believe their bug to salad ratio changes from 80% bugs to 80% salad but I don’t think that happens till they are much older. The experts here can help you more with that

Click to expand...

Wow! Maybe I'll graduate to roaches one day...not any day soon though. Spike eats only about a dozen crickets a day. I buy a Petland cricket card at $9.99 for 12 dozens, so it lasts us a while.

We started a roach colony in a big rubbermaid bin. We started with 5 female and 1 male roaches, and after 6 months or so we've never had to buy insects again. They reproduce plenty fast to keep up with the demand for our beardie (also Spike). They're a lot easier to handle than the crickets. We feed them carrots and broccoli stalks, mainly, as well as the cricket food and water gel stuff. You get used to them pretty quickly.