75Gal tank lighting

[foolsgold]

OK so I'm getting a 75gal tank for a dragon that I'm going to adopt/rescue sometime around the 14th of this month. He is still small (from what I've been told) so he is going to stay in his 20Gal until he is ready to be upgraded to the 75gal.
What I'm needing help with is a bit of explanation of lighting and the use of MVB's. A hood comes with the 75galtank and I was just going to get a a repti sun 10.0 bulb to go in it and a light to be used to heat up the basking spot. It was mentioned to me that a 75gal tank would be big enough to use a MVB in and I've been trying to do some reading and figure out how one would be set up and what I've come up with is that it will be used as the heat for the basking spot and to provide the UV light needed right? Dose that mean I don't need any other type of UV light for the rest of the tank though? Or do I place the MVB in a way that it shines on the basking spot and then across the rest of the tank? I'm sure I'm going to stick with the reptisun until I have more of an understanding of the MVB's. The reptiles I have now don't need UV light so this is a first for me lol.

 

[Catalyst]

it will be used as the heat for the basking spot and to provide the UV light needed right? Dose that mean I don't need any other type of UV light for the rest of the tank though? Or do I place the MVB in a way that it shines on the basking spot and then across the rest of the tank? I'm sure I'm going to stick with the reptisun until I have more of an understanding of the MVB's. The reptiles I have now don't need UV light so this is a first for me lol.

Yes, if you use a good MVB (like the T-Rex Active Heat Flood bulb) it will be the only source of UVB you'll need in the tank because it will be both your basking (heat) bulb and you UVB source and it's strong enough that your dragon will absorb all the needed UVB while he's basking. You want it to point straight down into the tank as far as I know - some MVBs seem to have a problem with burning out prematurely if you use them at an angle. With a 75g tank, if you do decide to use a MVB at one end, you could use your flourescent light fixture with a regular (non-UVB) flourescent light to help brighten up the rest of the tank since dragons do best in a brightly light environment. You may also find it necessary to add a lower wattage secondary heat bulb over the cool end of the tank to keep the temps up since it's such a long tank.

 

[foolsgold]

Awesome, thank you so much for the clarification. Turns out the '75gal tank' that I was picking up today ended up being a 40gal long tank :shock: :roll: :? *sigh* oh well, just going to assume the people were told it was a 75gal when it was given to them and so that's the info they were passing on. Oh well, I'll just keep looking for another tank HA! hubby is gona LOVE that :lol: