Hello everyone,
My son (6 years old) will be getting our family's first bearded dragon in about 2 weeks. We were supposed to get it last week but they were shipped to the pet store too small, so they are growing them at the store for a couple of weeks before releasing them. This has given us time to get everything ready and figured out.
I have been busy reading up on bearded dragon care (a lot of reading on this site included) so I think I have everything ready, but I thought I would check in and see if anyone noticed any issues I may have missed (thanks for the help!)
We have a 40 gallon tank. I have covered two of the walls with black construction paper, and the wall by the basking light with white paper.
I am using a 36" reptisun 10.0 UVB bulb in the reptisun fixture on top of the tank. I have slid the screen back on its track so that there is no screen between the UVB light and the inside of the tank (although my fixture has the reflective inside, so not sure if I need to do this).
The basking light is a 150W basking bulb set on a timer for 14 hours day, 10 hours night. I also have a ceramic heat emitter on a dimmer switch for night use.
My temperatures (measured with the exoterra digital probe thermometer left in tank on both hot and cool sides) are:
Day - Basking spot: 104-110.2 degrees F Cool side: 78-79 degrees F
Night- the lowest it has dropped is 58 degrees F, but usually around 62 degrees F. The CHE makes it too hot so I bought the dimmer switch and am experimenting with night temperatures now.
I am using paper towel for the substrate, and a piece of wood leading to a reptile hammock for the basking spot, which puts him 6" below the UVB light. We also have a couple of rocks and the food and water dishes.
For feeding I have found a source of reptiworms that I can get between about $.04-.06 per worm depending on how many I purchase. I still need to buy a fridge or wine cooler for them as I have not been able to find a natural spot in our house that stays within the 50-60 degrees F temp range to "keep them on ice"
I haven't decided if we will just feed him the worms directly or try fatten them up a bit first. To start with we will probably just keep it simple.
I also plan to buy crickets in smaller quantities for variety from the pet store ($.10/cricket so expensive)
For veggies we will have to depend on what we can get locally and I was also going to add in some of the Nature Zone Bearded Dragon Bites.
We have both Calcium plus D3, and multivitamins for dusting, though I am not sure how much we need to (or at all) dust the crickets if we are using reptiworms as the main diet.
I think that about covers it. I want to thank everyone on these boards for your posts, as this entire setup has been generated using info I have found here or on links from this forum.
Does anyone see any "holes" in this setup?
My son is super excited to pick up: Weirdo Godzilla/Red Godzilla/Scraggy/Dragonbreath from the pet store (he is still a bit up in the air with the name).
I will upload a picture once we actually have him in enclosure.
Thanks again!
My son (6 years old) will be getting our family's first bearded dragon in about 2 weeks. We were supposed to get it last week but they were shipped to the pet store too small, so they are growing them at the store for a couple of weeks before releasing them. This has given us time to get everything ready and figured out.
I have been busy reading up on bearded dragon care (a lot of reading on this site included) so I think I have everything ready, but I thought I would check in and see if anyone noticed any issues I may have missed (thanks for the help!)
We have a 40 gallon tank. I have covered two of the walls with black construction paper, and the wall by the basking light with white paper.
I am using a 36" reptisun 10.0 UVB bulb in the reptisun fixture on top of the tank. I have slid the screen back on its track so that there is no screen between the UVB light and the inside of the tank (although my fixture has the reflective inside, so not sure if I need to do this).
The basking light is a 150W basking bulb set on a timer for 14 hours day, 10 hours night. I also have a ceramic heat emitter on a dimmer switch for night use.
My temperatures (measured with the exoterra digital probe thermometer left in tank on both hot and cool sides) are:
Day - Basking spot: 104-110.2 degrees F Cool side: 78-79 degrees F
Night- the lowest it has dropped is 58 degrees F, but usually around 62 degrees F. The CHE makes it too hot so I bought the dimmer switch and am experimenting with night temperatures now.
I am using paper towel for the substrate, and a piece of wood leading to a reptile hammock for the basking spot, which puts him 6" below the UVB light. We also have a couple of rocks and the food and water dishes.
For feeding I have found a source of reptiworms that I can get between about $.04-.06 per worm depending on how many I purchase. I still need to buy a fridge or wine cooler for them as I have not been able to find a natural spot in our house that stays within the 50-60 degrees F temp range to "keep them on ice"
I haven't decided if we will just feed him the worms directly or try fatten them up a bit first. To start with we will probably just keep it simple.
I also plan to buy crickets in smaller quantities for variety from the pet store ($.10/cricket so expensive)
For veggies we will have to depend on what we can get locally and I was also going to add in some of the Nature Zone Bearded Dragon Bites.
We have both Calcium plus D3, and multivitamins for dusting, though I am not sure how much we need to (or at all) dust the crickets if we are using reptiworms as the main diet.
I think that about covers it. I want to thank everyone on these boards for your posts, as this entire setup has been generated using info I have found here or on links from this forum.
Does anyone see any "holes" in this setup?
My son is super excited to pick up: Weirdo Godzilla/Red Godzilla/Scraggy/Dragonbreath from the pet store (he is still a bit up in the air with the name).
I will upload a picture once we actually have him in enclosure.
Thanks again!