Brumation under the heat lamp?

[wuke]

Do bearded dragons sometimes prefer to sit under the heat lamp when going into brumation? Mine is about a year old and he never ever goes to the cool side of his 55 gallon enclosure, so I'm wondering if maybe he just prefers his basking spot, even for brumation. I do have digital thermometers on either side and I have the temperatures dialed in correctly in his enclosure.

About a week ago he started sleeping a lot, and now he's sleeping pretty much 24 hours a day. He'll eat a roach or maybe two if I set him next to some, but his appetite is very low right now.

I thought it was odd that he would start brumation in March, and I just today read that they tend to prefer the cool side of the enclosure for brumation. Has anyone seen a bearded dragon do brumation on the warm side?

 

[DaisyDragon123]

Is this the same dragon you posted about last year that had dark spots on his head?

It is possible for dragons to brumate during Spring in the US, but I believe most will do it during fall/winter. With that being said, drastic changes in behavior that last longer than a few days require evaluation of environment and adjustments made as needed. For example, are your temps correct and is your UVB source in date (should be changed to a new UVB every six months)? Are you providing proper diet?

If your set up and feeding, including supplemental vitamins and calcium, is spot on, I would get a fecal exam done to check for parasites.

 

[wuke]

Yeah, he's the same dragon that had dark spots I was concerned about. I ended up realizing that he just changes colors a little when he's away from his heat lamp.

The temperature at his basking spot stays around 110 degrees F and on the cooler side of the enclosure it's in the mid 80s. I just recently replaced his UVB light because the old one was about 6 months old. It's an Exo Terra 26W UVB bulb that sits about 12" from his basking spot.

I can only get him to eat greens from time to time, so his main diet is dubia roaches, always dusted with calcium. I haven't ever given him any vitamins.

Thanks for the advice. I should have grabbed his stool today, but he'll probably poop again tomorrow or the next day, so I'll grab it then and see if I can find a place near me to get it checked out.

 

[kingofnobbys]

The practice here is keep beardies from brumating in their first winter. Some keepers think a yearling is too young to brumate.

How long is your artificial day/night cycle.

In summer in their native range in tropic central Australia you are looking at daylight hours up to 16 hours per day in late spring through to early autumn , the breeding and mating session, so if your lights are on for less than 14 hours per day , it's too short a day, and he wont have the cues to be active and will think it's winter and he wont have enough hours under the UV light and heat globe to metabolise his food properly..

All mine are on 16 hour day cycles (16 hours lights on, 8 hours lights off) .

 

[wuke]

His lights come on at 8am and go off at 10pm, so 14 hours. Maybe I ought to give him another couple hours of light.

If I were going to stop him from brumating, how would I go about doing that? Just taking him out often and trying to get him to move around? I wonder if I'm already too late for that? He's been in sleepy mode for about a week.

 

[kingofnobbys]

I am NOT AN EXPERT, only kept pet lizards for about 6-7yrs, and beardies for 3.5yrs.

None of my skinks or beardies have ever gone down to brumate (they have slowed down late autumn into winter, become more lazy , but kept wanting to be fed, wanting to bask, wanting snuggles and time out to crawl about.

Essentially in the wild they go down to bromate in response to the following changes :
===== shorter daylight hours
===== cooler daytime temperatures and night-time temperatures
===== a reduction in the food supply (fewer insects, less edible vegetable material (winter is the DRY season in tropical Australia, is actually HOT and DRY in much of natural range of bearded dragon over winter. Contrary to what some keepers think, it is rarely cold enough to be frosty overnight in their natural habitat. our central deserts, woodlands, and spinifex grasslands are not at high altitudes unlike those in central USA which are very high so get VERY cold overnight in winter.)

So I simply:
===== keep the daylight hours long (like summer)
===== keep the uv flux high (on the assumption beardies can sense reduced levels of UVA and UVB
===== keep the habitat warm and I provide overnight heating in winter (my beardies never experience less than 23-24oC)
===== keep the food coming as wanted