new owner - does my setup look ok?

[jman101]

Not sure of the age of the dragon - just ordered the fluorescent light online currently using a compact fluorescent - was thinking of possibly building a second floor but is it fine for now?

 

[Terry15]

The setup looks beautiful. The Viv looks so big to the little dragon. As he gets bigger then it will look so small.

 

[CooperDragon]

I agree, that looks great. Plenty of places to bask, climb, and hide. How far is it from the top of the tank to the top of the rock he's on? If it's about 12'' then a T5 tube would work perfectly for UVB in that setup.

 

[charmander16]

You'll want to remove some stuff as he grows. How is the feeding bowl working out? If you're having a hard time with the feeding then check out my post on feeding dish here: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=231135

Also, looks like the basking spot may be a little too far from the light. Have you verified the temp there? You need to get a reading right on the spot where he would bask. Also looks like a lot of ventilation, so you may want a heat mat. I have a glass tank currently and I stuck mine to the side of the tank on the warm side, up just above where he would be able to lay against it. This ensures that there is at least a constant source of warmth even at night.

 

[jman101]

You'll want to remove some stuff as he grows. How is the feeding bowl working out? If you're having a hard time with the feeding then check out my post on feeding dish here: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=231135

Also, looks like the basking spot may be a little too far from the light. Have you verified the temp there? You need to get a reading right on the spot where he would bask. Also looks like a lot of ventilation, so you may want a heat mat. I have a glass tank currently and I stuck mine to the side of the tank on the warm side, up just above where he would be able to lay against it. This ensures that there is at least a constant source of warmth even at night.

Thank you lots of helpful tips! He is eating mostly crickets now as he is young. I have a heat gun at the temperatures are around 110 F it's probably due to the fact that my heating lamp is 150w.

 

[charmander16]

Thank you lots of helpful tips! He is eating mostly crickets now as he is young. I have a heat gun at the temperatures are around 110 F it's probably due to the fact that my heating lamp is 150w.

Oh yeah, if you've got 150w then for sure that distance looks okay. I'm a little scared of 150w lamps myself Those suckers get HOT. You may want to step down to 100w and shorten the distance in the future.

Also, I'd move to roaches ASAP. Crickets are a pain and hard to catch. You can find places to order roaches on-line and IMO they are by far the best feeder. What I'd recommend when they are small is start ordering small size roaches, like 200 or so at a time (they are easy to keep so no real need to worry about having too many), and some Black Soldier Fly Larva (Phoenix worms).

The BSFLs can be a little bit of a pain, depending on what you do with them, but I like having those around as an added feeder. What I did was I ordered about 500 small ones and then would take about 20 at a time and put them into a separate container in the same room with the viv and feed them stuff like bread and table scraps (veggies & starches, not meat. Beans, squash and tomatoes seemed to be good). They will grow quickly. Keep the others in the containers they came in and keep them in a dark cool area like a basement. Mine lasted for about 6 months that way. I just now finished feeding them all off.

If you feed up only about 20 at a time you can pretty much feed those 20 off by the time their container is getting messy and then when they are all gone you clean it out and start over again. What I did was when I order they came in little plastic containers and I emptied one of those and used it as the active feeding container and kept the rest in storage.