Pros and Cons of new tank

[Sue E.]

So (finally) Kais new tank is coming Sunday (bioactive). I couldnt wait when I ordered it, but now I figured I'd list the pros and cons.
Pros:
1.its a front opener! Thats huge, as the top opener is a huge pain, esp since my uvb is mounted inside.
2. Enrichment! Digging, live plants, all that cool nature stuff for him
3. Its bigger. Current tank is 4 foot x 21.5 high x only 18" wide. He'll have more room.
4. It has a climbable background, with ledges and a natural cave so he will never have to see that "other dragon" (most of the time he doesnt, but occasionally his reflection still shows through his desert background.
Cons:
1. I have his temp gradients and uvb gradients just right with his current decor and the height of the tank. Now Ill have to go thru and temp and solarmeter everything to make sure its as good as this one became.
2. Might need a strong basking lamp with the additional 2 and a half inches of height.
3. Loose substrate is going to make him dirty (I mean, I dont mind a dirty dragon, but hopefully it wont cause any health issues)
4. Im not going to be able to use all the same decor, or in the same places. He knows where everything is now and uses it all as he pleases. His basking platform (with cave!) is too big for the new tank because of the plants and background, so Ill have to figure out a new basking piece for him. Ugh, he was so patient in the past when I kept rearranging everything, and Ive left his things alone at last.
5. Biggest one!!! Ive got him eating veggies well now, in a fairly shallow dish. Sometimes he drops a few, I dont want him to get a mouthful of substrate! Also, Ive been putting the worms on top of his greens and he eats both which is great...I dont want to stop doing that, but again, its a pretty shallow dish and he likes his dish. Also, he doesnt get bugs everyday...hope he doesnt dig for the isopods and eat them. Theyre tiny and hide in the substrate but he has an eagle eye.
Ugh. I knew next to nothing when I ordered the tank, and was happy to have someone else figure it all out for me. Now, its going to be relocation stress for both of us lol!

 

[xp29]

So (finally) Kais new tank is coming Sunday (bioactive). I couldnt wait when I ordered it, but now I figured I'd list the pros and cons.
Pros:
1.its a front opener! Thats huge, as the top opener is a huge pain, esp since my uvb is mounted inside.
2. Enrichment! Digging, live plants, all that cool nature stuff for him
3. Its bigger. Current tank is 4 foot x 21.5 high x only 18" wide. He'll have more room.
4. It has a climbable background, with ledges and a natural cave so he will never have to see that "other dragon" (most of the time he doesnt, but occasionally his reflection still shows through his desert background.
Cons:
1. I have his temp gradients and uvb gradients just right with his current decor and the height of the tank. Now Ill have to go thru and temp and solarmeter everything to make sure its as good as this one became.
2. Might need a strong basking lamp with the additional 2 and a half inches of height.
3. Loose substrate is going to make him dirty (I mean, I dont mind a dirty dragon, but hopefully it wont cause any health issues)
4. Im not going to be able to use all the same decor, or in the same places. He knows where everything is now and uses it all as he pleases. His basking platform (with cave!) is too big for the new tank because of the plants and background, so Ill have to figure out a new basking piece for him. Ugh, he was so patient in the past when I kept rearranging everything, and Ive left his things alone at last.
5. Biggest one!!! Ive got him eating veggies well now, in a fairly shallow dish. Sometimes he drops a few, I dont want him to get a mouthful of substrate! Also, Ive been putting the worms on top of his greens and he eats both which is great...I dont want to stop doing that, but again, its a pretty shallow dish and he likes his dish. Also, he doesnt get bugs everyday...hope he doesnt dig for the isopods and eat them. Theyre tiny and hide in the substrate but he has an eagle eye.
Ugh. I knew next to nothing when I ordered the tank, and was happy to have someone else figure it all out for me. Now, its going to be relocation stress for both of us lol!

Your pretty much spot on.
You could use a piece of tile to set his greens on. Or get one of those cheap plastic platters from walmart and take it out when not needed. Heck even a small cutting board would work. If he pushes it around you could use the double sided velcro to hold it in place.

 

[ChileanTaco]

2. Enrichment! Digging, live plants, all that cool nature stuff for him
3. Its bigger. Current tank is 4 foot x 21.5 high x only 18" wide. He'll have more room.
4. It has a climbable background, with ledges and a natural cave so he will never have to see that "other dragon" (most of the time he doesnt, but occasionally his reflection still shows through his desert background.

I'm sure your dragon loves that It's similar to my Taco's setup and he's using all of this a lot

Cons:
1. I have his temp gradients and uvb gradients just right with his current decor and the height of the tank. Now Ill have to go thru and temp and solarmeter everything to make sure its as good as this one became.

With a larger tank, it's usually easier. (I do not have a solarmeter, though.)
I had mine set up to correct temperatures, with a gradient, within the second try - first positioned everything similar to what I found online, measured, and adjusted a bit, done.
The benefit of a larger tank is usually that with the size (including height), you get the gradient quite automatically.

2. Might need a strong basking lamp with the additional 2 and a half inches of height.

Which one do you have?
I can only get 100 W (and weaker). I use two 100 W with a distance between them being about 40 cm (if I would measure from the center of one to the center of the other one).
Sometimes the advice is that the wattage of the lamp is determined by the height of the basking decor. As I could not get a variety of lamps here to test out (expensive, rarely available) I went the other way round, adjusting the height of the basking decor or to say it better, make some at different heights.
A climbable background as you will get is one way. Mine has boards spaced at approx. 15 cm intervals.
Also a wooden branch positioned at a slope does the trick. So the dragon can get closer to the lamps.

3. Loose substrate is going to make him dirty (I mean, I dont mind a dirty dragon, but hopefully it wont cause any health issues)

Taco is on loose substrate since I got him, and I see no problems doing so. In case I would have to set up another enclosure, I would go for the same. (Hypothetically; I will not get a second one.)
There are many benefits, e.g.
a) great for the femoral pores (Taco also never had problems with his pores)
b) cleaning up is easier, works like cat litter (When I compare it to the mess when Taco poops outside of his enclosure, on tile... when he poops inside his enclosure, like he does in most the cases, the sand just sucks up the liquid, poop dries quickly (I remove poop as soon as possible, of course, and sometimes I get it immediately done, but it can always be some hours just because of work, errands and such when he poops when nobody is at home). This means of course also scooping out some of the sand, thus needing to replace this, but even if I had to buy sand, I would do so as I think it is much more comfortable and would then just see buying and replacing the substrate as something similar to buying cat litter.)

4. Im not going to be able to use all the same decor, or in the same places. He knows where everything is now and uses it all as he pleases. His basking platform (with cave!) is too big for the new tank because of the plants and background, so Ill have to figure out a new basking piece for him. Ugh, he was so patient in the past when I kept rearranging everything, and Ive left his things alone at last.

This will, of course, stress him in the beginning.
But as a benefit, I could imagine your dragon will get more relaxed as he then can hide, retreat, dig, climb... much better.
I see it in my Taco: Despite he's generally a shy guy, he's also very relaxed guy, confident, and there is no trouble related to getting him back into his enclosure, he easily goes home. (I'm sure he both enjoys just out of curiosity coming out into "human world", but knows it's better to his needs inside there.) And he also doesn't seem to be bored, annoyed or otherwise in bad mood when it is not possible to interact with him much for a while (e.g.: working night shift, nobody home at all for a few days).

5. Biggest one!!! Ive got him eating veggies well now, in a fairly shallow dish. Sometimes he drops a few, I dont want him to get a mouthful of substrate! Also, Ive been putting the worms on top of his greens and he eats both which is great...I dont want to stop doing that, but again, its a pretty shallow dish and he likes his dish. Also, he doesnt get bugs everyday...hope he doesnt dig for the isopods and eat them. Theyre tiny and hide in the substrate but he has an eagle eye.

My suggestion with a similar setup: Put the dish a bit higher, maybe even on a flat stone.
Benefit: To access the food, he has to walk over the stone, rubbing his pores while doing so.
Around his golliwog plant, which he eats a lot, I have a rough c-shaped stone (lucky find!) that prevents the plant from being dug out, and makes it necessary for him to walk over the stone, and holds the twigs and leaves of the plant a bit up so not more than traces of sand are eaten with it (I write "traces" as there will always be tiny amounts, but for sure it is not full of sand).

 

[Sue E.]

Your pretty much spot on.
You could use a piece of tile to set his greens on. Or get one of those cheap plastic platters from walmart and take it out when not needed. Heck even a small cutting board would work. If he pushes it around you could use the double sided velcro to hold it in place.

Oh thanks! Great idea!!

 

[Sue E.]

I'm sure your dragon loves that It's similar to my Taco's setup and he's using all of this a lot



With a larger tank, it's usually easier. (I do not have a solarmeter, though.)
I had mine set up to correct temperatures, with a gradient, within the second try - first positioned everything similar to what I found online, measured, and adjusted a bit, done.
The benefit of a larger tank is usually that with the size (including height), you get the gradient quite automatically.


Which one do you have?
I can only get 100 W (and weaker). I use two 100 W with a distance between them being about 40 cm (if I would measure from the center of one to the center of the other one).
Sometimes the advice is that the wattage of the lamp is determined by the height of the basking decor. As I could not get a variety of lamps here to test out (expensive, rarely available) I went the other way round, adjusting the height of the basking decor or to say it better, make some at different heights.
A climbable background as you will get is one way. Mine has boards spaced at approx. 15 cm intervals.
Also a wooden branch positioned at a slope does the trick. So the dragon can get closer to the lamps.

Taco is on loose substrate since I got him, and I see no problems doing so. In case I would have to set up another enclosure, I would go for the same. (Hypothetically; I will not get a second one.)
There are many benefits, e.g.
a) great for the femoral pores (Taco also never had problems with his pores)
b) cleaning up is easier, works like cat litter (When I compare it to the mess when Taco poops outside of his enclosure, on tile... when he poops inside his enclosure, like he does in most the cases, the sand just sucks up the liquid, poop dries quickly (I remove poop as soon as possible, of course, and sometimes I get it immediately done, but it can always be some hours just because of work, errands and such when he poops when nobody is at home). This means of course also scooping out some of the sand, thus needing to replace this, but even if I had to buy sand, I would do so as I think it is much more comfortable and would then just see buying and replacing the substrate as something similar to buying cat litter.)

This will, of course, stress him in the beginning.
But as a benefit, I could imagine your dragon will get more relaxed as he then can hide, retreat, dig, climb... much better.
I see it in my Taco: Despite he's generally a shy guy, he's also very relaxed guy, confident, and there is no trouble related to getting him back into his enclosure, he easily goes home. (I'm sure he both enjoys just out of curiosity coming out into "human world", but knows it's better to his needs inside there.) And he also doesn't seem to be bored, annoyed or otherwise in bad mood when it is not possible to interact with him much for a while (e.g.: working night shift, nobody home at all for a few days).

My suggestion with a similar setup: Put the dish a bit higher, maybe even on a flat stone.
Benefit: To access the food, he has to walk over the stone, rubbing his pores while doing so.
Around his golliwog plant, which he eats a lot, I have a rough c-shaped stone (lucky find!) that prevents the plant from being dug out, and makes it necessary for him to walk over the stone, and holds the twigs and leaves of the plant a bit up so not more than traces of sand are eaten with it (I write "traces" as there will always be tiny amounts, but for sure it is not full of sand).

Great idea! Thanks!

 

[Sue E.]

Great idea! Thanks!

I run one 150watt zoo med repti basking bulb on top of the screen in a deep dome currently...temps are 85 to 88 on warm side and 73-75 cool side with basking spot 100.0 degrees. Humidity ranges from 19% in the dead of winter to 27% currently in spring (less of a concern, but obv I dont want it 70%). My current tank height is 21.5" and 18.5" deep, so I may need to add more heat (hopefully not). Id really prefer to keep my heat lamp on top of the screen, its just easiee for me that way. The jungle dawn led is on top of screen too, I dont care either way for that. My t5 10.0 tube (zoo med) is 24", under the screen. He was talking about a longer uvb tube and obviously I didnt know much about length then. Now Id prefer to keep the 24" to give him a spot to escape the uvb without going into a cave. He basks and then gets out of the uvb and into his trees sometimes. I dont want to come off like a know it all because after all hes been a reptile owner and breeder for like 30 years, but his specialty is dart frogs and snakes, so...

 

[ChileanTaco]

Btw., regarding dirty:
With sand, while (and before) preparing my dragon's enclosure, I had (also) thought this is a mess and it would make him dirty like crazy.
As sand is here the natural substrate outdoors, thus me all the time walking through sand that accumulates everywhere and is dragged around, I knew the mess very well. That stuff gets into everything and we really have started certain new habits here, like a broom by the door (for the feet after getting out of your shoes!), shaking out clothes outside before putting them in the laundry bin, and such Floor at work looks all the time like all the people are careless but the sand.. it just sticks.
I thought, with the enclosure, there will be another source of sand that for sure would stick to an animal with rough scales and spikes walking rather low to the ground, and then each time I will take Taco out it would make a mess.
I was then surprised that it almost doesn't stick to Taco. I could imagine that those scales do have a microstructure that makes it hard for sand to stick to them. Various animals have microstructures on their skin or whatever their surface is to help to keep them clean, especially for animals that don't groom themselves. Sand sticks ways better to the bottom of his glass food dish, for example.
(And looking at the wild reptiles here outdoors: They look clean too.)
I never bathed my dragon.

Now Id prefer to keep the 24" to give him a spot to escape the uvb without going into a cave.

That's what I also do. And Taco uses it accordingly.