Hi everyone, I just purchased my first lizard day before yesterday, a 5-5 1/2 inch Sandfire Bearded Dragon born 5-17-04, and just wanted to ask if my cage setup is correct. For it to bask under I have a 100 watt bulb that sits just above his basking tree and puts out 100 degrees. On the cool side of the tank, where I've placed his water it stays a steady 80 to 85 (the gauge is tough to read, but it doesn't change). There's also a long 7% UVB that runs most of the length of the 20 gallon cage, I have it resting on the top screen in the back, so that it can reach him whever he goes. Yesterday I fed him for the first time, he ate five crickets. This is where I'm confused. I feed the crickets there own special food, and I dust them, but do I need to worry about whether the cricket food and the cricket dust will interact with each other and cause a bad vitamin problem for my Dragon? Another question: I bought the water bowl yesterday, but the reaction I got from him/her (can't tell yet which sex it is, I wouldn't know even if I knew what to look for) as soon as I put him in it, he ran out of it. This makes me think he wont dig misting much either. How will he get water? I've read about as much as I can online and asked a lot of questions at pet stores, but some of the answers have been conflicting, can you help me out?



Chris, Illinois



PS, he has a sandlike substrate. It says its made from crushed walnut shells. It doesn't says on the bag that it's calci-sand. I didn't want to buy any of that until I found out if that was good or bad for him or what.

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