Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello everyone. I am Chris. I have a lil daughter and a toddler son. For some time now, my daughter has been very very interested with beardies. She must have picked it from me since I love pets. Anyway, I am presently overseas and I will be going back home to Long Island next month. I thought getting her a few beardies as my coming home gift would be cool, so I went and placed an order for 4 baby beardies with Dragonzwhispers. Rhea has been very kind and helpful, giving me advices on how to properly care for these beautiful pets. I have been researching the net too for the last couple of weeks, trying to determine the proper set up and digesting all the info I can get my hands on. My biggest problem atm is the enclosures. From my readings, I gather that I will be needing four enclosures for each of the dragon I will be purchasing. These enclosures should be big enough to accomodate a growing dragon. I thought that it might be better to get a large one from the very start. I can simply partition them now, while they are still juveniles, and remove the partition as they grow. That way, I need not buy additional cages.

I want something that is at least 36" long, is stackable, and can use the Mega Ray mercury vapor bulbs. I simply cant afford to dedicate a special room for them, and thus would save precious real estate if I can stack all of them up. I read that mercury vapor lamps are a must if you want healthy, colorful beardies so I want to use them. Atm, two products seem to fill this requirements. One is the Big Apple acrylic cages, and the Vision cages. I was wondering if any of you here have tried either product and if they are worth it. Any suggestions and recommendations will be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much for reading.

Chris

PS. Btw, I am a complete newbie to beardies and lizards and these will be my first enclosure. Honestly, all these have been stressing me out. I just dont want to break my lil daughters heart if something goes wrong. And as the adult, I feel that I am solely responsible to the health and longetivity of my pets.

I don't think either of these cages are big enough to use Mercury Vapour bulbs. These bulbs need to be at least 18" above the basking spot. The intensity of the UVB put out can be harmful if too close to the dragon, affecting their eyes etc. However, you don't need these bulbs to ensure a healthy dragon, the repti-glo and repti-sun 5.0 and higher florescent tubes are fine, providing they are changed every 6-9 months and proper diet and supplimentation is done.

It is also best to get cages that are 4'x2' of floor space, height can be as little as 16" but 24" is more than sufficient. ANy higher and it is harder to get the dragons close to the UVB light and basking light. (taller cages can be used if you want to use the mercury vapour bulbs, as these do put out UVB much further than florescent tubes).

I have a question though, why get 4 dragons right off the bat? Since you are new to dragons etc, it would be better to just get one or two to start. Then after a couple years get more if you really enjoy them. This gives you time to get more experienced and knowledgeable with bearded care without having the extra chore of caring for 4 babies properly from the get go. THis isn't to say I feel you won't do well with 4 but if mistakes are made (and lets face it, we all make mistakes) it is easier to correct for one or two than 4. Also, if stress of shipping etc, causes one or more to develop parasite problems, it will cost more money to treat them all etc. Just a thought for you to consider.

Cages can also be custom made as well and made stackable.
-----
PHLdyPayne