Reptile & Amphibian Forums

FR,
I've been experimenting a little with your set up ideas regarding a light inside the cage with a lower wattage. At the present time I do not have anything other than screen tops, however I have glass panels that I have placed on a couple of my set ups to retain humidity. I have also taken the clamp lamp which normally sits on the screen top to be clipped on the the inside brace of the aquarium, where it is placed inside the aquarium, closer to the floor about midspace in the air. In an earlier post you mentioned that monitors live in dryer areas in their environments, even water monitors. Do you recommend a small water bowl just for drinking or do you suggest a large water container for the monitor to climb in? Also, what wattage of bulbs do you use pertaining to enclosure size? I don't want my monitors to get burned if they come into contact with the bulb. You mentioned that the custom tops you make for your tanks have a vent. How do you prevent molding or stale air from lack of ventilation? Thanks for the help, FR. I like to learn how to keep my animals alive and healthy.

Matt

The problem with water monitors is water, its a pain in the rear to maintain. As in lots of work. Monitors are already lots of work. So those that choose to keep water monitors with lots of water are, well work-a-holics.

They can be raised without swiming water, but then the point is WHY, have water monitors without water. There are plenty of other species that do not require large bodies of water.

I keep and have bred mertens, same for them and they are little. They are one of the greatist of monitor species, but tooooooo much work. The problem is, the work is constant. I recomend you make you own choice on this matter.

About wattages, with larger monitors its critical that you understand, they need a hot area at least SV size. So, a bank of low wattage lites is cheaper/safer/better, then one high wattage lite. So two to four 65 watt incandesent floods works great, without the ability to burn. Halogens 45 watts, can be used, but some brands have a strong ability to burn. Its rare, but does happen.

I use to use ackies to test types of bulbs, they were a poor test subject, Ackies seem to be fire proof. They do not burn. Of course other species like kimberlys are not fire proof. So its better to test with them. Halogens have the potential to burn, even low wattage.

You must consider, I do not go by my own rules and recomendations. But I am aware of the problems. This goes for you too. You can use dangerous bulbs, but be aware of the problems, don't allow them to get too close. There are times I do use halogens. Cheers

Thanks for the info. Here's a few more. Some(but not all) of my monitors sleep in their water bowls at night, and I have taken this as a dehydration warning. My question is, how do you maintain good humidity? I spray all of my monitors at night with a pressure bottle and they seem to be fine, despite the couple of monitors that sleep in their bowls(one nile & one salvator). The custom tops that you describe sound to me like too little ventilation, allowing mold & fungus to settle in. Stale air is something you want to avoid, right? I may be worrying about nothing but I think they're valid questions.

I wish I could see a picture of your basic set ups.

Matt

No offense but, if they did not work, I would not have been able to raise up hundreds and hundreds of monitors with those lids.

I think the point is, there is a distance between fungus and mold and too dry. Its in this area you want your monitors to be.

As with so many things, It does not have to be one way or the opposite. Monitors do not like wet or dry, good thing theres a middle ground.

This goes for niles and waters, both use water, then quickly dry off. That is normal. Sleeping in water is no normal, but does not have to be really bad either, It could be to hot. They without question, use water to cool off. We see this daily now that its very very hot out.

I really do not know a good way to tell your what monitors are trying to do, other then, they do not want to lose water from drying out. Or gain water from overly wet substrate. They want to be neutral and obtain water from their food, and if they have to, from some drinking. Just not losing water thru the skin, thats dehydrating. Cheers

Forgive me for inquiring, but I've kept reptiles for many years and this is the first time I've heard all of this. It does make sense, no doubt, however I don't believe that every monitor in a typical screen top set up with the light on top has died from dehydration. I believe there's mulitple factors involved. For instance, if the main problem is the loss of moisture, then either a misting system(going once or twice a day for 1 minute) or moving water with a pump would do more than help with humidity. I also believe a smaller bulb that won't cook the monitors would also help. I'm going to try your suggestion with two bulbs of lesser wattages to provide a larger basking area instead of one beam of extreme heat. I'm also experimenting with bulbs inside the cage and see if it seems to help the monitor's well being. Thanks again, FR.

Matt

I too have kept reptiles from the dawn of time. or so it seems, hahahahahahahaha.

So why is this only happening now. And It is a recent event.

Its my fault. It is, I was the one who introduce high basking temps. Well It did not start with this, but the extreme heat, brought it our attention.

In the old days(pre-me) the normal basking temps or monitors was 90F or less, now its around 135F or higher. As you can imagine the amount of super heated air raising out of the cage has greatly increased.

The problem always exsisted. Only it was not critical then, it became chronic, with the added heat. Back then, many reptiles commonly developed gout, both viseral and skeleltal. Gout occurs with chronic longterm dehydration.

With the normal temperatures of todays basking areas, you do not recieve gout, you recieve raisens(sultanas) With the amount of moisture loss in these cages, dehydration becomes critical quickly, having an immediate effect.

So yes, it was my fault. As Dr. Phil would say, I own this one. I am responsible. But I did offer the cure. Use less venting and lower wattage.

As an old saying goings, only a fool does the same thing, over and over expecting different results. It also takes a fool to do something very different expecting the same results. If you have a huge change like a large increase in max surface temps, you must expect something new to occur, both good and bad. Cheers

Even though I consider myself "experienced", I would still be considered a youngin' by most pros(I'm 23). I started keeping herps back when I was 7 and I didn't get out of them until I was 15. I dappled a bit here and there but didn't get back into them full force until about 6 months ago. I'm using what I learned back then and I'm trying to season myself on the latest info out there. My old Reptiles magazines aren't helping. I'm much more anal than a few fellow herpers of mine when it comes to environment and general care of my herps. I don't focus so much on the little things like temp & humidity, I just follow with a few basic practices and so far so good, then I learn about this dehydration/gout/lower wattage thing. I wonder what happened to make herpers want to increase the heat in their cages? It sounds to me like they were better off at the 90F hot spot way back when. How were captive monitors developing gout then with a lower temp basking spot? Were they still providing too much ventilation?

You do understand life is full, in fact, life is nothing but problems to solve. With that in mind, you want to go back to the conditions of the past, because you cannot figure out or are too lazy to install a lite fixture? I am not saying your any of the above but its something to make you think.

You see everywhere, people having success with the larger temperature range(do not eliminate what lower temps) and you wonder why you should copy that.

In the days of 90 degree temps and down, breeding monitors was unheard of.(extremely rare) To produce babies is only a sign that minimum conditions are met. Not maximum. Huge growth and massive amounts of offspring is a sign of great or maximum support.

With a larger range of temps, basic life events are commonplace(for those that apply it) Basic life events is a full circle, to hatch, to grow, to mature, to recruit(lay eggs and hatch) Thats a circle. There are tons of good stuff you can add to that circle, but if one of those steps are missing, there is no circle. No matter what else you add. You must include those steps.

So in other words, the circle of life is now commonplace to some, and getting near to others. Now a days, there is pattern breeding, morph breeding, cross breeding, etc. In those old days, there was no breeding of anykind. Heck, keeping them alive for over two years was rare. They died from all such things like Respitory disease, and mouth rot, Calcium defic. disease and fatty liver disease, and gout, and all manner of bacterial infections, kidney failure, the list is long. Funny, I can only speak for myself, but I have avoided that.

I mainly lose monitors from such things as getting their heads stuck in a crack or hole or hanging themselves. I am not figured out how to fix monitor stupidity. hahahahahahahahaha the dumb things are toooo curious and cannot seem to keep their heads out of the wrong hole. Oh, i lose females from reproductive complications, I am not smart enough, but I am getting better.

So other then that, theres no reason. Cheers(all in fun)

But those things like mouth rot, Respit disease, fatty liver, Calicum defic disease, and such, are gone.