Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey all. I am leaving town Thursday morning and will return Sunday. I have two smooth softshell hatchlings in a 10 gallon tank. My question is can I leave the light on for the 3 days I will be gone? I have noticed when the light is on all day the temperature goes from like 75 to 80 by nightime when I turn it off. The tank has about 5 or 6 inches of playsand and 4 to 6 inches of water depth. Should I leave the light on or off? Your thoughts? Thanks in advance! Chris

Are you talking about an infrared light or a strip (flourescent) light? If it is a flourescent 5.0 UVB light, there are a bunch of people who buy turtles for their kids, the kids get bored, and therefore they never invest in the UVB light...therefore they live their lives without it. You may notice them eating less without the UVB, but for just a few days, it wont matter that much. Just throw in a bunch of guppies or set the auto feeder if thats what you use and you should be fine. What I actually invested in was from Home Depot...its just a timer that plugs into the wall...all of $5....and i have it automatically turn my light on and off at a set time every day, since some days i may work until 2 am or so...it's just a big help. Hope this helps. -Chris

(do we have an overabundance of Chris' on this board or what? lol)

Hey Chris. It's just the 2 lights(bulbs)that came in my ten gallon tank hood. They are each about 4 inches long. How would a timer work with these?

ok...let me guess...10 gallon setup from walmart, right? First off, those aren't the kind of lights you need. You need a special kind of bulb, a bulb that produces 5% UVB light. These are only available in flourescent tubes I believe, although I could be wrong. The UVB aids in their digestion. Here's the bad part...if the fixture you have is the screw in type of light bulb (incandescant) you probably will need to buy a new light hood...along with the bulb (and the bulb runs around $35). If you go to a local pet store they usually have reptile lighting kits with a 5.0 UVB bulb (if it's marketed for an iguana that's fine too, they both have bulbs that produce 5.0 UVB.) These kits usually run about $45, include the bulb, fixture, and a screen top. And here's another thing about this...If you have a piece of glass under your light, when you put that UVB in there, you have to remove the glass. Glass, plexiglass, lexan, acrylics, they all block UVA and UVB lights. the only clear medium which I know of that doesnt is pure quartz. And i'll tell you with the price of quartz, no manufacturer is making it out of that. But anyway back to the timer, you just plug the timer into the wall then plug the fixture into the timer. Very simple. Hope this helps. -Chris

i don't think you have any problem
the temp shouldn't be much above 80 anyway (except possibly at a basking spot)
better to leave the lights off
or as CRToon said
getan apploacne timer
any drugstore home improvement or walmart/k mart place store has them. Just plug the light into them and plug them into the wall. Then set it to go on and off whenever you want.

Ok thanks guys I got a timer and it works fine! I am going to get a new hood in a couple weeks, they should be fine till then right?

yeah why not? is there anything else you are worried about?

yeah it wont hurt for just a week or two until you get that UVB light. you can also check out www.petsmart.com or www.petsupermarket.com you may find cheaper stuff there.