Sidney is enjoying his new house. I finally got his new tank. Traded in his 40 gallon breeder tank and got a lizard lounge (by oceanic systems: www.oceanicsystems.com). Actually, I had to trade some other stuff too, since my 40 gallon tank had a small crack in the bottom from when I used to use a heating pad. So I had to trade that, a 10 gallon tank I had lying around, my heat pad, and my entire lighting setup which consisted of 2 reflector domes, 1 lamp stand, and a slightly melted 18" flourescent fixture. I left with the 70 gallon lizard lounge (same floor space as the 40 gallon, but a lot taller), and the lizard lounge lighting system.
The tank itself was something like $250 (I could have gotten it cheaper, but the other places don't take trade ins). The Flourescent light fixture (which goes all the way across the tank) was $60 and was worth it because it is really nice, and the incandescent fixture which is realistically worth probably about $10-15, but cost $30, but I don't trust putting reflector domes near the glass top, so this was the clear choice. It's a really nice setup. My only complaint is that the glass door on the canopy is the same size as a would be on a fish tank canopy. But, I also found that if I ever needed more space in the opening, I can just move the fluorescent back to the back third to open it, and lift up the front and middle sections.
They have changes a bunch of things on the lizard lounges now compared to what they were like a few years ago. If you go into the better of the local petshops, all of the tanks (except the big water dragon enclosure) are the old model lizard lounges. there were a couple of problems with these. For one thing, the canopy was completely glass, so there was no good place to put the UV lamp, where as now the middle section is screen. Also, they didn't have the little incandescent like I have (which has the light bulb inside the tank, it goes in one of the vent holes), so the pet shop has reflector lamps on top of all of them, and the tops are all cracked.
Basically, these are very nice if you only need one or two tanks, or you want a show tank (and don't know how to build a really nice one like starmom's). They wouldn't work that great for breeding, since the biggest size they come in is 48"x18" floor space. It would work, but for that you're better to make a 4'x2' wooden cage with a glass front. So it's basically great for what I wanted, since I wanted something taller, that looked nicer, and held heat better (since it has closable side vents instead of a screen top), and I don't think I'll be getting any more reptiles or breeding any in the near future. I would like to get a trio of leapard geckos, which would work out nicely in the lizard lounge 24"x18"x18" enclosure, though they would also work out nicely in a standard 30 gallon tank, which is more in my budget since I am now in debt.
Well, I've rambled on long enough, I just am psyched I finally got him a permanent tank instead of the 40 gallon, which I didn't like for another reason, it was too short for me (I'm 6' something) so I had to bend down to look in. I hope he eats tomorrow though, because all of the change and stuff today put him off feed.
later
