Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have a full grown beardie who is currently in a 36W x 16H x 18D tank.

A few months ago one of my snakes passed away, and now I have a 48L x 21H x13D tank that I was thinking of moving my beardie into. It's a larger tank, except for the depth, but I would think there will be a lot more space for him to move around lengthwise.

Is it worth the move, or is the sacrifice in depth going to be a problem for him?

The cage would be worth it. I have a feeling that the smaller cage is stressing out your beardie. If you do decide to move him, be sure to thorougly clean out the snake's old cage.

ALso, due to the lower height, make sure none of your lights get too close to where the dragon basks. Last thing you want to happen is your dragon deciding to jump at the light and burn itself. Check the temps too to make sure the basking area isnt' too hot. Other than these two cautions, the larger cage should be fine

Well if you look at square inches on the floor space, I figured out that the new cage would actually be a 24 inches smaller. Thing is, his current cage is not very long, but a little wider, and the new cage is really long, but not very wide at all. He would have more room to go back and forth, but less to turn around. He doesn't really have much room in his current cage anyways, so I'm hoping the length would give him more space to run. There is a lot more tall space in this cage, and I'd give him rocks and branches to climb on, but I know hight isn't really as important as floor space. I'm just kinda torn. Eventually when I have the money I'll get him a tank bigger than both of these, but for now I want to make the best with what I've got.

Sure, there is much more space in that larger tank. You could even run a fluorescent for uvb since it is really low, and the dragon would benifit the uvb rays from the light on the ground without making a high basking spot. As long as you disinfect the hell out of it, I think the larger floor space would be great. Do you know what killed the snake?
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OOpps I see how you measured now. It's 21 inches high, and 13 wide. The fluorescent will not reach the ground then, but the tank is still larger, and will give you room to make a basking spot higher off the ground.
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Yeah, it is taller, just not as deep. I'm just hoping that the longer space will give him more room to run back and forth, even if the turn space isn't as much.

We never did know what killed my kingsnake. Poor thing.
But yeah, I would clean that tank like there was no tomorrow. I do know that much. Do you have any suggestions as to what disinfectant would work best?

I use bleach here for cleaning, but if you use bleach just rinse it really really good, and let it air out a while, and rinse again before putting the dragon in to make sure there is no residue left. I'm really careful with putting them in the tank after a bleach cleaning so I can't stress the rinsing enough. I take the tanks outside and rinse and clean it with the hose. There is a safer disinfectant that vets use, and it is called Navolsan this will kill anything like parasites, and bacteria that might be left behind by the snake. You could call up the vets office to see if they'll sell you some, but there is a place online as well where you could order it, but I don't know where. If you start a new thread with this as the subject I'm positive someone here would know where to buy it as I've seen this topic before, or you could just search past topics in the search on disinfecting.
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I really don't have the means to do a bleach cleaning. I live in a townhouse and only have a very small yard, and if I were to dump the bleach/water solution out there it would probably kill the only grass I have, and flood out into the lot out back. I called my vet and the don't sell the Navolsan. The pet stores sell this stuff from ZooMed called Wipe Out 1. It's supposed to clean, disinfect, and deodorize. Would that not do the trick?

Hi. Since I am getting back into this beardie thing after a long hiatus, I remember that I used a 5% bleach solution (1 part bleach to 20 parts water) to soak my tank in when I disinfected it. Now I have no idea what the new fangled solution might be but the bleach solution never did anything to harm the animals I had (you can read my post 'Starting Over'). If its like a reptaruim cage you just soak it in bathtub, warm water of course.

unless your beardie is no more than 16" long, it will be too hard for him/her to turn around. from what I've heard, the male beardie's genetalia (don't know what to call it) is in the base of it's tale, so whenever they are forced to turn in an area that forces them to bend their tail, it sort of constricts the lizard's genitals. I haven't done enough research on this, so I would like to see how much of a difference this would make between male and females.

Also, since the other tank isn't as deep, it will make the beardie feel like the equivalent of a person living in a hall way. Ideally, we would all have 4'x2'x2' cages which give the benefit of length, and allowing the lizard to turn without the ends of it's body touching the glass. I have a tank that is 36" long 18" deep and 25" tall (I upgraded from the same size as you) which works out well because my beardie isn't even 18" long (yet). This also gives you extra height to build a better basking site. Had I had the space available, I would have gotten something 4' long, but at the current time I couldn't fit it nor do I require it.

later

A lightbulb just went off in my head. It's going to take a lot more work, but I think it will turn out fine for all animals invovled.

I've already cleaned out the old tank. I have another kingsnake who is currently living in a 48H x 16W x 18H tank. She's grown about as big as she'll get, and I don't think she'll mind going into the old tank(it's still plenty big for her), and giving my beardie her larger tank. Of course now I have to move her and clean & disinfect her tank as well, but I think it will be worth it.