Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Being anal, I convinced myself to spring for a uvb meter.
I recieved it a week or so ago. With it I found out 2 points
I feel I should pass along for people who believe herps,
especially desert insectivours need uvb light even though supplemented.
(Johne: you don’t have to read any further) lol

Point 1.
I found out my mercury vapor bulbs although very powerful
do not effect as large an area as I thought. They have to be
right under the middle of the beam. All of my MV bulbs are floods.

So since I have a large cage I felt the need to add two 4ft .5.0’s
in my $8 home depot fixture and they read 16 square microwatts
at 6 inches away on the meter and in the low single digits a foot away.

I thought that was pretty paultry for brand new bulbs which will loose
most of their effectivness early in their life. So I tried the same bulbs in
my garage ceiling quick start ballast fixture and got almost 3 times the
uvb at the same distance.

Point 2
Cheap ballasts or non-quickstart ones are about 1/3 as effective.

I took the $8 flourescent fixture back to HD went to an electrical
supply store and got one for 20 bux made sure it said quick start on the
ballast. Put it in the viv checked it with the meter and got great numbers.
Better numbers 16 inches away than I did 6 inches with the HD fixture.
Disclaimer: I’m not positive quick start is the reason but its the only differnce that I
could see. maybe an electrical guy could (gag!) shed some light on the subject.

Hope you can use this info. For more info on UVB go to
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/UVB_Meter_Owners/?yguid=127423393

Bye,
John Styner

So...give me the name and manufacturer of the 5.0 bulbs you use, so I can find the cheapest ones. I sometimes use the small 8.0 iguana lights (I think)...once they're out of the box, I tend to forget what I'm using.

Are you saying your nice colored lizards and thriving plants have been doing great with 1/3 the quality UVB? I'm interested to see if they get any better!!! Might start frying eggs, with as many as you're producing LOL

John (going home!)

been proven to have the most uvb of any flourescent tube. Zoomed iguana light is exactly the same bulb. I got mine from PetGuys.com

Actually my older male Bluey twitches his toes and muscles in his legs occasionaly. This is a sign of vit. B deficiency even though I supplement at every feeding.He also has not copulated with his mate as she has laid 2 clutched of infertle eggs so far this year. I notice an increase in his performance in that area after boosting the uvb in his viv recently. My plants thrive not from uvb light but from the intensity of light from my 55watt Compact flourescents which are VERY bright.
John Styner

Is there a Bright side , hhahahahhaa ! THE SUN !!!
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Eve

wonder why some of the cheapo fixtures dont "burn" as well as the more expensive ones?
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see yah laterz people
jason
"the road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom for you never know what is enough until you have too much"