Reptile & Amphibian Forums

so i think my heat is good in my beardie cage.. and then i went out and picked up digi thermometers for all my cages .. and all of a sudden i have a problem... i was using a 65 watt bulb and it was only getting in the low 90's degrees so i went to a 75 watt and it was still in the 90's ... he hasn't had a problem digesting but i want the temps to be correct..so i went to a 100 watt bulb and now it is too hot.. what wattage do you think i should use for a 3x2x2 cage... this is the temp on the basking rocks... p.s these are all regular house hold bulbs.. or is my digi therm off ???

and does anyone use nolvasan (sp) over peroxide or neosporin or bendatine(sp) .. just curious because i heard it is good for cuts and scrapes and mouth rot etc... i found a bottle of it in my fridge (5 clumsy dogs equals oodles and oodles of meds) and was going to keep it if it was effective

sorry for long post

alissa

Yes, I highly recommend Nolvasan. My friend is a vet and they use it all over - to disinfect, clean cuts, and it doesn't hurt reptiles if they accidentially injest it. It's great stuff. Plus it smells pretty good too.

Ok, about your wattage problem. That can be a tricky thing to figure out. First of all, one thing you said raised a red flag. You said you were using regular household bulbs ... where is the beardie getting it's UVB from? That's very important. I would say it's as important as getting the temps right. If the 100 watt was too hot, can you raise it up just a bit or vent the cage a little? You can also buy thermostats for the reptile bulbs.

Also, if you need any help with the UVB thing, I'd be happy to help.

Veronica
Beautiful Dragons

i use esu desert 7% uvb bulbs and then for my basking area i use household bulbs ... i would use the 100 watt but it gets to be like 115 on the basking rocks ... how can a 75 watt only produce 92 degrees and a 100 watt jump to 115... is there any bulb inbetween those to wattages???

alissa

Is probably one of the best cleaning and debriefing product around. Most vets office use this for cleaning and also on the animals, its very effective in removing dead or necrotic tissue.

Studies have also found it to be excellent in removing simple skin/scale fungus that is not into the tissue also, mites HATE the shampoo. It comes in a several forms, the liquid that you dilute and the shampoo are the only I have seen.

Dr Mader recommmends this in all his books and publications and as said early it can be used on their mouth, I have seen it used to rinse out mouth wounds and on mouth rot.

You can also find "director light that are 60, 75 watts that may work, this is what I use in one tank that we could not get the temp right in.

115F is alright as a max value as long as you have areas in the enclosure that are in the 80Fs so the dragon can move around to cool off.

I use a 75W bulb for my 35 gal tank and get the basking temp up to around 100 to 105F regularly.

Try different wattage household "spot bulbs" for the basking area. They give a beam of light that is hotter in it's spot. I am using 65wt. on the bottom shelf and 50wt. on the top (because of the heat rising, the top has to be lower wattage) Then use fluorescent bulbs to light the rest of the cage.

I have never used the nolvasan but I did use an antibacterial ointment. I thought it was the greatest until I used Peroxide. The Peroxide allows it to dry after being cleaned. The ointment kept it moist and took forever to heal over. If nolvasan is a cream then it may be different?

Good luck.
Joel R

When I said, use fluorescents for lighting the rest,, I should have added,,, At least one of the fluorescents should be a UVB.

Sorry all,,,

Joel

i'm going to try those spot lights in a 65 watt... and i'm going to keep that novalsan..sounds great...

thanks alissa