Reptile & Amphibian Forums

So after spending lots of mony on all the reptile lights I have read that some are using the regular household bulbs( which is alot cheaper) Will someone please let me know what they use and what wattage is equivelent to the reptile bulbs. I use anywhere from a 74 watt to 150 watt right now in reptile bulbs. Also what about the tube style? Thanks for any and all help on this matter. Deb

Here is 4 of my adult beardies:
Kai- German Giant male 20 months
Skyla- German Giant Het for Pastel Female( gravid) 22 months
Banshee- Orange Sandfire female 14 months
Voodoo- Yellow Red Desert male 11 months

You can use a regular house bulb for HEAT ONLY. But you still need a ReptiSun for UVB AND UVA for their health. Wattages depend on the temps in your house.
-Sara

For the basking light, use the same wattage as you did with the more expensive basking bulbs you were buying.
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PHLdyPayne

Thank you for the info. I never realized they are the same. But this is so good to hear. as I have about 15 different cage set ups with two lights each(one for heat one for UVB/UVA) and they keep going out. Now do you mean the flood type lights or regular 100 watt light bulbs? Deb

a picture of the orange sandfire x snow babies( 2 weeks in the pic)

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Kai- German Giant Male
Skyla- German Giant Het for Pastel Female
Voodoo- Yellow Red Desert Male
Banshee- Orange Sandfire Female
Puff- Citrus x Red/Orange Sandfire baby poss male
Snowy- Snow x Leusitic baby( coming soon!) female
10 Sundial Coral x Orange Sandfire Red/Gold babies
10 Orange Sandfire x Snow babies
Velvet- Blond Leopard yearling poss female
Marley- Sulcata Baby poss male
Zaharra- Cherry Head baby poss female
Isis- Red Foot poss female
One Eyed Jack- Cherry Head Male
Sammy- Red Foot Female
Sinny- Red Foot Female
Paris- Red Foot probable male
Eisha- Russian Female
Mischa- Russian Female
Maddox- Russian Male
Zeus- Greek Male
Jade- Eastern Box Male
Sundra- Eastern Box Female
Shakira- Eastern Box Female
Runner- Basilisk Female
Kamile- Veiled Chameleon Male
7.22 Ball Pythons
1.2 Desert Horned Lizards
7.14 Manx Cats- too many to name here
1.2 German Shepherds- Danzig, Onyx and Okai
1.1 Hedgehogs Wicca and Willow
0.1 Rex Rabbit- Callie
0.1 Eastern Gray Squrriel- Paws
1.2 Ferrets- Spaz, Chyna Rose, Jumanji

You can use regular household bulbs with the same wattage you used with the more expensive petstore style basking bulbs. However you still need to use the UVB producing flourescent lights. You can use household flood light bulbs or spot bulbs, or regular house bulbs. The larger flood light bulbs typically spread the heat over a wider area. When I still had my bearded dragon I used 125 watt halogen type flood lights for a 5'x2'x2'
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PHLdyPayne