Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well here i am in Michigan...brrrrrrr....it was like 80 degrees out the other day and now its in the 40's and 50's what the heck happened??? anyways on to my question...we are having a difficult time to say the least at keeping the temps in our leo's cage consistant and warm enough especially with the weather changes...And now Monty (our leo) is starting to get darker....I have heard that they do that when the season gets cooler???...is that right??? also just so you know we use an undertank heater on one side with a humid hide, dry hide, and a dry hide on cool side. during daylight hours i feel like i am constantly checking her cage for temps....We have a heat light that sits on the wire mess top of her cage that we turn on for about 30-45 mins every couple of hours to raise the temp...

i guess my question is how do i keep the temps even??
and is the color change normal??

thanks everyone

i have a 20 gal. and a med-sml heat pad stuck to the side of the tank and a heat lamp on top. both on 24 hrs. a day. oh ya i also live in cali. hot side never gets above 95 and cool side will drop to 70 on cold nights (40's- 50's)
one weekand when i went on a 3 day camping trip my heat lamp went out. not sure how cold it actually got but he darkened up quite a bit. a few days of warmth gave him all his bright yellow again.
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there are things known, there are things unknown. inbetween are the doors.
-jim morrison-
1.0.0 leopard geckos
0.0.2 crested geckos
0.1.0 cat

Well, I have two suggestions...

1. Use a dimmer for the heat pad. You can buy them at home depot, you simply plug the heat pad into the dimmer, and the dimmer into the outlet. There is a switch that lets you adjust the heat. This is the cheaper method (dimmers cost about 10$)

2. Use a thermostat on the heat pad (such as this: http://www.reptilesupply.com/product.php?products_id=75). Thermostats are more expensive, but you can just set the temp and forget about it.

If you are in an area where the temps fluxuate a lot, then a thermostat would be better. Dimmers need to be adjusted frequently.
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0.1 Bearded dragon (Hannabil)
0.1 mexican Black kingsnake (Morticia)
2.1 Leopard Gecko's (Pogo,Jeffrey Nothing, Louise)
0.0.1 Tokay Gecko
1.0 Blue Tongue Skink
0.0.1 Reverse Okeetee Corn (Autumn)
1.0 Blood Red Corn (Virus)
0.1 Bullmastiff (Asha)
4.1 Cats (Poe, Tucker, Abhid, Felicity, Emmy)

I am in Indiana, so I know what you mean, getting cold here to. I use the dimmer switches on my tanks, but as Alteredmind said, they may have to be adjusted now & then, whereas with thermostats you can just set the temp & not worry about it. I use UTH's that cover approximately 1/3 of the bottom of the tanks, they are on day & night. During the day each of my tanks are lit with a regular 25 watt bulb, at night all tanks have the blue Moonlight bulbs which do add a little extra heat. My temps have been holding really steady at 89-91 degrees (warm side) and 78-80 (cool side) throughout the day & night. I've not had to adjust any of the dimmers.

WHAT COLOR?? ARE YOU STILL USEING REG. STUFF. MITE TRY HIGHERING ITS P.O.T A LITTLE BIT.
THIS IS MY ADVICE.