Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi
I use spiral bulb the piggie tail type on one part of the enclosure only for light.
The basking and specialty bulb are on other side of enclosure. My dragon will alternate areas.

I recently heard from someone the CFL bulbs can cause blindless . Anyone agree/disagree?

Thank you

Lia

There have been issues with UVB producing compact florescent lights in the past, especially with certain brands. I haven't heard of any issues with regular CFL bulbs used in the cage strictly for lighting purposes (as these bulbs produce much less heat than regular incandescent bulbs, they won't be useful as a heat source)

For more information about the issues with UVB producing CFLs, see the link below:

www.uvguide.co.uk/index.htm *note: upon checking to make sure I have the right URL, it seems they are updating/redoing the section about conjunctivitis issues being caused by UVB CFLs with past bulbs. I included the link to the main page of this site due to the huge amount of useful information available in regards to UVB needs in reptiles.

Basically, from what I remember when reading this article in the past, the intensity of UVB put out by the CFL's was in a dangerous index which can cause damage to the eye among other things. Symptoms of this are constantly keeping eyes closed or avoiding basking completely. If your dragon is basking and moving about normally..I don't think you have anything to worry about. If you are still concerned, simply remove the CFL's from your dragon's tank and return to regular incandescent bulbs for lightning/heat. Or just use straight florescent tubes for light. In my dragon cage I used a double florescent tube fixture, running nearly the full length of the cage. I had one UVB bulb and one full spectrum bulb in the fixture.
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PHLdyPayne

Forum Princess

Thank you very much for the link. I think I am going to switch the CFL to flourescent fixture because don't want to risk it but going to read the link.

Thanks