Green House Tubes
Proper heating/lighting for a green iguana?
The enclosure I will be using (for the first year or so) is a 40 gallon “critter cage”, made by Zilla (36″ long x 18″ wide x 16″ high), so luckily it’s wider than a normal aquarium and it has a lockable mesh-screen top. I live in Florida, so during the day the temperatures in my house during summer can range from 78F to 84F (I know, it’s already pretty warm); at night, the temperature goes no lower than 75F or 76F. I noticed someone said something about UVB tubes being better than bulbs or coils. Is the UVB supposed to be in one spot of the cage or basically covering the whole thing? I just want to know how I can set up the lighting/heating of my habitat specifically, considering most of the questions I’ve read on yahoo came from people with different size tanks and such. I also saw that someone said something about using a house bulb; is that just for heat? I’m looking for as detailed of an answer as possible, I want to make sure I get exactly what I need for now.
House bulbs will produce the same amount of heat as the store brand type of basking bulbs, they store basking bulbs just have the higher price tag.
It’s best to start w/ the long UVB tubes 36-48inch type … the 18inch is fine but the end of the tubes do not produce the UVB.
The coil compact type have been shown to show eye damage to some reptiles ( http://www.uvguide.co.uk ), there are some bulbs that say they are UVB that can actually lose its UV ray after 100-150hrs of usage, the light will still work but just not output UVB.
Natural UVB is best, but you live in a very warm state, so you’d have to watch your iguana and know the signs of overheating if he/she would be outside.
Temps
basking 92-96F if temp is too low digestion is slowed too high food digests too fast and nutrition is lost
medium/middle (overall) 88-92F
cool 75-84F
at night 73-84F
Yes wattages that worked for someone may not work for you, due to were you live and climate … always a factor to play w/.
Sites for you to read:
http://www.greenigsociety.org/ – http://www.iguanaden.org/ – http://www.anapsid.org/iguana/index.html
A great book to read and have on hand:
Iguanas for Dummies by Melissa Kaplan
Yahoo has some great sites for Iguana owners… these groups helped me and still help w/ questions .. if you’d like to join:
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/BabyIguana/ – http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/IguanaDen/
Green House Amsterdam – The Greatest Moments in 2009