How many minutes run mister

hilltowner

hilltowner

New Member
Hi, I just installed the mistking misting system. Right now we have it set up for every 3 hours to run 2 minutes. Is 2 minutes enough or should I do more?

Also, what's the difference between a white, frosted "basking" light and a red infrared light. Are they both good for basking? I have both on the cage, but not sure exactly how to use them. I do leave the infrared on overnight, but turn off the white "basking" along with the uvb and uva.

Thanks!

Marla (again)
 
Do you use a glass or mesh terrarium? The reason I ask is you will have to run the mister less if it is glass, as the humidity will remain the the cage longer because there is less air flow in a glass terrarium. Also the size of your terrarium makes a difference. I was running mine every 4 hours for 60 seconds. I am using a glass terrarium. but now my Chameleon has a Respiratory infection which can be caused by too much humidity and not enough air flow.

What I have been doing is measuring the humidity to about 90 right after the misting, then let my tank dry out before another mist. The humidity will drop to about 50.
 
hilltowner said:
Hi, I just installed the mistking misting system. Right now we have it set up for every 3 hours to run 2 minutes. Is 2 minutes enough or should I do more?

Also, what's the difference between a white, frosted "basking" light and a red infrared light. Are they both good for basking? I have both on the cage, but not sure exactly how to use them. I do leave the infrared on overnight, but turn off the white "basking" along with the uvb and uva.

Thanks!

Marla (again)
Click to expand...


Lower the time "per misting" but increase the frequency of misting as a general rule imo. In other words, better to mist 1min every 2 hours, than to mist 2 min every 4 hours. A good way to check if you are misting right is to check how much water drains out of your plants....if there is a lot of runoff water, you are misting too long (lower your duration). If the soil is not moist, increase your duration. Your soil should have time to air-dry a bit before the next misting kick in...if its still wet when the mister is going on again, then lower your frequency...and if its BONE dry before the mister is going off...then increase it.

About the lights...

A "white" light is a ...white light :)
A "frosted" bulb is a normal bulb (of whatever color) but the glass of the bulb has been frosted rather than clear. I don't know why you said a "frosted basking bulb" (I'm assuming it is a frosted incandescent bulb)
An "infrared light" is a light that emits IR light rather than visible light (its a different part of the light spectrum). You do NOT need this light and you should *NOT* be having it on at night. You should not have any lights on at night.

If your ambient temps at night drop below 50F, then look for a CERAMIC HEAT EMITTER (they put out heat but no light) and use that at night.


Just to be clear, the old style incandescent bulbs give off heat and are combined with a dome to make a "basking spot". Incandescent bulbs can be somewhat referred to as "basking bulbs".

There is a lot of misinformation in the reptile market. You can simply buy ANY incandescent bulb (to give off the heat) and put it in a dome (to focus the heat) and voila! CFL bulbs are designed not to give off heat so they won't work for this purpose. The bulbs sold at pet stores for $7 each are just BASIC INCANDESCENT BULBS you find at home depot for $0.50 with a color coating on them.



Since you seem unaware of lighting, just a few other things so you don't get confused:

COLOR TEMPERATURE (6500K or w/e) refers to the average "color" of the light. Lower number = more red, higher number = more blue. This is a VERY rough generalization. (you want 6500K b/c its usually "full spectrum" ...both reds and blues are included for ideal plant growth)

the chameleon doesn't care really if you use 6500K or 3000K, its more for your plants.

the WATTAGE of the bulb will determine how hot it will get (and how much light it puts out). You want the lowest wattage that gets hot enough for your setup...I would start with a 60W bulb and test your basking temperatures and go from there
 
I use my Mist King for humidity purposes only... My cham drinks from his dripper that drips all day. The humidity here is real low during the winter. I mist every hour and a half for 30 seconds. This wont flood my cage and keeps levels where they should be. Hope that helped... but others have thier own schedule.
 
I actually disagree, I think that the length of mist is more important. Most chameleons won't even begin to drink unless the mister has been going for 2-3 minutes (which is why we get a lot of those threads going "my chameleon runs away from the mist, why?!" because the chameleon doesn't have time to relax and drink if they are skiddish) so I think misting anything under 3 minutes is not enough if you have a cage with proper drainage.

I'm of the school of thought that believes in "rain showers, not mists." So to give you an idea of what I mean, I mist in the following way:
8:00 am - 15 minutes.
12:00pm - 5 minutes.
5:00pm - 20 minutes.

Remember that misting isn't just for drinking and humidity, it plays a vital part in allowing the animal to soak their skin and wash out their eyes. My chameleons will frequently sit under the mist the whole 15-20 minutes once a day and just sit there soaking and rolling their eyes. They love it, and I feel that it's way more natural. Anyone who has ever been to a rainforest may agree with me. It'll frequently rain in bursts of 15-30+ minutes and stop, and then again and stop, and again and stop.... But definitely longer than a few seconds.

You are limited of course by your drainage and whatnot, but I would go no less than 3 minutes, with 5 being probably better.
 
Everyones situation is different.
So everyone has to find the best for their own situation.

I look at my MK for mainly raising humidity.
I agree with Olympia that if it runs for a length of time, that a chameleon will drink from it, clean its eyes ect.
I offer a dripper for drinking water though.
I give little bursts throughout the day to keep up RH(5 1-2 minute mistings), but I give two five minute mistings, and one 10 min one as well.
That is for my jackson, who likes water.

Different chameleons need different RH/water availability, and different regions of the globe have different ambient RH levels to account for.

Just take as much info into account as you can, and keep an eye out for dehydration.
JMO
 
Olimpia said:
I actually disagree, I think that the length of mist is more important. Most chameleons won't even begin to drink unless the mister has been going for 2-3 minutes (which is why we get a lot of those threads going "my chameleon runs away from the mist, why?!" because the chameleon doesn't have time to relax and drink if they are skiddish) so I think misting anything under 3 minutes is not enough if you have a cage with proper drainage.

I'm of the school of thought that believes in "rain showers, not mists." So to give you an idea of what I mean, I mist in the following way:
8:00 am - 15 minutes.
12:00pm - 5 minutes.
5:00pm - 20 minutes.

Remember that misting isn't just for drinking and humidity, it plays a vital part in allowing the animal to soak their skin and wash out their eyes. My chameleons will frequently sit under the mist the whole 15-20 minutes once a day and just sit there soaking and rolling their eyes. They love it, and I feel that it's way more natural. Anyone who has ever been to a rainforest may agree with me. It'll frequently rain in bursts of 15-30+ minutes and stop, and then again and stop, and again and stop.... But definitely longer than a few seconds.

You are limited of course by your drainage and whatnot, but I would go no less than 3 minutes, with 5 being probably better.
Click to expand...

I agree with this. i have found my chams to be much more hydrated when i have longer misting times. However, living in utah my air is very dry. Especially in winter because of the heater i run in my room to keep a constant 65. I personally have 8 mistings to help my humidity problem. 7 AM it runs for 5 minutes.. then a couplle 1 minute showers till 12 they get a 3 minute mist. couple more 1 minute mists untill 5 PM they get another 5 minute.
 
Thanks for the different ideas. The current timer I have only can handle 8 times, so for now i may stick to every 3 hours, but increase 4 of the misting times to 5 minutes or so and see how our cham reacts. Today when we were using the misting hand sprayer, he loved it. He kept walking closer and closer until he was drinking right out of the mister. So, I think he really loves misting, so longer times are probably better.

Thanks!

Marla
 
Olimpia said:
I'm of the school of thought that believes in "rain showers, not mists." So to give you an idea of what I mean, I mist in the following way:
8:00 am - 15 minutes.
12:00pm - 5 minutes.
5:00pm - 20 minutes.

Remember that misting isn't just for drinking and humidity, it plays a vital part in allowing the animal to soak their skin and wash out their eyes. My chameleons will frequently sit under the mist the whole 15-20 minutes once a day and just sit there soaking and rolling their eyes. They love it, and I feel that it's way more natural. Anyone who has ever been to a rainforest may agree with me. It'll frequently rain in bursts of 15-30+ minutes and stop, and then again and stop, and again and stop.... But definitely longer than a few seconds.

You are limited of course by your drainage and whatnot, but I would go no less than 3 minutes, with 5 being probably better.
Click to expand...


Totally agree with the higher lengths of time. my chameleon loves long showers.
 
I(and most) use room temp.
Some use aquarium heaters to heat the water.
Really, it comes out in such a fine mist that its going to be "cool" anyhow.
For hand mistings I use heated water.
 
Olimpia said:
I actually disagree, I think that the length of mist is more important. Most chameleons won't even begin to drink unless the mister has been going for 2-3 minutes (which is why we get a lot of those threads going "my chameleon runs away from the mist, why?!" because the chameleon doesn't have time to relax and drink if they are skiddish) so I think misting anything under 3 minutes is not enough if you have a cage with proper drainage.

I'm of the school of thought that believes in "rain showers, not mists." So to give you an idea of what I mean, I mist in the following way:
8:00 am - 15 minutes.
12:00pm - 5 minutes.
5:00pm - 20 minutes.

Remember that misting isn't just for drinking and humidity, it plays a vital part in allowing the animal to soak their skin and wash out their eyes. My chameleons will frequently sit under the mist the whole 15-20 minutes once a day and just sit there soaking and rolling their eyes. They love it, and I feel that it's way more natural. Anyone who has ever been to a rainforest may agree with me. It'll frequently rain in bursts of 15-30+ minutes and stop, and then again and stop, and again and stop.... But definitely longer than a few seconds.

You are limited of course by your drainage and whatnot, but I would go no less than 3 minutes, with 5 being probably better.
Click to expand...

You bring up an interesting point with the drinking I had not considered. I have personally had no trouble with my chams drinking as they start licking it up almost immediately if they are thirsty and just ignore me if they aren't...other times they just wait for the misting to end and then drink off the leaves. My drainage is apparently much worse than most of yours based on these responses....if my mister runs for more than 2-3 minutes, I'm sitting in a flood!

I primarily use my misting system for my frog/tropical setups and have only recently begun using it for my chams. I do want to clarify that I am not suggesting that you mist any less...but I do feel that a 2-minute misting session every hour is better than a 4 minute one every other hour...I do understand there is some time lost to "startup" but as a whole they would be getting essentially the same amount of "shower" time.

Now I'm going to have to get a second timer and do an experiment ... ^^

EDIT: I just realized your numbers are REALLY high....40 minutes of misting per day * 0.55L/minute (mistking pump) = 22 Liters per day /3.7 = ~6gallons per day! My misting reservoir isn't even that big lol ..

Also, it is important to note HOW MANY NOZZLES ARE YOU MISTING FROM? The flow of water is set by the PUMP.
For example...
4 nozzles (say 1 tank) misting 5 minutes..... 0.55L/min * 5min = 2.75L = 0.75 Gallons of water are dispersed in that 1 cage.
12 nozzles (say 3 tanks) misting 5 minutes.....0.55L/min*5min = 2.75L (SAME AMOUNT since its controlled by the pump) = 0.75 Gallons TOTAL = 0.25 gallons PER cage....
so although both of these people mist "5 minutes" there is actually a 3:1 difference in "how much" they are actually misting

Additionally, the PUMP matters. The basic Mistking pumps 0.55L/min while the advanced model, designed for large systems pumps at 2.8L/min. A huge difference !

I mention this because the time, by itself, can be misleading....where someone has more nozzles hooked into the system, they will need to have it mist longer in order to distribute the same amount of water throughout.
 
Last edited:
I'm really new with chameleons, I don't even have mine yet. I did buy one!! just don't have it yet. One thing that I believe is valuable here is it also depends on the state you live in. For example Colorado is a dry state. If you live there the humidity you create will disipate faster than it will where I live in Missouri. Missouri is so humid in the summertime that people often times run dehumidifiers in their homes to keep mold and other problems at bay. Clearly in Missouri you will need to run your humidifying system far less.

As said before, I am new but this seems logical. I'm sure Someone with a lot of experiance will shoot me down though. lol.
 
Salty said:
I'm really new with chameleons, I don't even have mine yet. I did buy one!! just don't have it yet. One thing that I believe is valuable here is it also depends on the state you live in. For example Colorado is a dry state. If you live there the humidity you create will disipate faster than it will where I live in Missouri. Missouri is so humid in the summertime that people often times run dehumidifiers in their homes to keep mold and other problems at bay. Clearly in Missouri you will need to run your humidifying system far less.

As said before, I am new but this seems logical. I'm sure Someone with a lot of experiance will shoot me down though. lol.
Click to expand...

Solid Snake said:
Everyones situation is different.
So everyone has to find the best for their own situation.

I look at my MK for mainly raising humidity.
I agree with Olympia that if it runs for a length of time, that a chameleon will drink from it, clean its eyes ect.
I offer a dripper for drinking water though.
I give little bursts throughout the day to keep up RH(5 1-2 minute mistings), but I give two five minute mistings, and one 10 min one as well.
That is for my jackson, who likes water.

Different chameleons need different RH/water availability, and different regions of the globe have different ambient RH levels to account for.

Just take as much info into account as you can, and keep an eye out for dehydration.
JMO
Click to expand...

Nope. Valid.
Redundant:p
But valid none the less;)
 
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