jglefler
New Member
OK finally home.....
I read you are using linear incondescent lamps... I would still put in a basking spot lamp. use a 50w lamp. I don't know much about linear incondescent lamps..... I remember when I was a kid the church I went to had one on the podium... but that is as much as I know about them lol.
I think you should also step your UVB lamps down to the 5.0.
What kind of temps do you get at night in the house? You don't want to maintain heat really... you want heat swings. Chams need a cool down time at night. Dropping his temp into the mid (even lower) 50's is ok. I was keeping my chams outside for a bit and they were doing just fine with night temps in the 50's.
The gaping you speak of is prolly over heating... or... it can be him trying to equalize his body temp. My Melleri will move into a basking lamp and gape at first... once warm they close the mouth and sit for a bit... then more on. If you have a laser heat gun and can take readings of his body to get a good reading of his skin temp you can determine if you are providing too much or too little heat. If he only gets a body temp of 85 under his lighting... there is an issue. He needs to get a good bit warmer... like 100-110 skin temp. This is only under a basking lamp. He should be able to move away and find himself in a cooler space if he chooses.
Actually, the only difference between the basking incandescent lights I'm using and a spot lamp is my lights screw into a socket in a hood instead of a socket in a spot fixture. The hood forces the heat and light downward much as the spot would. I do, however, also have a clamp-on spot that I remove the clamp and place on the top of the cage or clamp on the side of the cage as needed. I used it today because the boy didn't come up for much of a bask so I took it to him.
The main reason I was using a 10.0 UVB is because it goes through the screen top of the cage then needs to go down another 8" minimum to hit Marty. Would a 5.0 get filtered too much in that situation?
Thanks for the info about the pm temperature. I have reard it needed to be lower but I have held it to 68 degrees at night. I will lower it to 60 degrees if you think that's OK.