heat at night for young bts?

[StaceyLeigh]

Ok Thor is finally here. He seems to like his new home, he is buried under the aspen right now, hopefully he will come out a little later. He is so cute, we want to see him! I was planning to feed him in a couple hours just to see if he's hungry. My big question is about heat at night. We are having a little cold spell, only about 50 at night. I have a very accurate Temp LCD Data logger which I can leave in the tank and track the temps, then hook up to the computer to see the temps over a 24 hr period (cool little gadget DH brought home) So last night the temp got down to 66 in the tank. Is this too cold? Thor is only 5 weeks old so he is still young.

[zakkhogan]

shouldnt be a problem as long as you have a thermostate attached it wont drop below 50/60 anyways


If the temp outside is 50' the inside temp wont be that cold anyways

[Alioop]

66 is a bit too cold for your little one. I'd say 75 as a bare minimum, but Ray Gurgui has always told me to keep my eastern babies no lower than 80 (its cooler than that on the cool end, but they always have a spot of at least 80). Consistently cool temps (even if its only at night) puts your baby at risk for a Resp Infection, a lesson I learned the hard way.

My favorite thing right now is Flexwatt heat tape. I installed it on the easterns' tubs and use it now instead of basking lights. It needs to be installed with at least a dimmer, but you can hook it up to a thermostat so it self-regulates. Mine is on a dimmer now so it stays about 98f on the hottest spot, and I just leave it on 24 hrs. When I am able to purchase a thermostat I'm planning put the basking lights back and set them to come on for a few hours a day as well.

[StaceyLeigh]

I am planning to use a black light for heat at night, and I have it on a dimmer so I can keep the temp at little lower than basking during the day. Once we get in to summer I don't think temps will be a problem. The tank is upstairs in my son's room, and it gets plenty warm up there in the summer (no AC), even at night it stays 75-85 most nights.

[StaceyLeigh]

Alioop, I will look into the Flexwatt heat tape for winter, I think we will need something extra then. Thanks.

[Fatal_S]

I can't say I'd provide heat unless it was getting really low (under 50). At least not for scincoides-types. For gigas I'd prefer it above 65. Either way, to me 66 isn't low enough to be worth worrying about. That's just MO though.

I'll also add I prefer heat cable over flexwatt, simply because flexwatt without a thermostat can overheat and burn/melt things. Heat cable gets warm, but it's not strong enough to be dangerous. Again, MO.

[Mystique_2011]

Can anyone help? I was reading a few post\forums on this really wonderful website for Bts. Its and stumbled across an issue that I am having-heating, mainly at night. Lately for some odd reason the night temperature in my skink's tank is gets high as 80-85 degrees :/ I use to have it at 70 but for some really odd reason that is not happening anymore. I may be wrong but do you think that the night temperature of 80-85 degrees is too hot? Thanks. I appreciate your time and help. Also, the skinks tank is placed in the basement where its normally cool but on hot days it gets a little hot in my basement. Oh, my basement is setup nice-tv, couches lol its not a dark and scary place but a happy environment lol. Oh, one more thing. I shut off the heat lamp right before I go to sleep and in the morning it gets turned back on-so the heat lamp gets tirned of for 8 hours. Sorry for bugging you so much. Thanks for the help.

[Katrina]

Don't worry Mystique, this is what the forum is for! I'd switch the heat lamp off for a bit longer - closer to 12 hours on 12 hours off, but 80 at night should be fine.

Welcome!

[raredesign]

personally, I use a gradient 24/7.

Environment.
on one side I have large heat pad and aspen substrate for burrowing, covered by a large cave rock that has a direct heat lamp pointing on it. (250Watts)
on the other side is a custom cut rock slab with a UV full spectrum bulb, his water, food, and tree that he likes to climb (yes, my BTS actually climbs a tree).
In the middle is the IR heat lamp that is on only when needed and at night.

Day: UV and heat lamp (IR as needed)
Gradiant: 90 - 77

Night: IR heat lamp
Gradiant: 77/80 - 68

He moves around depending. Sometimes under the lamp directly, and others just lies on the cool stone.

I let him choose, and I think that is very important.