New digs - one week later

[Zig]

Well..................

...........moved our Leo from her ten(10) gallon tank to a 35 gallon enclosure this past Sunday.
It was an abrupt move. We moved all her belongings (turtle hide, water bowl, lone "tree") over and added a rock that doubles as a moist hide and a place for her to lay on for belly warmth, a piece of driftwood, dry moss over her old turtle hide for aesthetics, a food bowl (with calcium/d3), and repti carpet.

Since this tank is a custom I made years ago for use as an aquarium, I ran into a slight snag with UTHs. It seems all the ones available locally are for use with glass bottom tanks - stating not for use with plastic tanks. She was used to only having an overhead light, so I kept the original fixture and installed a 75 watt, clear glass bulb (designed for reptiles?).

It worked out this way:
Side with moist hide - 91.2º (surface of hide)
"other" side with turtle hide - 71.4º (surface of hide)
food bowl is on warm side
water bowl is center of tank
light cycles on for 9hrs./ off for 15hrs.

It took her all of 2 hrs. to feel safe enough to enter the new hide (old was straight thru - new is one way in/same way out).
'Till last night, we learned:
- she loves to climb, enough so that we'll be adding more driftwood both for her enjoyment and aesthetics of the tank.
- she will take mealies by hand. This was somewhat unnerving for me the first few times (seeing her "gear up" for the strike), but she has been amazingly accurate and gentle. She responds to my voice, and will come to my hand in the tank. Surprisingly, she doesn't respond to either of the boys, or the Mrs. this way.
- she uses the rock hide to bask, but only after the light cycle is off. I haven't quite figured this out yet, as she seems to not be bothered by the direct light anywhere else in the tank.

I do want to thank everyone who takes time to post throughout this site. I believe I have found answers/solutions to most of the questions I have had so far. Hopefully, as my experience level grows (on the pet level), I will be able to pay back what I have used from here.
Thanks!

 

[sushikam]

Well it sounds like you are doing a lot to make your gecko happy ! Great to have you on the site too!

I see that you aren't using a UTH. It's fine to use a light when necessary, but my personal opinion is that you use a UTH as the main heat source. I know you said that this is a plastic tank (or is it more like an acrylic?), but I am using UTH's on two of my acrylic tanks, and with the use of a rheostat or thermostat the temperatures don't get too hot to melt or warp the acrylic, so it works just as good as it would on glass! Maybe you can consider doing this to give your gecko more belly heat.

>>>she uses the rock hide to bask, but only after the light cycle is off. I haven't quite figured this out yet, as she seems to not be bothered by the direct light anywhere else in the tank. (sorry, I forgot how to quote!)

I think this may be because the light may be too bright for her, since geckos typically do not go out during the day in the wild. She is probably getting on the rock to bask in the warmth left from the light being on, and she is using that heat as belly heat. But that's just my though, I could be wrong !

But other than that it sounds like you have a great set up!

 

[Ccrashca069]

For belly heat you can use a heating pad and I think Bean Farm and a few other places sell something simialar to a heat pad. For the lighing try the red nocturnal heat lamp or those Moonlight lights. They provide heat and won't mess up the day/night cycle. You can leave those lights on 24/7.