Slight Urgent Crestie Question and Pics of my new gecko!

[ketz]

Hi everyone,

As some of you may know by now by my endless questions, I recently got a new crestie named Toby!!

Now I've been misting his tank to keep the humidity up but today I noticed some mold on the branches and substrate so I took it all out and washed it and let it sit in the sun. What are ways to keep humidity up and the mold down?

He was in my basement to keep him a bit cooler, which leads to my second question. We don't have air conditioning in my house and in the evening only for maybe 2 hours tops the temperature reaches about 85-88F.

Everything I've read says to keep them under 85 at all costs, but I'm wondering if it really needs to be this strict, usually my house is at about 75, it's only for a couple hours in the evening when it is that hot. My basement is usually a steady 65-68F which also seems a bit on the cool side.

Sorry for so many questions, I just want to give him the best care I can. Thanks in advance for any help!

Also here's some pics I got of him today.

 

[acpart]

I don't know what to tell you about the mold, though I was just reading a dart frog article in Reptiles Magazine and they recommended just wiping away the mold.

I don't think you have to worry about the temps being high for that short a time. I live in New England and it can get pretty hot here without AC in the summer. When I know the temp is going to be really hot all day, my crestie goes into his basement condo for the day, but I've kept him upstairs in his cage a few times when it was just a 1-day heat spell and he's been fine. You can always put a bottle of frozen water in there if you're worried.

Aliza

 

[darkridder]

Mold is natural however how large is your gecko? I dont normally suggest geckos under 10g to be housed on any type of particle substrate, actually I normally tell people to wait till 15-20g mark before housing them on it.

Now there are different types of molds, natural ones which wont do much harm, then harmful ones. If you are dead set on keeping your gecko in a more natural setup then you will have to set it up for that making a false bottom layer for drainage before the dirt layer. Then within the dirt layer you will want things like earthworms, springtails or isopods (cb or been l/t captive for at least 9 months). With these guys in your tank your molds will be under control as they will eat away and it and keep the soil well airated. But I would suggest spot cleaning the tank to remove the mold and scrub and let the branches dry out really well before putting them back in.

And you dont need a humid tank all day long, it is natural and healthy for it to dry out a little. You should really only have to mist 2 times a day unless you live in a seriously dry place like the SW, but you live in Ohio with me, and we are plenty humid enough! WHen you mist in the morning your humidity should hit around 80%, then by mid afternoon it should be dropping to around 50%, which is fine. Then by evening before they wake up give them another good misting so that they jump back up to about 80%. And all of this can be achieved on paper towels also. All of the geckos I keep are all kept on paper towels except my phelsuma she is in a planted living viv set up like I explained earlier.

Yes above 85 is very dangerous, can they handle it for a few hours? Yes normally but it honestly can very per gecko. But 88 is really pushing it, it is better to have these guys cool in the 60's then in the 80's. These guys can be incubated, hatched, and raised at 65 degrees, they just simply grow more slowly at that temp, which isnt a bad thing. I would say instead of stressing your poor gecko out almost nightly, I would keep it in the basement until the temps go down a bit, or consider a small window unit for the room you want to keep it in and just keep that room at 78 degrees at all time (you can put them on a thermostate so that they only turn on when it hits a certain temp so that it isnt running all day and all night).