Yet Another Heating Question

[Ginger Snap]

I did a search on temperature posts but I want exact answers.

We live in FL, we're using a 50 wt red heat bulb. It's currently 79 in our house because something is wrong with the AC. The cool side of the tank is 81 and the side with the red heat light is 90. That doesn't seem like a big enough heat gradient to me after reading endlessly on the net. I'm also concerned because it's night and the temp isn't in the low 70s on the cool side like I've read it's meant to be. I'm using a heat gun to check the temp.

I guess my question is if that is ok for the time being? We also just separated her from the male because when we got them they had been living together and she came to us pregnant. She laid her eggs yesterday and now she has her own 20 gallon tank. She ate very well tonight I think. 4 large crickets and about 10 meal worms. She also did her first poop in the new cage and its a perfect consistency so far.

Oh, I did choose calcium sand for her substrate. I know a lot of people are against this but for one she is 2 years old and I do not feed her crickets in her tank. I move her to a 10 gallon tank with just paper towels on the bottom and a tree branch. I mainly did this because when they were housed together he would get all the crickets before her. It just worked out easier to separate them and clean the tank at the same time. I do feed her meal worms in the tank but they are in a bowl and she just eats them out of that.

I also clean out their poop area every day. I can't stand the smell of their urine. I use a diluted distilled vinegar and water solution for this which I read was ok...so just want to make sure.

Thanks!


EDIT
Here are some pictures of her tank so far. I'm not done because I bought her some succulents to add but I need to buy different pots and some soil for them first. I made her hides out of natural clay...which I'm not sure is a good idea. She only likes the warm hide so far (which is the super flat one). The other one has damp sphagnum moss in it because I thought I saw some skin shedding on her head but I could be crazy.


Not the best pictures either. It's when I first stuck her in there today.

 

[Ginger Snap]

She is out of her hide so I took these just now. Still red from the light but that sleeping position looks odd to me.

 

[indyana]

In the summer, my geckos pretty much only have a gradient down to ~80 F on the cool side during the day. Just the nature of living in a warm climate. I wouldn't want it like that year round, but they seem to deal with it during the summer.

I would suggest having a humid hide in the cage if you do not already have one in there. It will help keep your gecko from getting dehydrated in the hot weather.

 

[Ginger Snap]

I removed the hide I had on the cool side with the moss (which I moistened) and put in this log in the picture. Will that work as a humid hide if I keep it damp or do I need to buy her one?

She didn't seem to like the other hide and I'm thinking it's because I painted it?

 

[Ruvik]

Why is she on sand? You should take out the sand ASAP. leopard geckos don't live on sand and it can cause impaction and kill them

 

[brendan0923]

I usually suggest three hides: 1 cool, 1 humid, 1 warm. Though I'd imagine you would be fine with 2. My female usually only uses 2 anyway!

Nice setup, but I wouldn't reccomend calcium sand as a substrate. Leos may detect the calcium and try to eat it, and the sharp, processed grains can cause issues. I would reccomend tile, but if you really want sand use a fine grain play sand, which you can find at your local home improvement store.

My leos usually handle the summer temps just fine. As long as it isn't that way year-round, your leo should be fine.
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[Ruvik]

I usually suggest three hides: 1 cool, 1 humid, 1 warm. Though I'd imagine you would be fine with 2. My female usually only uses 2 anyway!

Nice setup, but I wouldn't reccomend calcium sand as a substrate. Leos may detect the calcium and try to eat it, and the sharp, processed grains can cause issues. I would reccomend tile, but if you really want sand use a fine grain play sand, which you can find at your local home improvement store.

My leos usually handle the summer temps just fine. As long as it isn't that way year-round, your leo should be fine.
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Eh i wouldn't even do that type of sand. All Sands are a no go. It's not even natural for a leopard gecko to be on sand. If you want something natural looking try eco earth, tiles, repti-carpet, or excavator clay. Even paper towel or news-paper would be fine.

 

[brendan0923]

Yeah as Ruvik said sand in general isn't reccomended. As I recall, leos typically live on a rocky, hard-packed substrate in the wild, so yeah something like tile, excavator clay or newspaper/paper towel is fine. Basically nothing loose that can cause impaction.

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[indyana]

If she seems to like the log, it should work as a humid hide so long as you're good about keeping the moss moistened. You'll have to ge diligent with all the open air and heat though. With mine, I usually use things that are more enclosed (like tupperware containers or store-bought humid hides) because they don't dry out as fast.

 

[Ginger Snap]

I have read about the impaction and sand and had her on paper towels, which the male is still on in his cage. After reading Ron Tremper's book I thought the fine sand was OK if they were full grown. And the fact that I don't feed her crickets in her cage. I also liked the idea of the sand because it seemed more natural than the paper towels our male is on. I will look for other substrates though.

 

[Ruvik]

I have read about the impaction and sand and had her on paper towels, which the male is still on in his cage. After reading Ron Tremper's book I thought the fine sand was OK if they were full grown. And the fact that I don't feed her crickets in her cage. I also liked the idea of the sand because it seemed more natural than the paper towels our male is on. I will look for other substrates though.

It's not natural at all for them. Their natural area has a lot of dirt, rocks, and foliage. Not all "desert" areas are sand. For example. They call Antarctica a desert area. Desert just means any area in which few forms of life can exist because of lack of water, permanent frost, or absence of soil. better choices in substrate would be, eco earth, tile, paper towel, excavator clay, repti-carpet or news paper. As of the moment I used Eco earth that has a lot of rocks, cork bark flats, and drift wood laid out on the flooring of the tank. they have many hides and other things to climb on. I will be looking into getting some excavator clay to use instead seeing as it hardens up really well.

 

[Ginger Snap]

Yeah, the excavator clay was my first choice until I looked up about cleaning the cage. They show videos of adding water to it once it's hard and it becomes soft again so you can remove it...but actual users say it's not quite that simple. And I really don't like the smell of the gecko's urine so I constantly clean out their poop area. The paper towels only intensify that smell in my opinion. Since using the sand in hers and cleaning her corner out every day, I've not had an issue with the smell.

I wrote Ron Tremper and asked him. He said...

Sometimes the sand works. And it works when the gecko is an adult, has a jar lid of supplement and does not have crickets in the cage.
RT

I'm not saying I will stick with the sand since I bought fine calcium sand and it's dyed but I think it's important to point out that using the correct sand and under the correct conditions isn't the worst thing in the world.

The Eco Earth looks like a great alternative!

 

[Ruvik]

Eco earth is. the best thing about eco earth is that it sucks up the smell of their poop almost like cat littler and leaves your cage with no smell. I clean my cage out once a week depending on how much they poop. If they poop a little more then I'll clean twice a week. A good thing about eco earth is that if you leave it in water over time it breaks down. So just think of what it would do if in stomach acid. The Ecoearth rarely causes impaction and I have yet to hear anything bad about it. A lot of people use eco-earth in their humid hides as well.