basking temp trouble shooting

Marc10edora

Avid Member
I have been having problems recently trying to get the right basking temps in my chams new cage. He is a 6 month old veiled. The cage is 4' tall X 3' deep x 4' wide. The basking light is mounted about 15" above the basking branch. The weather here has been driving me crazy. One week it is like summer, then the next couple of days it starts to rain. I've been changing light bulbs almost every other day in order to adjust the cage temps. I can acheive a basking temp of 90*F easily on a hot day. But on the days when it starts to rain, the basking temps easily drops to 75-80*F. I use a 60 watt house bulb on the hot days and a sun-glo 75 watt sun beam bulb on the cold days.
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What can I do to keep a consistant basking temp during the cold days?
 
anyone have any suggestions on what kind of basking bulbs to use? How about anyone in canada? I know it gets cold up there. I was thinking about getting mercury vapor bulb. But I want to make sure it isn't hot enough to melt the scree. If I do get one, how many inches should I mount it away from the screen?
 
Howdy Marc,

One way to adjust the basking spot temperature is by changing the distance between the lamp and the critter. You may find that a 75W flood will work fine by moving it up and down over the basking spot. Another way that I've used in the past but no longer recommend is using a dimmer. The problem with dimmers is that they control temperature by making the lamp brighter or darker. I switched back to positioning in order to maintain a high brightness level that is better for my critters.
 
Adult chameleons can usually handle a hotter day or two as long as they are well hydrated and can move out of the heat to a cooler part of the cage. They can also handle a cooler day or two. In the wild there have to be variations in the temperature too!
 
Adult chameleons can usually handle a hotter day or two as long as they are well hydrated and can move out of the heat to a cooler part of the cage. They can also handle a cooler day or two. In the wild there have to be variations in the temperature too!

true. It just frustrates me that I can't get perfect control over my chams enviorment. I would feel more comfortable if I knew that I was the one controlling what the temps would be on certain days.
 
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