Direct light, vs. ambient light

[zlew]

As everyone knows, it's always great to get the chams out for some natural sun. My question is, on a cloudy day, is the natural ambient light still beneficial even if they aren't really basking in it?

 

[bobcochran]

If the temperature is warm enough it's great, they're still getting the uv through the clouds, just like you still get sunburned on cloudy days.

 

[jajeanpierre]

As everyone knows, it's always great to get the chams out for some natural sun. My question is, on a cloudy day, is the natural ambient light still beneficial even if they aren't really basking in it?

I think it is.

I have a Solarmeter 6.2 and some cloudy days there is very little UVB getting through and other days a lot.

They see a lot more colors than we do, so I wonder if we don't make them a little crazy with artificial lighting because what comes out of a tube isn't quite the same as what comes out of the sun.

 

[Thegreatfonz]

Although it may be not be perfect basking temperature/weather there are still rays of sunlight that radiate through the clouds and make it on to the chameleon. Therefore I would say that the little bit of real UV is better than the artificial we provide.