Temps & Humidity

UrbanChameleon

New Member
Hey I'm wondering if you guys can help me out. I know it's Mother's Day, but hopefully I can get some responses.

I have a new cage (LLL) set up. It's a 16x16x30 aluminum screen. It is housing my 3 almost 4 month old Panther. This is his first full day in the cage and I'm having two main problems. Let me give you a little background first. Loki became ill after being shipped to my house. He went a week without eating and vomited once. Since then, I have been able to nurse him back to health. I decided to get him a new cage, and only use fake plants/vines. I want to make sure he has a perfectly clean environment, so he doesn't start to backslide. Even though he is healthy now, I want to take every precaution possible. So all in all, things are good. I just need some help with the humidity and temperature.

-The humidity is definitely the biggest problem. I feel like I'm misting his cage every 15 minutes. I have a mister, but his cage is too small to fit the lights and the mister. I'm going to work on that, but for now it's out of service. The fact that I don't have any live plants is also a problem. I'm going to jimmy rig something to catch water from a dripper today. I could also line the back of his cage with this plastic sheeting I have. Honestly, I don't think those two things combined will help all that much. If I don't mist for an hour, his humidity gets around 40% (35% at the lowest), so something has to be done. The best I can do is 60% without drowning the cage floor. And I do have drainage.

-Second, he seems dark. The temp on his basking spot is 85 F give or take a few degrees up or down. The rest of his cage is ambient temp. I have a 25 watt bulb in there now. I have a 40 watt, but I don't want him to get burnt. There's no way to hang the light above his cage. The screen doesn't get hot, but it still worries me. I don't want him to bake himself.

I'm brainstorming and working on ways to fix these issues. I'm going to need some help and ideas from you guys though. No idea, is a bad idea. I know I've listed off probably everything you were going to tell me, but there has to be something else I can do. Please, please, please, help!
 
photo-147.jpg
 
humidity

Covering his cage with plastic on two sides would surely help, as well as live plants. You might consider getting a cool mist humidifier and placing it close to his cage. You must live in a pretty dry place. I don't have to worry about that to much in Rockport tx just my ac going out. It is kind of why I am afraid to keep any montane species. Ultra sonic foggers will also help.
 
Thanks. :)
I kind of figured his cage being right next to Bodhi's (two live plants) would help out. Guess not. Lol. I'll probably cover it and get a small plant. I really didn't want to do that though. We'll see how it goes. Keep the suggestions coming!
 
Ok.. so it seems like the humidity is staying around 55%. When I mist it gets up to 60%, and just declines from there. But the average is 55%. Is this sufficient for a Panther Chameleon? I assumed it should be 60-70%. With my Veiled the humidity is usually too high. Panther.. too low. What's a girl to do?
 
I am also having a humidity issue. I've only had the little guy 4 days but I want to nip this as quickly as I can so he stays happy and healthy.
He is in an 18x18x38 screen cage which has a 1 gal dripper, we ended up putting a litter box in the bottom with a terranium liner, peat moss, and large red wood chips (I had heard substrates are bad but are pretty much needed in this kind of cage - advice from reptile experts - and luckily he stays at the top anyway so I'm not worried about him eatting the wood chips). I also mist his cage 5-6 times a day. Yesterday I covered 2 sides of his cage and that seemed to help through the night but today his humidity is back down to 30%. Seems I can't get it over 40%.
I really don't want to go the live plant route if I don't have to but will look into a humidfier. I may cover a 3rd side if I have to. Are there any other suggestions? Thanks!
 
Back
Top Bottom