new to reptiles... just bought a tegu. help please

[sillysallie]

hey guys i just bought a 18 month old tegu and i cant seem to keep his cage warm enough. he is a black and white Argentinean tegu and never moves from under his heating lamp and i am not sure how to keep his/her cage warm enough during night i want to make a perfect environment for him i just am not sure how to... if anyone can tell me how they achieve this and maybe send me pictures of what products you use to maintain the overall temp as well as the basking spot and how they use these products.[/img]

 

[dorton]

How big is the enclosure? Is the top open, screened?
What is the ambient temps in the room in which it stays?

Congrats, and welcome to the board

 

[sillysallie]

How big is the enclosure? Is the top open, screened?
What is the ambient temps in the room in which it stays?

Congrats, and welcome to the board

thank you so much!

the enclosure is a 48 gallon tank with a screen top. I have a 150 watt bulb in the basking side as well as a 9 watt heating pad under that same side. he is currently is our room where i am not sure how cold it gets but it gets pretty cold, as my boyfriend turns a fan on at night and the window is always open. we thought it would be ok to turn the lamp off last night and just about had a heart attack because the temp on his basking side was below sixty. we need to close the window huh?

 

[dorton]

Thats a little on the cold side. The 9 watt pads, is it flexwatt?
How long is the tegu?
As far as the screen top, you can make a lid out of plywood, or lexan, or plexglass, but I would make a covering to not only help hold heat, but also to help hold moisture.
What substrate are you using?

 

[Mvskokee]

put a towel over half of the cage it should keep in more humidity and heat that the screen lets out. or you could use tinfoil

 

[PuffDragon]

You want the lamp to go off every night. Leaving it on 24/7 will be very stressfull to your tegu. You want a basking spot of about 110 F and a gradient temp of 90-75 during the summer months. 60s F will be ok for brumation temps in the winter.

 

[sillysallie]

i am not sure what flexwatt is but i do know that it is a reptile heating pad. my tegu is about a foot and a half. the substrate i am using is repti-bark i was going to get cypress but it was what he was using before and it kept getting in his mouth and was really dry. he seems to like this stuff as he burrows in it and doesnt stick on him or poke him. I am working on getting pictures right now so you guys can see him because we are also concerned with a couple of other things.

 

[PuffDragon]

Is the 150 watt bulb you are using a UVB/UVA bulb? Other wise known as a Mercury vapor bulb?? (IE. Power Sun, Megaray, Trex Active UV)

 

[sillysallie]

here is his cage

IMG]http://i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc156/sillysallie1990/fa48f21a1a75.jpg[/IMG]

the light. i dont think it is a Mercury vapor bulb.

 

[sillysallie]

this is a pic of his tail which we are worried about. He has lost it before. and the tip of it is very dry could it be that its old skin that he tried to shed but didnt have a humid enough enclosure?

another pic of him/her

and from what i have read bout sexing, he is too small to sex correctly? is this true?

 

[Mvskokee]

you need to get some form of uv bulb on him like a repti sun 10.0 and i would recomend buying a temp gun to checkl the basking spots.he needs high humidity make sure you spray down his cage and put somthing over half the screen fornow. i cant tell wha type he is in the picture. but if he is a arg b&w white your gonna hav to buildhim a cage the is 8x4x4 for his adult size. also you might wanna get him a HIDE TOO

 

[Mvskokee]

HE LOOKS LIKE A COLUMBIAN B&W TO ME I CAN TQUITE TELL sorry caps lock

 

[sillysallie]

you need to get some form of uv bulb on him like a repti sun 10.0 and i would recomend buying a temp gun to checkl the basking spots.he needs high humidity make sure you spray down his cage and put somthing over half the screen fornow. i cant tell wha type he is in the picture. but if he is a arg b&w white your gonna hav to buildhim a cage the is 8x4x4 for his adult size. also you might wanna get him a HIDE TOO

the guy we bought him from has a uv light for him and i am going to call him about it on thursday, can he wait that long?

we have a digital theremomitor w/ a probe for him but i am unsure of how to use it. do i leave it in all the time or just to check temps everyonce in a while

i bought a reptile spray bottle for him

yes he IS a arg b&w and we are already drawing up plans for his new enclosure

and we have a half log for him is this what a hide is? or is it close in all the way.

I did lots of research about tegus but i just need help on the reptile basics. no one seems to talk about these.

thank you everybody for all the responses!

 

[sillysallie]

at least the guy said he was a arg b&w hmmm here are some pics in good lighting (from before we got him. i have only had him for two days and he is pretty freaked out so i am trying not to handle him much)

what do you guys think? sorry bout all the questions i just really want to be a good reptile owner. I want to take good care of this adorable lizard.

 

[sillysallie]

sorry there are alot of questions mixed in there.. any answers?

 

[Mvskokee]

well i cant really telli think thats arg
you are gonna need a big enclosure if it is

 

[PuffDragon]

I can tell you right now it is definetly not a Argentine B/W Tegu, Tupinambis merianae. It is 100% Tupinambis teguixin, a Columbian Tegu.

You can find out lots of info on this species here: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.tegutalk.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=17">http://www.tegutalk.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=17</a><!-- m -->

 

[sillysallie]

well i cant really telli think thats arg
you are gonna need a big enclosure if it is

yeah lol we fell in love with him and are very excited about it we know that he can get to be five feet long and we are thinking about how we are gonna build his new cage but the tank is fine for now. i just checked on him an he finally moved. i just put a blanket over half his cage and i am gonna close the window.

 

[sillysallie]

I can tell you right now it is definetly not a Argentine B/W Tegu, Tupinambis merianae. It is 100% Tupinambis teguixin, a Columbian Tegu.

You can find out lots of info on this species here: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.tegutalk.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=17">http://www.tegutalk.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=17</a><!-- m -->

how can you tell?

 

[PuffDragon]

Coloration, scalation and pattern. Take a close up pic of the side of the face for us please. You will see only 1 Loreal scale. Use this page as a reference of what I am talking about.

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