Another horror story about heat lights.... - Page 5

BoidKeeper · 01-11-05, 05:49 PM

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Ken's method = snakes that have proper temps and thermal gradients,

Don't need heat lamps to accomplish this feat.

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snakes that eat and crap just as well as anyone else's,

Don't need heat lamps to acheive that kinda of success either.

Let's recap. Jeff's method = lots and lots of captive bred offspring consistently year after year.
Ken's method = 3 clutches of eggs from 2 breeding parents, 1 of which produced 2 large clutches of offspring on her first ever breeding without a brumation period.

If I was a newbie looking for husbandry tips I think I know which side of the coin I would chose.
Face it, no large successful breeders use heat lamps. There must be a reason for it. I know when I'm looking for advice I look to the people who are actually producing animals consistently and then I copy what they are doing.
Cheers,
Trevor

Scales Zoo · 01-11-05, 06:36 PM

I use a heat light for the blackheads (which don't require high relavive ambient humidity as compared to many other boas and pythons) as I was told to by other people who have bred them, but will probably test a new radiant heat panel on them.

If I like them, I'm going to get a lot more of them. Still looking for the cheapest deal.

I also love bright sticks. I have not had any accidents with them over my years of using very many.

They are a single use flourecscent type of light. They provide a bit extra ambient cage temperature (depending on amount of ventilation in the cage), a bit of a thermal gradiant, and also act to help warm any cages above the cages they are in.

Add a small heat mat, under the cage for a basking spot - figure out what to keep the room temp at - and you are set!

Ryan

Tim and Julie B · 01-11-05, 06:47 PM

Uromastix are another species that comes to mind were a bulb is just more practical. I think that it like anything else all comes done to the application. Other heat sources can be used but if it can not be practically applied then..........use what works. I think we have proven that some of these other items are safe and a bulb that is used in a well thought out way can be safe as well. Different tools for different applications. Has anyone tried Ultratherm pads yet?

Gary D. · 01-11-05, 07:41 PM

Ryan's got me hooked on bright sticks too. Each is 33 W and are available as standard warm white or "plant and aquarium". As for radient heat panels is any one familiar with Big Apple's "Desert Rays"? They look a lot like flexwatt and are under half the price of most convertional ceramic units.

http://www.bigappleherp.com/Reptile_...ls_118100.html

Jeff_Favelle · 01-11-05, 07:45 PM

I would love to have lights (low watt) in all my Woma cages. In fact, I think I will be the end of next summer. Womas LOVE it hot, so a low wattage light won't hurt them, plus they hate humidity so that's not a problem. But you have to pick your spots to use lights and not be silly about it.

Tim and Julie B · 01-11-05, 07:45 PM

Those look interesting. I wonder what type of temps they can reach. It even says they can be mounted to the top of a cage. Very cool.

BoidKeeper · 01-11-05, 07:46 PM

Ryan I'm up to three heat panels now. One in my female vision chage and the other two in my chondro cages. They are great, over heat with out the bulb and they can safely go inside the cage and the cages can be stacked!
Cheers,
Trevor

marisa · 01-11-05, 07:52 PM

My whole problem with lights isn't the drying issue alone.

It's the fact they take more energy.

They blow out WAY faster than any other heat source.

They get hot enough that they can break if you need to move them before cooling. This is a non-issue with other choices.

You need to build gaurds or install them properly to keep animals off them. Heat tape and pads don't have this issue.

Cat's can't knock heat tape over.

So they are not cost effective, not long lived, and a higher fire hazard than most other things in some cases. On top of the humidity issue.

I have no reason to use bulbs when looking at the pro and con list. None.

Marisa

Scales Zoo · 01-11-05, 08:33 PM

Trevor, thanks for your view on the heat panels. If they really radiate the heat down, and don't cause too much heat going up, and are safe enough to spray water on - I think they are probably worth the high price - but will wait to make my decision when I try 1.

Maybe I can get a company to send me one or 2 to try out, and then work out a deal on a lot of them or something.

I can even see them applying in the argus enclosure at the zoo which is 8'' tall and doesnt need to be. The monitors don't use the trees nearly as much as they originally did (which at the time, suprised me a bit that they used the trees at all). I could build a shelf that was 10'' away from the sand, and install the heat panel below that. If they don't get very7warm above them, the monitor should be able to also use this shelf for belly basking - if it wishes.

No reports of these kinda things burning reptiles, or causing any fires or anything?

Ryan

Shad0w · 01-11-05, 08:43 PM

Hey Ryan,

Dont forget that panels typically last 20+ years

Google Radiant Heat Panel and read all about the technology and the benefits of radiant heat... Its been used in home and commercial applications for a LONG TIME

Check here:
http://www.radiantpanelassociation.o....cfm?pageid=96

paulsreef · 01-12-05, 09:59 PM

I have a 130 gallon reef tank. I grow coral in it that requires intense lighting. I used to run 4-48", 110 watt vho( very high output) bulbs; a total of 440watts. I was losing 1 gallon per day through evaporation. I wanted more lighting so I added 2- 250 watt metal halides; for a grand total of 940 watts. I am now losing 2.5 gallons per day through evaporation. It appears that the evaporation has more then doubled. The room that contains the aquarium is humid unless I control it with a dehumidifier or increase ventilation. You can look at the room as a large herp. enclosure.

Paul.

patenaud · 02-15-05, 03:18 PM

Just built a melamine rack system and I'm using 80 watt heat rope embedded in the melanime. I've covered with heat tape (the metallic kind) for heat dissipation and I've got it attached to a thermostat so the heat rope doesn't run at full power all the time. Works well. The heat rope can be attached (via electrical tape) under the aquarium floor, and also can be rapped around branches in the enclosure. Again, you must use a thermostat with them but so far they've been great for other applications also.

It's about $40.00 for 27 feet of it.

Denis

Jeff Hathaway · 02-21-05, 12:22 PM

Wow, I missed a lot of this thread, but since it has been bumped back up...

All of Marisa's recent points about lights are right on the money. There are lots of great reasons not to use lights in many situations. However, there are also reasons TO use lights, such as when you can't heat from below (thick insulative substrate, thick cage floor, need to heat branches in a tall enclosure, etc.) and you can't have a radiant panel close to where you need the heat (either it is too far away or it would be unsightly in a display enclosure). Lights aren't inherently evil but they are a greater fire/burn risk and should be secured or guarded accordingly. And as a general rule, don't have carpet where your enclosures are, for a variety of reasons, and try to minimize any flammable materials nearby.

Now as for some science:

Lights don't dry out a cage more than any other equivalent heat source, in an equivalent cage. If you could figure out an equivalent to an agricultural 'drying index', it would be a function of the amount of heat, amount of air flow, amount of evaporation, ambient air temperature and relative humidity, and the volume of the cage. The processes that create heat, air flow, etc. would not matter, but realize that different processes may change other parameters (i.e. a fan-forced electric heater will increase air flow as well as add heat).

Heat doesn't rise. Heat radiates in all directions, though at different rates though different media. Heat also is conducted, again at different rates through different materials. What does rise is air, heated by the previous two methods so that it is less dense (heat causes the volume of air to increase while the mass remains the same, remember D = M/V?). This process is called convection. Doesn't anyone remember science class?

If a bulb dries your cage out more than an equivalent wattage of heat tape, RHP, etc. (no, they don't produce exactly the same amount of heat, but it is pretty close for incandescent lights as almost all of the power (wattage) is lost to heat instead of making light) then it simply must be a function of the light increasing the air flow. This isn't surprising since the light is usually mounted on hardware cloth on top of the cage, so that it creates a lot of warm air right at a location which provides a nice vent- the resulting convection currents move a lot of air through the cage, resulting in a lot of moisture loss. Put 100W of heat tape in a coil on top of the same hardware cloth you'll see the same effect.

All heat sources have their applications. Use them safely in the right application and you'll be fine. In most cases, heat pads or heat rope/tape make the most sense.

And yes, virtually all bacteria, algae, etc. multiply faster in warmer water.

Jeff Hathaway
Sciensational Sssnakes!!

boywithscales · 02-24-05, 12:27 AM

ummm ya, this has been an interesting post. So when you were talking about how to supply heat to monitors and lizards that need high temp, it got me thinking. I bought a large fiberglass heat pad,(3ft by 2 ft) From a companie called.......Osborne Industries, sounds spidermanish dont it? Anywhoo when it finally got to my place i plugged it in, just to see how hot this thing would get before using it in my boas cage.(turned out also, it was too big too fit in her cage properly so now its under her cage.) I was reading it with a cheap walmart grade thermometer, this thing had like between 46-50 surface temp,it was really hot, even the air above this thing was nice and toasty. So i had to figure out how to turn down the heat,i went to kent building supplys and bought a lamp dimmer, made sure watts and volts werent all screwy, and now voila, my boas cage now sits above this heat mat. The cage is above the mat by about an inch, being held up by old broken atari games, and some books. The mat is working great, heats her entire enclosure, with basking spot and all,its a big cage too.(6-2-2)

Also, about halfway through reading all these posts about fires, i have already e-mailed helix controls about a heat panel, because i also have a heat lamp on my boas cage too, so i can see in her cage better during the day, the lamp itself doesnt get that hot, but after what you all said, its being turned off in the mornin, funny thing is it has a wooden box around it to keep it from being knocked over. i dont think ive wrote this much since grade 12 english................dam........
anyways thanx for the input
jesse