New to leopard geckos need help

fuzzhc · 06-13-14, 05:27 PM

Hello all! I got my girlfriend a leopard gecko for her birthday and all has been fine so far (I think). I just have a couple of questions: the enclosure she came with is a small exo terra tall glass enclosure, if this was to be turned on its side to give more length would it still have enough air flow with the screen being at the side and vents at the front?

Also she is looking quite a bit darker but the temperature on the hot side is reading 102f with a temp gun. Could it be down to stress of a new home?

Last but not least she has only eaten one locust in the past week. Should I be worried as of yet?

Thanks,

Andy

Cmwells90 · 06-13-14, 06:01 PM

Honestly I have no idea, but I know that someone who does will ask these questions:

Can you provide pics?
How is the humidity and ambient temp?
How are you messuring these?
How long have you had it?
How old is it/how large?

fuzzhc · 06-14-14, 04:05 AM

I can get pics later if I go over to her house and can take my hygrometer to check humidity, ambient should probably be in the 70s as I was getting those readings off the sides of the cage with a temp gun but I can check with a probe later. She has only had it a week now and is about 4" snout to vent.

smy_749 · 07-20-14, 01:32 PM

102 is too hot.

franks · 07-20-14, 01:40 PM

Humidity in the 70 ' s is too high. Your temps are off as well. My hot side is around 91* and my cool side at 78*. Humidity hovers around 50.

drumcrush · 07-20-14, 03:07 PM

Temps should be in the high 80s - low 90s. Humidity should be anywhere between 30-60. 60 is probably even too high. I would try feeding mealworms and crickets, and every once in a while, a few waxworms.

rattus knits · 07-20-14, 03:17 PM

we were breeding those guys for a bit, we used paper towels on the floor to prevent ingestion of substrate, and then a heating mat under 1/3 of the tank max, we didn't bother with heat lights since the breeders and vets we talked to said they can use either and so a heating pad worked great for us. just make sure you put a few extra paper towels over where the pad is if you have one without a thermostat. We enevr watched humidity since we had the pad but i'd say as long as you have a wet hide (we used a tupperware contained with a hole cut in the top and dampened paper towels inside) that it can lay in then they will deal with any and all humidity needs for shedding themselves (for a healthy gecko) also make sure you have at least one hide, but two is good (one for the hot area and one for the cold) and a water dish. As for food crickets (the width of the head should be about the length of the cricket) and mealworms (same sizing as crickets) and i think it was like 5 mealworms or crickets 1 tiem a day, though we usually gave a couple crickets and kept a little bowl of mealworms since we were breeding and worried about our females not having enough fat for egg production. and then we did waxworms once a week, but again this could probably be less for a non-breeding gecko

polito · 07-20-14, 03:48 PM

Definitely think 102F is way to hot. When i had my collection of Leopards I had their Herpstat set to 91F which gave me an actual temp in the bin of 89F cool side fluxing from 74-76F. Humidity in bin was a usual 45%.

I would work on getting your temps correct and lowering them asap. Then if your water dish is above your heat source (ontop of an UTH for example) I would move it over to the cool side. This could very well help with your high humidity issue.

What are you using to heat the enclosure? I would recommend heat tape or a UTH. Hooked up to a proper thermostat.

Teal · 07-25-14, 11:12 PM

As others have said, your temperatures definitely need to be lowered.

How are you trying to feed her? Are you just tossing in live prey and leaving it in her enclosure, using tongs, using a dish they can't escape out of, etc.? What was she eating with her previous owner? Are you dusting with calcium?