Yvonne posted an interesting thread here
http://tortoiseforum.org/Thread-pyramided-VS-normal?pid=184239
With links to some recent work by Andy Highfield on Pyramiding.
A discussion of that paper would be a great thread in its own right, but something in particular that got me thinking was how basking lights could be a large source of the problem from overly drying the shell. I've thought about this as well. Whenever I see Rocky basking I whip out the mister and wet her down, she dries out so quickly under that thing.
The obvious fix is of course to monitor how much time your tort spends basking, and if it seems excessive, up enclosure temps. If they never bask, might be too hot, cool it.
Could there be better means though. Do some heat sources indeed penetrate deeper faster, helping to prevent long bask times? I hope we are all applying belly heat to speed the process. (oh no not that!) but if you set a rock or tile down for the tort to bask on you are doing just that, as the rock accumulates the heat and becomes actually hotter than the air above it.
*which brings another question to light- the basking temperature suggested for a species IS the air temp at Tort Level under the light correct? So what is the true amount of heat being applied at that time. Math would be involved I think.*
Would a HOT HUMID HIDE be a "better" solution. I tried to address this somewhat in Rocky's enclosure by placing the humidifier next to the basking spot, but its still not enough, humidity is still usually normal at bask, which may be ok... maybe not.
A Humid Hide placed at the hot end is usually one of the coolest places in the enclosure from my experience. The constant evaporative loss excedes the thermal gain. It cools itself off faster than it heats up. Maybe that's just my bad luck?
So by Hot Humid Hide, I mean more like a turkish bath to maintain sufficient humidity and heat for safe basking.
any thoughts, ideas?
http://tortoiseforum.org/Thread-pyramided-VS-normal?pid=184239
With links to some recent work by Andy Highfield on Pyramiding.
A discussion of that paper would be a great thread in its own right, but something in particular that got me thinking was how basking lights could be a large source of the problem from overly drying the shell. I've thought about this as well. Whenever I see Rocky basking I whip out the mister and wet her down, she dries out so quickly under that thing.
The obvious fix is of course to monitor how much time your tort spends basking, and if it seems excessive, up enclosure temps. If they never bask, might be too hot, cool it.
Could there be better means though. Do some heat sources indeed penetrate deeper faster, helping to prevent long bask times? I hope we are all applying belly heat to speed the process. (oh no not that!) but if you set a rock or tile down for the tort to bask on you are doing just that, as the rock accumulates the heat and becomes actually hotter than the air above it.
*which brings another question to light- the basking temperature suggested for a species IS the air temp at Tort Level under the light correct? So what is the true amount of heat being applied at that time. Math would be involved I think.*
Would a HOT HUMID HIDE be a "better" solution. I tried to address this somewhat in Rocky's enclosure by placing the humidifier next to the basking spot, but its still not enough, humidity is still usually normal at bask, which may be ok... maybe not.
A Humid Hide placed at the hot end is usually one of the coolest places in the enclosure from my experience. The constant evaporative loss excedes the thermal gain. It cools itself off faster than it heats up. Maybe that's just my bad luck?
So by Hot Humid Hide, I mean more like a turkish bath to maintain sufficient humidity and heat for safe basking.
any thoughts, ideas?