Bearded dragons need heat and light to be healthy, happy, stimulate digestion, keep warm and also help them regulate their day and night cycles. They are, after all, desert animals and their enclosure habitat should reflect that.
Provide the right wattage of basking bulb is key to healthy bearded dragons. But not all basking bulbs are made equally with the proper wattage. If you are looking for the best basking bulb for bearded dragons, keep reading this post.
#1 How many watts does a basking bulb should be?
The higher the wattage, the more heat the bulb emit. If you’re wondering how many watts you need to produce the right temperature in your bearded dragon’s, unfortunately, there is no exactly answer bulb but I can tell you some general guidelines.
For basking area, you could use either halogen, fluorescent, or ceramic bulbs. Although there are some factors will affect the tank temperature, general number to aim for is ranging from 75 to 100 watts. Usually, 75-watts work just fine. It is the safe watts if you use the standard Halogen bulb.
Fluorescent heat bulbs work similar to the halogen ones, so you just need to purchase on 75 watts Fluorescent bulb to do the great job. It is also save on energy and sometimes last longer.
Ceramic bulbs will provide heat only and no light, that means it will do the work of heating more effective than other with less wattage. If you want to use Ceramic bulbs, it is better to get 50 watts ceramic bulb is warm enough.
These wattage above are excellent place to get start as they are power enough to hep up most tanks, but they won’t burn your bearded dragon.
#2 Things to consider when it comes to heat bulb wattage
The first thing that will affect the tank temperature and bulb wattage is the tank material. For example. If your tank is made of wood, it will retain heat much better than the glass ones. Due to this, it does not require high wattages heat build.
You’ll also need to consider the size of the tank. My tank is 40 gallon terrarium and I use 75 watts halogen bulb to maintain the tank temperature. However, If you are keeping under 20 gallon tank, I would like recommend you to use just 60 watts heat bulb for your tank is enough to works great.