Lizard without heat

[greggyf]

My house is not connected to the power grid. i rely on solar and water power. I gave away all my snakes and stuff before i moved here because 200 or so watts of power on 2/3 of the day is not an option (i have a back-up generator but it's noisy etc).

My question is- is there any lizard that i might be able to keep without any (or much) extra heat? The temp inside the house, in winter, doesn't drop below about 15 and would be 20 or so most of the time (thanks to the fire). Summer would see similar lows and up to 30-35 at the peak.

i had my eye on a blue tongue, but the advice is that they need similar heat to the spotted python i had. Are there any nice lizards that i can keep?

 

[GeckoJosh]

Are you able to set up a pit/aviary?

 

[Red-Ink]

thick tailed geckoes......
or
check whats endemic to your area and see if their available in captivity.

 

[greggyf]

yep, Goldmember. 100 acres.

we don't have a lot of reptiles available in captivity here (on the edge of Kosciusko national park in the snowy mountains). Most of it falls into three categories- 1) super dangerous 2) protected and pretty special 3) plain stuff.

 

[ianinoz]

Eastern Water Skink comes to mind, Lizzy just happens to be spoilt , we have reverse cycle aircon and she makes use of the warm air, and she also loves the modem transformer (35 oC), the laptop's transformer/adapter is probably too hot for her (56 oC).

She did disappear for a few months to go into brumation over the colder months.

 

[GeckoJosh]

I was thinking that you could build a pit for some Alpine Blue tongues and maybe some Mountain Dragons (im sure they would share the space without any issues)
If your into geckos then most species can be heated with a 15 watt heat cord.
You could also look into Thick-tails and Leaf tails that would require no heating at all as long as you keep them in a heated part of your house during winter

Good luck

Josh

 

[BigWillieStyles]

Get a blue tongue. I have kept one without heat in my house before. They are fine with normal room temperature. Just provide some nice hides for them to retreat to if it cools down to much.

If you can have an outside pit/avairy, then there are a few more options. You could consider a cool climate python like a Diamond in an outdoor enclosure.

 

[GeckoJosh]

Would a diamond tolerate Snowy mountain temps?

 

[BigWillieStyles]

Would a diamond tolerate Snowy mountain temps?

I missed that, but I reckon it could. Not if you placed it in a tin cage, but if you provided lots of hides and cover. Temperatures at microhabitat are a lot warmer than atmosphere level. I live not far from Mt Hotham/Falls Creek, and we get Murray Darlings around here. They just remain dormant in hollow logs until the temps are warm enough to move around.

 

[ianinoz]

If you are good with tools make your own solar heated warm water system to provide your reptiles with a warm basking pad (think a mini version of a solar pool water heating system - all you need then is small 12V bilge pump to recirculate the water Think solar heated hot water bottle to visualise it. (need plastic tubes (flexible , a sheet of glass, a sealed water tight water tank made as shallow open box, painted BLACK, and the boat bilge pump to circulate the water as closed loop and a solar panel to power in daylight and a battery that will be recharged daily by the solar panels.

If you have space in the yard or the garage , you could convert part of it to a warm - glass house type arrangement for those reptiles who need to be warm most of the time, a big mass of concrete in each enclosure will be good for storing heat during the day, and will stay quiet warm all night (go onto a big breakwater winter on a sunny day and the big boulders and concrete blocks warm up and can get quite hot to touch, and at night they are very warm to touch unless they get wet by the waves.).

You can also make low VDC low IDC resistor based heating strips pretty easily that can be powered during the day by a small solar panel and at night by a truck battery. (You can buy these resistance strips ready made (they are called dew zappers - telescope owners use them warm the mirrors and lenses in their telescope to keep them from fogging up), I think they run on 12V DC and less than 1.5A and they operate at about 25 - 35 oC (some can be thermostatically controlled - costs more).

Astrozap Flexi-Heat Dew Shields could easy turn one of these into a warm refuge for your reptile/s.
https://www.bintelshop.com.au/Product.aspx?ID=8060 you could wrap one of these around your reptile's hide and give it a warm refuge, insulate it and the reptile will be even better off and less power will be lost by irradiation and conduction to the surroundings.



UV A-B , give the reptiles access to direct sun.

No generator needed.

 

[greggyf]

Outside life / solar power is not really an option to keep reptiles alive down here. i'm at about 1200 metres and, in winter, it can go for 10+ days without any sun. the coldest it was this year was about -10, but it got down to -17 at one stage last winter. 200ish frosts per year.

i like the sound of the alpine blue tongues.

 

[souldoubt]

just an idea, but you could always get one of those reptapets 5w heat mats. they come with a thermostat and cant go too much over 40ish so will be able to provide a warm spot for digestion at the very least - so long as it isnt a python that happens to be twice the size of the mat.

Mountain dragons would be so awesome to keep - are they easy to get a hold of?

 

[GeckoJosh]

Outside life / solar power is not really an option to keep reptiles alive down here. i'm at about 1200 metres and, in winter, it can go for 10+ days without any sun. the coldest it was this year was about -10, but it got down to -17 at one stage last winter. 200ish frosts per year.

i like the sound of the alpine blue tongues.

Hmm Im no expert but that sounds cold even for Alpine Blue Tongues, maybe have a look at their natural distribution range to see if they go ok in similar climates

 

[crocdoc]

I know of people who have kept and bred angle headed dragons (Hypsilurus spinipes) at room temperature in Sydney. They don't bask, so don't require the high basking temperatures which most other lizards require but do like it fairly humid. As I've never kept them, please don't take my word as gospel on this and you may want to do some research into their temperature preferences first.

 

[Mr.James]

Greg, I live near the alpine area aswell. You can keep Alpine Blotched Bluetongues, Eastern/Common Bluetongues, Cunningham Skinks, Rosenbergs Monitors & possibly Eastern bearded dragons if you set up a good north facing outdoor setup.

Or a few vens if your into that kinda thing and have the appropriate licence.