Nighttime temp drop?

[Ivyna J. Spyder]

Should I bother with any significant night tight temp drop for a baby RF? I mean, aside from the slight drop that occurs normally in a house at night, should I actually turn off some of the heating elements in the enclosure? (Currently I'm using an undertank heating pad and two heat emitters to get it around 85-90 ish. I think without the heat emitters it might be more like 75-80)

Or with a baby is it safer to keep it more consistent?

 

[Yvonne G]

I don't keep redfoot tortoises, but I wanted to bump this question so you would get an answer from someone who does. It sounds ok to me, though.

 

[Madkins007]

There is no real strong evidence either way. I leave my undersoil on (with a thermostat) and a small CHE on the cooler nights (we keep our house pretty cool) but turn off the big heaters at night just to save some energy.

 

[-ryan-]

Yeah, I take about the same approach with my guy. For heat he has two 45 watt halogen flood bulbs, and those get turned off at night to darken the enclosure, and the enclosure naturally becomes cooler. The ambient temp at night for the enclosure is usually somewhere around 65f, though it can get lower in the winter. His hid box is heated with a large heating pad wrapped around one side, and that stays in the 70's most of the night, so that is where he usually sleeps. Sometimes he will choose to sleep out where it's cooler though.

I want to get the ambient temps up a bit but that is a struggle in a cool basement. I will hopefully be moving to my own house in a few months anyway, so I think I will wait until then to make any heating changes, but I have been thinking either a radiant heat panel or a pig blanket.