heating light

Question
Hello. You have given me helpful information in the past about my fat tailed gecko who by the way is doing just fine and his tail is growing back. I wanted to know since the weather is changing, how long should we keep the heating lamp on? Can we go less in the summer? Thank you.

Answer
Genevie,

Well this all depends on the temperature you have your house at. He needs to maintain an internal body temperature of at least 85 degrees during the day and overnight, it can dip lower into the 70s. You really want to mimic the activity of the sun. During the summer, days are longer and hotter, so you want to create that kind of environment in captivity. I do not know if you have central air and keep your house at a specific temperature at all times or if you keep your windows open, etc. I do not even know where you live...for example, in most parts of the U.S., it is nothing like the normal environment of a gecko in the wild. Geckos usually live in dry, desert areas. Basically, you want to get your captive environment as similar as possible to their natural environment and the only difference between summer and winter is that the days are longer and the temperatures get higher. This may mean you need to leave the lamp on longer unless you can keep your temperatures up some other way. Is this making sense?

Sara

PS. Glad to hear he is doing well :)