First, lets talk heat! Your iguana's cage needs to be at least 80 to 90 degrees during the day, and no lower than 75 degrees at night. Especally if it's a baby iguana.(under one year old)The best way to do this is with proper heat lamps.
Depending on the size of your cage you will need one to two day lamps, and one to two night lamps. The lamp wattage should be no less than 40 watts, and no more than 100 watts. Again depending on the cage size. You should make sure the lights are at least twelve inches away from your iguana's highest basking spot. Your iguana absorbs most of it's heat from the sun or heat lamps. they have a small sensor on top of their head to tell them when they are to hot, and need to get out of the sun.The best kind of lights to use are full spectrum bulbs.These are the tube lights much like the floresant lights you see in office buildings and other places,except made for reptile use.You can usualy find these lights at you local pet store in the reptile section.They are costly,usualy running 20 to 30 dollars a peice.The good thing is you will only have to buy new ones about every six to eight months.
IMPPORTANT!Never ever use a heat rock for your iguana!If they are laying on a hot rock, they don't have sense enough to get off of it when they are to hot. So, they will end up burning them selves pretty bad on the hot rock. This is why you should never ever give your iguana a hot rock to lay on.
Ok, so we've kinda covered heat and lighting at the same time. Next lets talk about the importance of humidity. The green iguana is native to central and south america. They live in a very humid climate. So, in captivity you need to mave the climate in the cage as close to their natural environment as possible.
To do this you will need a combination of heat and humidity. We've already covered heat, now we need to cover humidity. To ensure proper humidity, you should put a couple of water sources in the cage. and place them under the lamps so that the heat from the lamps evaporates the water and makes humidity. Make sense? I hope so. Also give them fresh water daily,because they like to deficate(poop)in their water. another way to create humidity is to get a humidifier and make the entire room humid. Wich is fine if you to like a very humid climate.Or, you could spray the cage down daily with water from a spray bottle being carefull not to hit the light bulbs.Wich ever way you go,Make sure your iguana's cage has a humidity level of at least 70 to 90%. This is crucial to their health and happiness.
Last but not least, there is the matter of basking areas. If you have a small iguana and took my advise of getting a 50 gallon aquarium for it, then one or two logs should be fine. You want to give your iguana a few things to climb on and soak up the rays. At the same time you don't want to crowd the floor with a lot of stuff. Now, if you decided to just go for the gusto and get your iguana a full sized cage (about 6 feet tall, 6feet wide, and 4 feet deep(front to back)like I did, then you can actually install a couple of shelves, and a climbing post so it can get up to the shelves. Then your iguana can strech out on the shelf and get the maximum amount of heat. Well, that about covers it. Don't forget to check out My links page to go to other great iguana sites, and if you have any questions feel free to e-mail me!
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