Can scorps see the exo terra light?

I am using the exo terra night lamp right now, but I have no idea if they can see it.

And if I want to use some sort of black light to make the scorpion glow when it is turned on, what should I get? 25w or less fits my hood.

If its the blue lamp, they can see it. The exo terra night glo is just fine.
Don't worry it gives off a little heat but makes it all more viewable.

However, it is suggested they are less disturbed by red light.

Also I wouldn't recommend permanent black light. Uv rays are bad for scorpions on the long run and of course the occasional viewing isnt that bad but in on the long run it can cause complete desensitization for light, and/or problems with its exoskeleton.


I would suggest a normal day and night circle. The exo terra compact top you probably own, works fine with a sun glo ( red neodymium) and with that night glow. The sun glo also comes in 15/25 watts.

Take care

Joey

They CAN see it? I want to observe their nocturnal behavior that's why I was hoping it wouldn't disturb them too much.

I don't like the red lamp too much. I get the feeling that they are in the oven or something when that things on. I know it's not hot, but I just don't like the style.

Yes, they can see the night glo bulbs...and there has been some controversy on forums in the past about the safety of using them with scorpions. Said bulbs will make the scorpions glow green, much like a blacklight does. The glow is a little less intense, however. I've noticed that Zoo Med recently came out with a similar bulb, called a Moonlite bulb...which is probably exactly the same as the Exo Terra bulb, though I haven't seen one in use yet.

Its generally agreed upon that red light is best to use, as it provides the most visiblity for you while apparently being nearly invisible to a scorpion's vision spectrum.

Personally, I wouldn't bother with a sun glo bulb during the day either...its produces UVA light, and daylight broad-spectrum bulbs will probably annoy your scorpions. If your room has a window in it, there is likely enough ambient light for a day/night cycle if one is concerned about it.

vespers wrote:

Yes, they can see the night glo bulbs...and there has been some controversy on forums in the past about the safety of using them with scorpions. Said bulbs will make the scorpions glow green, much like a blacklight does. The glow is a little less intense, however. I've noticed that Zoo Med recently came out with a similar bulb, called a Moonlite bulb...which is probably exactly the same as the Exo Terra bulb, though I haven't seen one in use yet.

Its generally agreed upon that red light is best to use, as it provides the most visiblity for you while apparently being nearly invisible to a scorpion's vision spectrum.

Personally, I wouldn't bother with a sun glo bulb during the day either...its produces UVA light, and daylight broad-spectrum bulbs will probably annoy your scorpions. If your room has a window in it, there is likely enough ambient light for a day/night cycle if one is concerned about it.

So you are suggesting that my sun glo neodymium daylight bulb of 26 watts which emits UVA is also harmfull for my animal??? Exo terra recommends these for scorpions. I don't understand.

I did some research and called various facilities who have much experience and expertise in husbandry and they explained to me that it works like this.

Are Uv rays in large quantities harmful?
YES


Is an exo terra Neodymium sun glo with uvA dangerous ?
No, the neodymium on the inside works like a protective coating.
It is fine to use in the terrarium with your scorpion.
the UvA isn't that much and the wavelenght isn't harmful for your scorpions.

Other incandescent bulbs on the market, other than specially designed for terrariums also contain uva and often do not have the protected coating on them.

So in the end I choose to remain with the lamp I purchased.



The following picture is in no way intended as commercial interest or advertisement, merely to show the exact product to prevent misunderstandings.







As for the nightglo




It does not contain UVB.but I doubt if it doesn't contain uvA in some sort, because that is needed to make the scorp glow in the dark. But I suspect it must be in such low quantities that it is perhaps so low that it is negligible.

The reason I don't think this is harmfull, again is the absence of large quantity's of uvB which are more harmful and can cause cellular degradation in animals.


The low UvA emitting, sun glo and the "suspected" low emitting night glo, in my opinion are more safe to use with your scorpion than most commercially available lamps, some of which do not have any protective coating whatsoever.

The solely infrared lamp is also good to use with the scorpions, as they find red light less annoying and do not react to it the same way as they do to other light.

I don't think you have anything to worry about, unless you work with high UvB output lamps.

Also, I would have to emphasize the need for a good hide. The scorpion is mostly nocturnal and avoids light most of the time, it has excellent light detecting skills, so it is very important that your scorp can hide and choose if it wants to be in the light or dark. This reduces stress and stimulates natural behavior.


This is of course my opinion based on the info I have gathered and the experience that I have . And of course others may agree or disagree. However, after reading as much as I could, and talking to people who have years of experience and education,
I do not feel worried in the slightest to keep using my current lighting.


I hope this all helps the OST

Take care,


Joe

Shakudo wrote:

So you are suggesting that my sun glo neodymium daylight bulb of 26 watts which emits UVA is also harmfull for my animal??? Exo terra recommends these for scorpions. I don't understand.

I'm saying that, at the very least, it annoys your scorpion and is not necessary.

Exo Terra is most interested in selling you things. But even so, I have never seen them recommend that daylight bulb for scorpions. They specialize in reptiles, not arachnids. One only has to look at their "Invertebrate kit" to see how little they know about keeping invertebrates. The say its ideal for tarantulas and scorpions, but: The water dish comes with a sponge in it. It doesn't come with enough substrate. The design of the terrarium doesn't allow for adding alot of additional substrate anyhow, which isn't good for burrowing scorpion species or minimizing the height between the top and substrate for terrestrial tarantulas. The PDF instructions for the kit recommend using an opional heat rock, or placing a heat mat on the bottom of the enclosure, which is also usually wrong for keeping any arachnid. Then we get to the bulb, which the instructions claim is a Repti Glo 10.0 bulb...if true, that is their "desert" reptile bulb with high UVB output! It even notes in the instructions about "beneficial UV output closer to the bulb". Just, no. No. I wouldn't trust Exo Terra's recommendations whatsoever. They want you to buy their products and make them money. Period.

Shakudo wrote:

The solely infrared lamp is also good to use with the scorpions, as they find red light less annoying and do not react to it the same way as they do to other light.

So if you know that infrared is a good light to use, why not just use it?

Shakudo wrote:

The scorpion is mostly nocturnal and avoids light most of the time, it has excellent light detecting skills, so it is very important that your scorp can hide and choose if it wants to be in the light or dark. This reduces stress and stimulates natural behavior.

You just said it yourself...why put a blaring bright daylight only inches above them, when they are nocturnal animals? It isn't going to choose to bask in it likes its relaxing at the beach. And hides are just common sense in most any scorpion enclosure.

You can use what you wish of course. I don't see the logic of using UV or daylight bulbs of any kind when red is easily obtained. I don't put aesthetics over my scorpions' health or well being, and I don't choose to intentionally irritate them. Scorpions don't appreciate UV, and I'm not going to unnecessarily inundate them with it.

Perhaps sometime I'll get a pet bat and house it in a tanning bed.
(sorry, not trying to argue, I just have a strange sense of humor)

I posted this not to long ago in a similar thread. It is from John Courtney-Smith from Arcadia Lighting. He's a bit of a guru when it comes to exotic animal lighting.

Hi, most filament lamps emit an extremely small amount of UVA only. So anything with a filament itnis possible but only UVA and in no way enough to affect the animals in question. True infra red is invisible so not many true infra red lamps are available. Also the colour red is now not thought thoughtnto be appreciated by most inverts. They prefer blue and green. They are amazing really, there compound vision uses high quantities of UVA and they can use a chemical response to shiftnthese wavelengths in the visual field by around 100nm to make full use of these wavelengths. Very, very cool!! John

Indeed, true infrared is invisible.

The daylight bulb included with the invetebrate kit I mentioned is a CFL.

I have never heard of blue and green being the light to use. So is this to insinuate that blue or green aquarium bulbs would be most the appropriate? Those night glo bulbs are not blue, they emit a purple violet light. I have read that blues and greens were the easiest colors for them to see...is that what he means by inverts prefer those hues? Otherwise, shouldn't this information be dispersed across various arachnid forums so keepers can see the apparent error of their current ways? Does this mean that Arcadia Lighting will soon have blue green invertebrate bulbs for sale? Questions, questions!

vespers wrote:

Shakudo wrote:

So you are suggesting that my sun glo neodymium daylight bulb of 26 watts which emits UVA is also harmfull for my animal??? Exo terra recommends these for scorpions. I don't understand.

I'm saying that, at the very least, it annoys your scorpion and is not necessary.

Exo Terra is most interested in selling you things. But even so, I have never seen them recommend that daylight bulb for scorpions. They specialize in reptiles, not arachnids. One only has to look at their "Invertebrate kit" to see how little they know about keeping invertebrates. The say its ideal for tarantulas and scorpions, but: The water dish comes with a sponge in it. It doesn't come with enough substrate. The design of the terrarium doesn't allow for adding alot of additional substrate anyhow, which isn't good for burrowing scorpion species or minimizing the height between the top and substrate for terrestrial tarantulas. The PDF instructions for the kit recommend using an opional heat rock, or placing a heat mat on the bottom of the enclosure, which is also usually wrong for keeping any arachnid. Then we get to the bulb, which the instructions claim is a Repti Glo 10.0 bulb...if true, that is their "desert" reptile bulb with high UVB output! It even notes in the instructions about "beneficial UV output closer to the bulb". Just, no. No. I wouldn't trust Exo Terra's recommendations whatsoever. They want you to buy their products and make them money. Period.

I have bought the terrarium only, so can't judge about that. Purchased no kit with it.
I have looked it up, and I agree that it is perhaps necessary to tweak the set quite a bit to make it more suitable.

But again, I didn't purchase the kit, and luckily knew a thing or 2 about scorps already so decorated it myself and I am very satisfied with the product. Also the design does allow for 10/12 cm of substrate and you can create hight differences, and I think it works fine.

But back to the lights.

vespers wrote:

Shakudo wrote:

The solely infrared lamp is also good to use with the scorpions, as they find red light less annoying and do not react to it the same way as they do to other light.

So if you know that infrared is a good light to use, why not just use it?

Shakudo wrote:

The scorpion is mostly nocturnal and avoids light most of the time, it has excellent light detecting skills, so it is very important that your scorp can hide and choose if it wants to be in the light or dark. This reduces stress and stimulates natural behavior.

You just said it yourself...why put a blaring bright daylight only inches above them, when they are nocturnal animals? It isn't going to choose to bask in it likes its relaxing at the beach. And hides are just common sense in most any scorpion enclosure.

You can use what you wish of course. I don't see the logic of using UV or daylight bulbs of any kind when red is easily obtained. I don't put aesthetics over my scorpions' health or well being, and I don't choose to intentionally irritate them. Scorpions don't appreciate UV, and I'm not going to unnecessarily inundate them with it.

Perhaps sometime I'll get a pet bat and house it in a tanning bed.
(sorry, not trying to argue, I just have a strange sense of humor)

I didn't choose for infrared because I want to see natural colors of the set up and the animal and not just red light.

"Blaring light" is in my opinion far , far to exaggerated. It is not at all comparable with a spot or fluorescent light.
It is a very soft light. I find it very nice and it looks great in the setup. My scorpion is a Cavimanus who spends most of her time underground. So making the set up in to something natural worth looking is for me a necessity as I watch a pet hole most of the time.

Hides, as you say are common sense? Not for everybody.
You would be amazed how many people "want to see the animal" and don't want it to let it hide.
So no, only people who have an understanding of it's behavior and needs can call it common sense.

And I don't put any aesthetics before the well being of my animal let's be crystal clear about that

Red light certainly isn't the only way to go. And it's possible to use something else.
If you have read my comments, you have also seen that the UvA output of the bulb I use, again, isn't at all dangerous for the animal. Referring to the coating, wavelength and opinions I have collected by people with excellent references. So find it an excellent alternative, without harming my animal.

Callum B wrote:

I posted this not to long ago in a similar thread. It is from John Courtney-Smith from Arcadia Lighting. He's a bit of a guru when it comes to exotic animal lighting.

Hi, most filament lamps emit an extremely small amount of UVA only. So anything with a filament itnis possible but only UVA and in no way enough to affect the animals in question. True infra red is invisible so not many true infra red lamps are available. Also the colour red is now not thought thoughtnto be appreciated by most inverts. They prefer blue and green. They are amazing really, there compound vision uses high quantities of UVA and they can use a chemical response to shiftnthese wavelengths in the visual field by around 100nm to make full use of these wavelengths. Very, very cool!! John

My bulb in question is fine, the quantity of UvA output is not harmful.
Thanks!