What is the best lighting?

[ArtBug]

I've seen some interesting topics on using plant lights.

I only have one 24/7 red heat lamp on my T.olegrandjeani.

The other three:

G. grandidieri. A. tesselata and L.verrucosa don't have heat lamps and seem to be doing fine.

Is the spectrum of light from a plant light better?

Should I be using some kind of light on all of these guys?

[Nicolas Rousseaux]

Hi

at the moment, the roaches'tanks are in my room, so there is the normal light in a room, given by a window, and the lights of my reptile's terrarium. I don't add light for the roaches. I know some people on the forum breed roaches in bins, so there is nearly no light, and it doesn't matter. I don't think it's really important to have a particular lightning to breed roaches

[ArtBug]

You know, I thought of all of those guys in buckets! They don't get much light, do they?

I don't know, I just want them to be happy

[Alex]

ArtBug

I have noticed a light/heat source is beneficial for quite a few species. I don’t think it’s the light but the heat produced from the light. Pseudomops and Blattella come to mind.

Can they be kept in a warm room with no light? Yes and they will do just fine kept like that.

But I do feel there are benefits to in terms of longevity and interesting behaviors to see when kept with choices to thermo regulate it makes them expensive to keep “electric bill” and takes up more space.

I use a 15, 25, 30 watt incandescent bulbs inside the cage with a solid top and very little ventilation.

Keeping them like a cricket farmer with high heat all the time and no natural substrates you can produce them consistently and just clean out the cage and harvest but you lose the interesting behaviors and it shortens there lifespan “ higher metabolism due to being kept hotter without the choice of slowing down”. It depends on what you want to do.

[ArtBug]

_Alex,

_{Thanks for your feedback. Mine are just pets - I'm not looking forward to the day when I'll have to feed them to something!}

_{I'm thinking that moisture is more important than heat if I'm more concerned about general health than breeding.}

_{(However - the moisture/heat variables probably depends on the needs of the individual species!)}

_{So much to learn. . .}

[wodesorel]

I use a 150W infrared reptile bulb to heat the entire invert room (5 foot x 8 foot) to between 77 and 90 (floor to ceiling), and then I use 4 foot double-bulb florescent shop lamps for light as I have several species in planted tanks on a shelving system. Just put a third in there this week to get my garden seedlings started for summer.

I don't think the white light matters very much to the roaches other than they hide all day from it and only venture out in droves after it's been shut off for the night. The red they can't see at all - no reaction to the light itself going on or off, or by casting shadows on the tank - so that gets left of 24 hours a day except in summer when it would cook the room.