Hagen Bearded Dragon Starter Kit

The Hagen Bearded Dragon Starter Kit brings the terrarium, the lighting and the basic furnishings together in one box, which saves working out which Exo Terra parts fit each other. Read the notes below on temperature control and on adult size before you set it up -- they are the two things that decide whether a bearded dragon thrives or slowly does not.

Key Features

• Natural Terrarium: 90 x 45 x 30 cm glass terrarium with front opening doors and a full screen top
• Solar Glo 125W: A self-ballasted mercury vapour lamp giving basking heat, UVB and visible light from one bulb
• Aluminium Dome Fixture: A reflector dome rated for the lamp, which concentrates the light and heat into a basking spot
• Light Dome Bracket: Holds the dome above the screen top rather than resting it on the mesh
• Liquid Crystal Thermometer: A stick-on strip for the glass -- see our note below on measuring temperature properly
• Large Sand Mat: A solid desert-look liner rather than loose sand, so there is nothing for the animal to swallow
• Medium Water Dish: A shallow dish for drinking and for raising humidity slightly during a shed

Check Your Species First

A starter kit is a sensible way to buy the hardware in one go, not a care sheet. Temperature, humidity, UV requirement, substrate and adult size vary enormously from one species to the next, and the single most common cause of illness in captive reptiles is an environment set up to a general guide rather than to the animal in it. Confirm the figures for the species you are actually getting before the animal arrives, and have the enclosure running and stable for a few days first.

Controlling The Heat From A Solar Glo

The Solar Glo is a self-ballasted mercury vapour lamp, producing basking heat, UVB and visible light from a single bulb. That has a consequence worth understanding before you set it up: a mercury vapour lamp must not be run through a dimming thermostat. Dimming it ruins the lamp and its UV output. You control the basking temperature by how high the lamp sits above the basking surface and by the room temperature underneath it, and you use a timer for day length rather than a dimmer. If the basking spot reads too hot, raise the lamp. Mercury vapour lamps also carry a minimum mounting distance -- check the figure printed on the Solar Glo box, because a low terrarium can put the bulb closer than that distance allows.

Warm End, Cool End

A reptile has no internal thermostat; it manages its temperature by moving. That means the enclosure has to offer a choice -- a basking spot at one end and a genuinely cooler area at the other, with a hide at each end so the animal never has to pick between feeling safe and being the right temperature. An enclosure heated evenly all over gives it nowhere to go. Look up the exact warm and cool figures for your own species before you set anything up; they differ widely.

Measure The Temperature Properly

The liquid crystal strip thermometer in a kit like this tells you the temperature of the glass it is stuck to, which is not the number that matters. What matters is the surface temperature of the basking spot and the air temperature at the cool end. An infrared thermometer, pointed at the basking surface, costs very little and is the single most useful thing you can add to a starter kit. A digital thermometer with a probe you can position is the next best thing.

UVB Bulbs Expire Before They Stop Lighting

A fluorescent UVB bulb keeps producing visible light long after its useful UVB output has faded, so replacing it by appearance is how deficiency starts. Change it on a schedule -- roughly every six to twelve months depending on type, and write the date on it. Glass and plastic block UVB almost completely, so the bulb has to sit inside the enclosure or above open mesh, and even a dense screen filters out a good part of it.

Plan For The Adult, Not The Hatchling

Starter kit terrariums are sized to be affordable, and reptiles grow. Check the adult size of the species you are buying against the enclosure in this kit before you order, because an enclosure that is right for a hatchling is often wrong within a year -- and an under-sized enclosure is the commonest husbandry problem there is. Most current bearded dragon guidance puts an adult at around 120 cm of floor length as a minimum. The equipment in the kit transfers to a bigger terrarium; only the terrarium itself needs replacing.

Who Makes It

Exo Terra is the reptile and amphibian brand of Rolf C. Hagen, the Montreal company founded in 1955. The components in these kits -- the terrarium, the dome fixture, the lamps, the mats and the hides -- are all standard Exo Terra parts, which means every one of them can be replaced or upgraded individually later.

Out Of Stock Right Now

This one is out of stock at the moment. The page is here for reference while we wait on the next delivery -- ask us and we will tell you where it is.

Good To Know

• What is not in the box: a calcium and D3 supplement, an infrared or probe thermometer, a timer, a second hide for the cool end, and a dish for live food. The supplement in particular is not optional -- metabolic bone disease from too little calcium and UVB is the condition that kills the most captive bearded dragons.
• Two hides, one at each end of the temperature gradient, so the animal never has to choose between feeling safe and being the right temperature. This kit includes none.
• Bearded dragons rarely drink from a standing bowl. Most of their water comes from food, and a warm bath once or twice a week does more than a full dish.
• Run the setup empty for several days and get the temperatures stable before the animal comes home. It is much harder to adjust with a dragon in there.
• A dragon that stops eating, goes dark, sits with its mouth open away from the basking spot, or drags its back legs needs a reptile vet. None of those are things to wait out.