What size vivarium do I need to house a Crested Gecko?

I'm going to be using a deep peat substrate as recommended on your care sheet, is this just standard peat you can buy from any basic garden centre?

I'm going to be using a deep peat substrate as recommended on your care sheet, do I need to change the substrate when I clean the vivarium?

How do you actually go about cleaning out a Crestie vivarium?

Do Cresties have to be misted?

How do you mist a Crestie vivarium?

How much do you need to mist?

Should the water be warm or cold for misting?

Does misting water need to be boiled or filtered first or will straight out of the tap do?

Do I need to provide lighting for the Crested Gecko?

Do I need to provide heating for the Crested Gecko?

How long before hand would you recommend setting up the vivarium so temps and humidity can be maintained before putting the gecko in?

I plan to keep my Crested gecko vivarium in the living room and have the enclosure as part of the furniture. Would things like the TV disturb the gecko?

What size vivarium do I need to house a Crested Gecko?

Some people keep the Crested Gecko in 12"x12"x18" vivariums, this size is not really big enough for an adult Crestie though. They get quite big (6") and being arboreal they need the height more than the width and 18" high just isn't much room. An 18"x18"x24" vivarium is ideal for a single or even a small group of Crestie's. If you are getting a hatchling then you're going to be best keeping it in a small faunarium type enclosure for quite a while first. This is so you can make sure it is shedding and feeding correctly. If you get a Juvenile of reasonable age (6mths old or so) then you could go straight for the 18"x18"x24" vivarium.

I'm going to be using a deep peat substrate as recommended on your care sheet, is this just standard peat you can buy from any basic garden centre?

You can use peat from a Garden Centre but you need to make sure it's pesticide/additive free.

I'm going to be using a deep peat substrate as recommended on your care sheet, do I need to change the substrate when I clean the vivarium?

If you have a deep peat substrate (around 3 to 4 inches deep) then bacteria build up in the substrate and they deal with the Cresties waste. As a result you do not need to change the substrate. Sometimes you can even get worm cultures living in the substrate that feed off the waste too.

How do you actually go about cleaning out a Crestie vivarium?

When I clean out our Crestie vivariums I remove all the decor and place the Crestie's in plastic tubs. I have a large tub of prepared warm water and reptile safe disinfectant (there are loads of makes - Ark Klens is good) and I then wash all the decor in the tub and leave it to soak whilst I take a cloth and using the water/disinfectant mix wipe down the inside of the Crestie's enclosure, making sure I remove any remains of waste from the sides, etc. I then turn over the top layer of the peat substrate using a fork and then pat the peat down again as you don't want to leave it loose. I then have another tub of just water to rinse off all the decor before I put it all back in the vivariums. Once the decor is back in I usually take the time to get some photographs of the Cresties and to weigh them before putting them back in the vivariums too.

Do Cresties have to be misted?
How do you mist a Crestie vivarium?
How much do you need to mist?
Should the water be warm or cold for misting?
Does misting water need to be boiled or filtered first or will straight out of the tap do?

I've grouped the answer to these questions together as they are related to each other.

With a natural enclosure how you mist comes down to personal choice, you can mist every evening using a hand mister, you can get automatic misters that will do it for you and you just have to fill their water store up but whichever way you do it your Crestie's viv will need spraying with water every day (unless you've over misted and are letting it dry out). The water you use shouldn't be too cold or hot, room temp is fine but it needs to be de-chlorinated, you can buy water conditioner that removes the chlorine for you or you can simply leave the water from your tap to stand for 24hrs as Chlorine dissipates out of water over time. Whether you are misting enough or too much is best judged by the moistness of the peat substrate. If there are wet areas forming on the substrate surface then you are misting too much, the peat should be moist but not wet. It should be moist enough to stay together if you squeeze a clump of it together in your fist. In a simple enclosure you do not need to mist at all, instead you can keep a 'moist box' on the bottom of the vivarium. A 'moist box' is just a plastic tub (large ice cream tub or large margarine tub size) that you half fill with a moist substrate (again I use peat) and then make a hole in the lid big enough for the Cresties to get in and out of freely (I make it around 2"). The Cresties will then go in to this box when they are shedding or to lay eggs in the case of breeding females.

Do I need to provide lighting for the Crested Gecko?
Do I need to provide heating for the Crested Gecko?

I've grouped the answer to these questions together as they are related to each other.

The Crested Gecko only needs light to enable it to distinguish between day and night so that it can regulate it's sleep pattern. If their vivarium has some daylight in the the same room then no extra lighting is needed as far as they are concerned. You may want some lighting for your own sake, so that you may view them, particularly of an evening when they are most active. If the Crestie's vivarium is kept indoors and the room is heated during the winter then no further heating is required. Average temperatures in the mid 70's fahrenheit are ideal with nighttime lows of 60 fahrenheit being fine so long as the Crestie can warm itself during the day. Summer time highs of up to 88 fahrenheit will not be fatal over a few hours but over the long term this is far too hot, a sustained temperature of above 82 fahrenheit will kill a Crested Gecko. My recommendation is to use a vivarium with a mesh top and to get a 50w IR Heat Lamp and hang this over the viv, we actually use a desk lamp with these in over our Crestie vivs. I'd leave this on all the time but have it fitted to a Dimming Thermostat to make sure it doesn't get too hot for the Cresties. This way you can watch them in the evening when they are active (they cannot see the IR light) and you make sure that they do not get too cold or too hot.

How long before hand would you recommend setting up the vivarium so temps and humidity can be maintained before putting the gecko in?

With a natural vivarium I'd say a good few days at least, to make sure you have got the temp sorted and to help make sure the peat is well soaked if you're using it as a substrate. With a simple enclosure a couple of days to make sure you have the temp right should be fine.

I plan to keep my Crested gecko vivarium in the living room and have the enclosure as part of the furniture. Would things like the TV disturb the gecko?

They'll be fine, ours have their own building outside now but originally they were in our living room along with our TV and home cinema.