It is going to be freezing tonight and I am going to keep Robin outside. To prepare, I just reworked her foam nestbox a bit with the hopes of the heating pad being more effective. I have a metal radiant barrier in there and I have had the heating pad on the wall so as to warm up the space and try to avoid overheating the animal. That only works so well against the cold, so I have decided to place the pad on the metal sheeting right below where she will nest so that the heat can rise up right to her body. She can bury herself under blankets and sit right on top of the heating pad if she wants to. I did relocate the thermostat a few inches above that area so that it can turn off the system when it gets too warm. I doubt it will shut off at all tonight. The pad only draws 8 watts. If you can imagine an 8 watt incandescent light bulb; well, it would give off very little heat or light, and this pad is no different. It is warming and pretty safe for her and should do the trick.
The pad is a
Zoo Med Repti Therm
6"x8" flat nichrome heating pad controlled by a
Repti Temp thermostat
with probe to turn it off which does the job well.
I fastened the pad and the power wire using metal hvac tape. Since I have the thermostat controller to protect from overheating, I might get the 8x12 version next time if it fits just to give an extra umph to the warming.
You can watch Robin on her
webcam
, and I am monitoring the box temperature with a wireless probe. I havent been able to figure out how to get it to display on the video feed yet.
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