Dimmer recommendations?

[donprec]

I've never tried dimmers before, didn't really seem to need them with the aquariums. But since getting the enclosures, I had to struggle with so many different light watts to get the temps right and not too hot. Just when I thought I got things right, this recent warmer weather is making my enclosures too warm again. The air conditioner doesn't cool off the upstairs the way it does downstairs and the room my lizards are in is the warmest room in the house. I have the basking and mid temps in the enclosures ok, but there's just not as much of a cooler side. Do other people have this problem with their wooden enclosures?
When I'm home and the temps start to peak, I just leave one side of the doors of their enclosures open to let more air flow through and that usually works good enough. But sometimes when I come home from work, both Precious and Tequila are on the cooler side and Precious will practically jump in my hand to get out. Granted, she'll come right out only to go straight into the window where it's warm again, so I can't tell if her wanting to come out is just because she just wants to come out or that she was too hot...or both.
I'm going to Home Depot today to try to see if I can come up with some way of trying to make one of the doors a screen door or just somehow have a screen on one half of the enclosures. But I'm not handy so I don't know if I'll be able to come up with something that works securely enough that I could leave the screen there all day when I'm not around.
So I'm thinking I should look into dimmers but I have only once seen dimmers in a pet store a while ago and I didn't buy them then because I thought they were a bit high, but maybe $40 is a normal price?
I was hoping you all could send me some links of the dimmers that you use so I can order them?
Thanks in advance.

 

[PatsyB]

I don't have a dimmer but it sounds like a good idea. I'm having a hard time with Dexters tank, I caught her gaping in the bottom middle of her tank a few times, not even on her basking spot. I've also taken her out of her tank a few times and she's been real warm. I put a lower wattage bulb in her tank for her and then the weather dropped and we are back in the 40's again. It was 80 on Friday and now 40!!!!

 

[donprec]

Geez, what a jump in weather lol!
I bought expandable window screens for the enclosures, they worked out pretty well actually. I have them velcroed to the inside and they don't interfere with the doors. Precious didn't seem phased by the screen but Tequila had been scratching at her's pretty much all day until I took her out, it was crazy but funny too!
At first, the temps seemed good and I could just tell there wasn't as much heavy heat coming out of the enclosures when I opened the door. However, at one point even with the screen, the temp in the cool side was 90, basking was 120...this is with a 45 watt in Precious's enclosure!! The next lowest I have is a 35 watt flood light (not made for reptiles) that I hadn't tried in her tank yet...the 35 made Tequila's a bit too warm but her enclosure is 6 inches lower, she has a 25 now.
I definitely have to get dimmers, this is getting ridiculous!

 

[PatsyB]

The weather in the midwest has been so unpredictable lately. The week I ordered my chameleon was in the low to mid 60's and I thought it would be a good time. Well the minute I ordered him they announced a FROST warning overnight! I think the weather is messing with Luci, he seems to be in a mini brumation at the moment. Not running around in his tank, not eating much of his salad, Sits in his hammock with sleepy eyes all day. Yesterday afternoon I put him in his tank on his hammock and when I checked on him later he was under it with his head resting on his log and his eyes were closed. He's not usually big on hides in his tank but I put one in to see what he does.

The only good thing about all the rain we've been having is that I don't have to water my flowers!

 

[donprec]

LOL, that's good your flowers are getting watered but wow, that weather would be driving me crazy!

How is the chameleon? Getting bigger, doing well?

 

[PatsyB]

He's getting bigger. He's so big, he thinks he's hiding from us but we can totally see him in his tree, LOL! He's still pretty scared of us so we haven't been able to get him out of his cage yet. A few weeks ago I had a choking incident, I gave him a big hornworm that grabbed on to his lip while he was swallowing it and he couldn't get it loose. I ended up pulling it out of his throat! Scary moment for sure.

We decided on Bumble as a name, like the monster from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Here's a photo:

 

[donprec]

Aw, Bumble is adorable! I had a cat named BumbleBee but I mostly called her Bumble! She was a sweetheart but not pretty, I used to say she was my little bug, hence the name. She had a bad heart, vet told me she wouldn't make it to a year old but she passed on just a few weeks before she would've turned 15.
What a terrifying experience! At least you knew how to go into action and get the hornworm out, wow!

 

[PatsyB]

Sorry about your cat

I really didn't know and what to do about the hornworm and I panicked and cried and went on FB for advise. He kept making this noise it sounded like he couldn't breathe but he could have also been hissing at me, I don't know. I was told I should have just left but in the moment that was my first instinct. He has just a little dark spot on his lip where it latched on

 

[donprec]

Why would they have suggested to leave it? If you had left it maybe it wouldn't have latched on? I would've panicked at first, for sure, but I would've been scared to just leave the hornworn latched and choking Bumble too, especially if he was making those noises! Poor thing!
That's so scary to me. I never offered a hornworm to Tequila because she doesn't attack her food like Precious does. She just scoops the food in her mouth and does one or 2 gentle bites before she swallows. Now after hearing this, I'm never giving her one! Precious is different because they seem done with or at least severely incapacitated after one bite from her!
For the same reason, I never offered superworms to Tequila yet either. But just the other day, Precious ate a big one and about 1/3 of it's tail end fell out of her mouth. Of course, Precious didn't want that part because it wasn't moving. So I offered it to Tequila who ate it right up and was wanting more. I told her she better ask Precious to chop one up like that again because I'm not doing it!

 

[PatsyB]

When I took the worm out it was actually dead and soggy so I think if it didn't latch on he would have been just fine with it. But I'm not taking my chances with him like that again. Poor guy. He already doesn't want to be handled and here I was trying to get him out of his cage to help him and I was just upsetting him more. I don't give hard shell worms to my frogs because I've always been afraid. Even though I'm pretty sure that once they get in liquid they get immobilized. I once made Dexter a smoothie and put her supers in it and they instantly froze up and started to die. Luci does that too with his worms, he bites them and breaks them in pieces. If he's really hungry he will eat the parts right away but lots of times he leaves them behind.