Heating a Vision Cage

[Satana]

I picked up a used vision cage from the local reptile expo and I'm having an issue. I put a UTH on it and that was fine for a few weeks then all of a sudden it shorted out and the sticky came off and it also seemed like it had burnt the bottom of the tank. I am using a thermostat on it so I don't understand what the issue was. I've never used flexwatt and was looking into that. Any suggestions on what to do? I've heard of putting the uth on a piece of glass and putting the cage on that. Does that really work?

Thank you

[The Serpent Merchant]

I would just use flexwatt, Visions cages are harder to heat because of the way that they are designed/manufactured. Most that I have seen simply use heat lamps, but that is terrible for humidity.

This is how I heat my Animal Plastics PVC cages:



The flexwatt is taped to the bottom of the cage with Aluminum tape. The thermostat probe sits in a slot. Visions do not have these slots which makes things more difficult.





Some people will get a piece of plexiglass or Plywood and cut a slot out for their thermostat probe. The cage would then sit on the plexiglass or plywood.

Regular UTH's I have found simply aren't up to the job when it comes to plastic cages.

Here is a thread that I wrote on Plastic cages. it is more focused on Animal Plastics style cages but the basics are the same: http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...With-Pictures!

[Satana]

Awesome! Thank you so much!

[LLLReptile]

We use ZooMed brand heat pads on every single one of the 50+ cages we have in all 4 retail stores, with zero problems with melting, shorting, or problems.

Important things to consider:
Do not have the heat pad directly under the heat light. That WILL get too hot, and will melt the vision cage plastic.
Do have space between the cage and whatever is below it for ventilation. The bottom row of vision cages in our stores sit directly on the floor, and as a result do not have heat pads on them. If yours is sitting flat on a surface, try simply elevating it with taped stacks of pennies around the pad - I find 2 or 3 is enough to elevate most cages and allow for air flow. With Vision cages, you may need just a short block of wood. How old is your cage, and what model is it? They should come with tracks along the bottom that elevate the cage as-is.

Since we follow those rules, we've never had a problem with heating our cages with heat pads. Our small 211 size cages actually heat up significantly with just heat pads; I often open one up to illustrate to people what a warm, humid cage should feel like when you reach into it. Larger model cages, of course, have much more air to heat up and would probably benefit from the help of a low wattage heat bulb. Thanks to the mostly enclosed style of the vision cages, if you mist the cage daily and/or use damp moss within the cage, keeping humidity up is no problem. We keep Amazon Tree Boas, Tree Monitors, anacondas, and other species with much higher humidity needs than ball pythons in vision cages with heat lights and have few problems in them (the few problems we do have are easily corrected with the addition of moss!).

Hope that helps!

-Jen

[Satana]

Thank you, I have the V211, I think what happened is the dimmer I had shorted the pad. I ordered an ultratherm heat pad and a new thermostat. Right now I have a lamp over the top of the tank but I can't leave it on during the day because I am scared it will melt the plastic while I am at work so I've just cranked up the heat in my apartment until the new stuff comes in.

[LLLReptile]

Thank you, I have the V211, I think what happened is the dimmer I had shorted the pad. I ordered an ultratherm heat pad and a new thermostat. Right now I have a lamp over the top of the tank but I can't leave it on during the day because I am scared it will melt the plastic while I am at work so I've just cranked up the heat in my apartment until the new stuff comes in.

Hey whatever works for the short term. Consider grabbing 40 hour heat packs for emergencies. I have at least 1 per snake at home in case of emergency, would work well in this kind of emergency to keep the snake warm.

Good luck, hope it works out for you!

-Jen

[Satana]

I never thought about that! Great idea! Thank you

[AEnimaDrummer98]

Hey all, I have a Vision 332 with extra vent. Anyone have that and want to share their heat/humidity methods??

[The Serpent Merchant]

Hey all, I have a Vision 332 with extra vent. Anyone have that and want to share their heat/humidity methods??

all Plastic cages are heated in a somewhat similar manner, check out this thread:

http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...With-Pictures!