Maintaining ambient temps during winter

[Jered]

Hi everyone,

First of all, thanks to all of you for contributing to this site! I've learned a ton just by browsing around.

My question is what is the best way to maintain ambient temperatures during the winter season? I live on the west coast, so I don't have to worry about temps of -40 or anything. However, it's only October and my girls ambient enclosure temps have already dropped to 76-77 during the day.

She's currently in a divided AP T8. Is a radiant heat panel my best option? I'm also curious about the possibility of adding another heat mat. I would put this one under the cold side and set it to 80 degrees or so.

Experts, whats my best bet? Thanks in advance!

[PitOnTheProwl]

You could do the radiant panel, you could do a cool side heat mat, or you could get an oil filled heater and do the room.
Its all up to you.

[Tigerhawk]

I use an oil filled heater to heat my reptile building with a good thermostat and a fan to circulate the air.

[200xth]

my girls ambient enclosure temps have already dropped to 76-77 during the day.

How low do you expect it to get? 76 or 77 should be fine for ambient temps as long as she has a hot spot to crawl onto when she needs/wants it.

[Eric Alan]

I would fully expect that temperatures will keep dropping as the year goes on. Here in AZ, we're down in the 60s at night now. Yes, that's about perfect weather for us, but the snakes have an oil filled heater in their room to keep it from dropping that far.

[RoyalRegius]

Your ambient temps are fine if you have a hot spot around 90 degrees. High 70 is normal for their climate in the winter.

[Jered]

Thanks for the quick replies everyone, I appreciate it.

I'm not sure exactly how low the ambient temps will drop overall but I think they'll wind up being low enough to cause some concern. She's in a fair sized room, so while I will consider an oil heater, it's probably going to be my last resort.

I should have worded my question a bit differently. I've heard from some people that radiant heat panels aren't the best solution for ambient heat because they primarily heat the floor of the enclosure. Is this true / an issue?

[Jered]

Bumping because I still have one unanswered question

I should have worded my question a bit differently. I've heard from some people that radiant heat panels aren't the best solution for ambient heat because they primarily heat the floor of the enclosure. Is this true / an issue?

[CloudtheBoa]

I have personally noticed my RHP doesn't heat the air very well, so it has a CHE to back it up. I also have to cover up the large glass doors with sleeping bags as the glass allows too much heat to escape even with the apartment being heated. During the summer I can have it uncovered. But we're going to be moving soon so hopefully I can have the room he's in heated enough that I won't have to wrap it anymore. We're dropping into the 30's here on some nights, with it usually being 40-50F or 60F on a warm night. We're lucky if day time temps reach the 70's, although we've had one or two in the mid to high 70's recently. I don't expect too many more, we're getting an early winter here in the mountains.

[Eric Alan]

Bumping because I still have one unanswered question

Radiant heat panels heat the surface of anything in direct line of sight of the panel. Here's a thread that goes into detail on how they work - http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...flexwatt-heat/. If you skip over the drama, it's a good source of information.