Temperatures are hard!

[onewaylife4all]

Hi again, I'm at a dilemma here... My ball pythons cage is set up like this

Left side: water bowl

Right side: heat pad, hide rock, and heat lamp.

Is this okay?? I'm kind of concerned, if the heat is on the rock that hehides in, how is that any different than a heat rick that everyone says is bad for your snake? If I put the heat lamp on the left, then it heats up his water all hot. How should I arrange this cage?

Help!

[Skullkid]

Hot rocks are dangerous because they emit a tremendous amount of heat and can SEVERLY because snakes have are unable to tell when something is too hot. A hot rock could be used with a thermostat, but I would not put my snake at risk in such a way, so please NEVER use one . Putting a heat lamp over a rock is sort of the same, except the rock absorbs the heat rather than producing it, hence it can not reach such temperatures and will eventually cool down as your snake lays on it. As for the setup, I also have a heat lamp but I only use it when the temperatures dip below minimum for the snkes health, and then i use it in the middle of the tank so the hot side does not get too hot and the cool side remains cooler to allow the snake to thermoregulate. hope this helps

[Purrrfect9]

Well, first thing is to make sure that you have two identical hides on both the warm side and a cool side of your snakes enclosure. Second, do you have any way of controlling the amount of heat that the heat lamp and undertank heater?

[AiSuki]

I only have one hiding spot..should I put another on the other side too then? (I'm having this problem too..sorta. only my cage isn't getting hot enough)

I also read somewhere that covering the heat rock with a washcloth will keep your snake from getting burned. Is this true?

[Chuck]

I am just asking but do a bunch of people use two heat sources to regulate a cage. I have seen lamps and UTH on different sides to regulate both ends of the thermo gradient i have seen this more than a few times in posts. I think in this case it is on the same side but none the less it could be considered overkill. I don't see why you need to do this unless you are using a really large enclosure or you have really cold room temps. The proper set up of an enclosure in a great many cases can and should be done with one heat source. This heat source place properly and of the correct size should be able to hold one end at an optimum hot temp and this will naturally bring the cool side into proper temp. This takes a lot of playing around and taking into account all the environmental factors going on in a room. Nature has variation in temperature and to think that the idea that you have to keep an animal at exactly a set of temps is sorta going overboard IMO. I am not saying that you don't have to keep a proper range just not an exact temp. I am not trying to hijack this thread I just have noticed this and wanted to ask the question.

Chuck

[dr del]

Hi,


Well , as you said it depends on room temps, where I live for example is considerably cooler than where you are so most of my tanks need 2 heat sources to keep within the right range. In fact the only two that don't are using ceramic heaters designed to dry car paint and can reach a surface temperature of 700 degrees C. Before everyone panicks they are on proportional thermostats and are well gaurded so they never reach that temp and the snakes cannot get burned.

When I finally get my finger out and build a rack it will need flexwatt on both sides just to make sure the cool end is high enough.

But on the cage arrangements I would go with an identical hide on each side andf the water bowl near the cool side hide - though if humidity is low you can move it nearer the heat source as they really don't care what the water temps are.

AiSuki,

Sadly the only way to make a heat rock safe is to cut the cord off. Their problem is not so much the entire rock getting too hot ( though they will if unregulated) but that small patches of the rock get far warmer than the rest of it - hot spots. These can be hot enough to burn your snake so we never advise anyone to use them as anything but decoration.

Just to clarify a "hot rock" is a commercially sold resin block with a heating element buried in it - a hot rock is one that's been in the sun and is fine as cage decor.


dr del

[frankykeno]

Please note though the original poster is not saying he/she is using a heat rock. They are simply asking about a rock style enclosure and how it may retain heat from the overhead heating source.

To the OP: The only way to truly know how any hide deals with heat is to monitor it. Grab an Acu-Rite and get some temps from the probe. You can place it for a day or two on top of the hide to get some reads, then tuck it inside the hide to get readings there as well. The other option is a temp gun (a PE-1 or PE-2 should do the trick nicely).