Hey KSB keepers....

[ChrisBowsman]

I have been reading up on sand boas, and so far, they seem really cool. Is there anything about them that is not obvious until you've owned one for awhile?

I don't care about having display snakes, if I want them displayed, I'll get them out and display them

What kind of setups have worked for you guys? I see that an adult male can stay in a 10 gal aquarium, but do they do better in a tub? Is aspen as good as sand as a substrate?

[Shelby]

Sand boas are pretty easy.. sometimes they refuse food for awhile, but generally they're pretty good eaters. They're usually very docile.

I keep mine all in tubs with several inches of aspen. I would not recommend sand.. there is risk of impaction, and it's harder for them to burrow in it. Just because they're 'sand' boas doesn't mean they need to live in sand.

[Patrick Long]

They are quite interesting little snakes, like April said, they sometimes refuse food, but I see them going in spurts, (eat for multiple weeks then not eat for multiple weeks). I keep mine on walnut shell, I know not a lot of people like that stuff, but they like it a lot.

[wilomn]

I've kept and bred them for a few years now. The girls tend to eat almost every time I offer food. The boy, onces they're adults, will go off feed on occasion.

I keep them on sand and have never had a problem. They do eat some with their food but it is passed when they poop.

I use 10 gal tanks, keep 1.2 to a tank in about 5 inches of sand with a 25 watt red bulb above one end of the tank and the water on the other.

I get babies every year. In fact they're breeding now. I'll have babies the end of June or beginning of July.

I don't see them often, they tend to stay just under the surface, but you can tell they're in there because the sand and water bowls get moved around.

[Shelby]

Do you keep yours together all the time or just in the breeding season? I know the breeder I got mine from said it's ok to keep this species together, but I don't know really.

[wilomn]

Do you keep yours together all the time or just in the breeding season? I know the breeder I got mine from said it's ok to keep this species together, but I don't know really.

They've been together for the last few years.

[Patrick Long]

Wes, Even as babies you house them together?

[Repti-Rob]

I keep mine all in tubs with several inches of aspen. I would not recommend sand.. there is risk of impaction, and it's harder for them to burrow in it. Just because they're 'sand' boas doesn't mean they need to live in sand.

I keep mine in tubs with aspen also. When I first got a KSB it got impacted badly and required vet attention. After moving to aspen they love it and spend all day tunneling through it. They all seem to have great personalities also

[wilomn]

Wes, Even as babies you house them together?

Yup. I get 50 to 100 babies a year and I keep them in groups of about 25.

They all get put in separate bags for feeding then back in a communal tank. Sometimes with the little guys I use aspen or pine because I dump the bedding weekly instead of just straining it, but I have kept them in sand as well.

The adults are fed separately in small plastic containers.

The only problems I've ever had were with the mothers eating babies immediately after birth. Twice I've gone to bed in the wee hours of the morning, having grown tired of waiting for the last two or three babies to be born, and found a mother with lumps in her belly and no babies in the cage.

[Patrick Long]

Well Wes, I think you just freed up a tub in my rack!!!!!!