Night viewing light.

I'm going to be getting a ball python soon and was wanting to get a light for at night so I won't have to turn the actual light on. Not necessarily one for heat, just something that can be kept on for viewing that won't disturb the snake.

I use black incandescent bulbs. They do add heat but I use them with a rheostat (lamp dimmer switch) & keep them low...my spotted python LOVES to bask
under it all night long, & some of my other snakes like them too (especially in colder weather, my Trans Pecos rat snakes are nocturnal desert species that use
them also.) Black bulbs add a purplish light, nothing bright.

I use the same lights Bogertophis uses. On thermostats. As long as ALL heat sources are regulated by a thermostat you'll have no issues.

If you want lights that don't also produce heat (which you might, if you have other heat sources dialed in already or if your house is warm enough that you don't want to add more heat to the cage, etc) you can get LED strip lights in a kit with a dimmer. You can set them really dim so that you can just see in, but it's not actually any brighter than a night with a full moon. They're pretty inexpensive. Just exercise a little common sense in how you mount the strip. They generally have adhesive on the back, so you need to either permanently cover or remove the adhesive before attaching them inside some other way, or stick them to the outside of the cage facing in. Don't use the adhesive to stick them to the inside of the cage!!

In any case, they're inexpensive and if you decide you don't like them on your cage you can use them lots of other places.

Like it's been mentioned before, LEDs are a great accessory for a terrarium. I did a lighting setup back in 14 and they all still work perfectly! Here's the write up:
https://ball-pythons.net/forums/show...a-AP-T12/page8

Also, here's a study on what light spectrum BP can see. It's quite interesting.
https://ball-pythons.net/forums/show...um-can-BPs-see

I used to use the black heat "night time" bulb when I first got him - but once it burned out I switched to a CHE on both sides of the cage. I don't get to see him as much at night, but I'm also not up as late now that I am out of collage. He also *loves* to wedge his head in the grove of the sliding glass door of his AP cage and the only way I can prevent this is to hang a dark towel over that side of the cage (on the outside). He seems to think this makes it a solid wall and moves to the other side to surf the walls where his head does not fit...snek not that smart

he wall surfs from about ten pm to midnight then goes back in a hide. Does it longer as he gets hungry, but usually once the "curtain" comes down he finds somewhere else to be. So I can't actually see him even if I had a night bulb