Got my 1st BP

:D. Any other reccommendations to zap some of my humidity?

As for your humidity reading goes, I wouldn't be too stressed at this point, but if you can find another hygrometer or two or borrow from anyone, to compare with, that'll be best. Hygrometer probe, I'm guessing its digital? I hate digital hygrometers even more so with probes, they give me very strange readings. But if it is indeed 70% humidity, I think it shouldn't be a problem unless its causing your enclosure to get wet and gets condensation. If its dry and at 70% it shouldn't pose a problem for them, and they'll get a clean shed everytime.

I recently started a thread on this wondering whats the best to measure humidity since my digital probes are so useless, and stating that my cheap analog ones were much more consistant and accurate. I quote kitademon's response:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kitedemon

I use analogue I have also found that digital ones painfully poor I get readings that are more than 50% apart with some of mine. The things I look for are actually easy a well mounted 'number card' The ones sold for reptiles are often paper and not well mounted so they move. The other thing I look for is a calibration screw so if I test it (salt test is easy EASY and accurate) and it is wrong it can be corrected. I found this one (western instruments brass faced one http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digita.../dp/B0007VWEQA), to be very good out of the box, accurate and consistant (I have 7 all read within 5%) the digital ones are all over the board no two read closer than 7% and many or farther than 20% I can live with 7 but 20 is a bit much.



There are very accurate digital ones avaliable but must be serviced before use and be perfectly clean, they really would be to complicated to use in relation to reptiles and too costly to toss when it was no longer working (http://www.thomassci.com/Instruments...ature-Meter/?=)

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Thank you Ogden. I just ordered two of those hygrometers.

Just a little heads up for anyone else who is interested. Templar is finally in one of the hides I have in the cage. The humidity is down to 60% and the temps are correct. Im so glad that he has calmed down and is relaxing in his hide.

okay. first off, take pictures of your setup. 1 birds eye view should be good enough. I recommend using paper towel instead of bedding for a BP. My BP Mitch LOVES paper towels, they are easy to clean, change, and there's no odors from shavings. Also your tank might be too big. The smaller the tank, the better. I have a 20L tank and i can barely fit a water dish and 2 hides, if you have 4 hides and a big water dish that might be a little too big of an enclosure.

Also to help your snake adjust there is an awesome trick someone taught me from these fourms. Take newspaper and roll individual sheets into loosely crinkled paper balls. then drop a bunch of them in the tank. Then every day or 2 take one piece out at a time. Sounds stupid but it works.

Ill be posting pictures today when I get back from shopping with the girlfriend.

As far as the tank situation goes, I think I did a good job filling up the tank with a bunch of stuff in order to make it "feel" smaller, but when I post pictures you all can give me ideas to what else I can do.

I think for now, it sounds like a pretty decent setup, if maybe a little big. I would recommend just leaving everything the heck alone for a week or two. Just change the water every three four days maybe, otherwise IGNORE it. Unless there's an emergency, he can live with a little inconvenience. Letting him get used to the new smells of your place, getting used to a new human monster that's going to be poking and prodding him will help him a lot. Sometime this is even more important than having the temps one or two degrees off!

As a side thing, I would recommend grabbing an Iris brand tub in about a 15- 20 gallon size and soldering some hole in it for aeration and building a "mini cage" setup with it. Get a zoomed dimmer, an ultratherm under tank heater and a temp gun, as well as a couple hides and a 4-5" ceramic cooking ramekin. These things are relatively inexpensive and very portable! I put all my babies in really simple setups and I always have a TON of extra hides. I make most of mine from microwave lasagna dishes, they are black and lightweight and super easy to melt a door into with a soldering iron! Or RBI sells some good hides for most sizes for balls, babies love the mini size.
This way, you can experiment with humidty and temps without messing with your snake's cage and if you can obtain better results with this, you can move him into a smaller, better contained environment. If the cage works out fine, then no problem, you've got a really easy to transport setup and backup cage in case you need to bring him to the vet or take him to another location in case of a power outage. I have carriers and emergency supplies for all my pets, including my snakes! They mean just as much to me as my cats and dog and having that stuff clean and ready to go means I don't worry about disasters as far as mu snakes are involved! My house occasionally loses power in winter and the first few years, i really stressed about the snakes getting too cold. I had those shipping heat packs, but didn't have enough tubs to transport the snakes in. I have since found a few friends without their own reptiles who are willing to keep the snakes if they have electricity while my power is out! I just return the favor by babysitting their dogs while they are out of town.

Also, this is my quarantine setup for new snakes. The tubs are really easy to clean and I always have a few back up ramekins and hides of the same kind as are in the snake's cage so I can bleach & scrub them if they get poop on them!

Sorry to ramble, but I have noticed how fussy my first ball is compared to my later animals. It is probably not JUST because I was always freaking out over him, but I bet that didn't help! He has since mellowed out, but I'm pretty sure my inexperience and worry didn't do him too many favors while he was young. I wish you the best of luck and just don't worry too much about the details right now. Everything will work out, you just have to fine tune and probably spend a chunk of change getting everything squared away! XD (That's the last lesson. These guys pretty much never stop costing money, ha ha!)

Sorry all. I'll be posting pictures tomorrow of Templar and his new mansion. I went today and got 2 new hides and now Im done messing with his cage. Not going to do anything else to it till Sunday when I try to pick him up and then feed after a few hours after I handle him. Sunday will be one week since I bought him.

Darkbloodwyvern - Having a temp gun is amazing. I love my temp gun. Yeah, I've been meaning to get a steralite tub and a soldering iron. I do have an ultratherm uth as a spare incase anything happens to my flexwatt. Thanks for the tips. As far as touching him since I got him. I'll be honest - when I put him in his cage I haven't touched him since. I've been wanting to touch him so damn badly. He's been in his Exo Terra 2 in 1 hide. The hide that comes apart from the top. I bought 2 log hides to replace the other 2 smaller hides. So, maybe he'll like those as well.