under tank heater

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Originally Posted by Jack_Hammer

KLG, bp-pandora asked for some advise. That is just what I did. I'm not here to argue with you or anyone else. I simply gave some advise. Some pretty good advise if you ask me...

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Trust me...I have much more to do with my time than argue with you or anyone else on the internet, so please don't think that's what I was attempting to do. She was simply asking how to reattach the heater, and like you, I also gave her advice. We simply have two different viewpoints on effective use of undertank heaters.

Agreed?

K

Agreed. :D

I use metal heat-duct tape; regular duct tape did not work for me, because it stretched and my UTH was not flush with the tank floor. The actual metal duct tape is, well, metal. :)
My UTHs touch the bottom of my cages underneath, but i use a rheostat and they never get so hot that they could burn the snake. I use a thin layer of cypress substrate and the heat goes nicely through that.

Reptile heat-pads MUST touch the bottom, they have to stick...

UTH + Thermostat + on only 1 cage = not worth it

UTH/Heat Tape + Thermostat + Rack System = very worth it

Get an overhead lamp if you are only heating one animal in one enclosure. UTHs don't raise the air temp in aquariums, and often just bake the urates inside your snake before they even come out.

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Originally Posted by elevatethis

UTH + Thermostat + on only 1 cage = not worth it

UTH/Heat Tape + Thermostat + Rack System = very worth it

Get an overhead lamp if you are only heating one animal in one enclosure. UTHs don't raise the air temp in aquariums, and often just bake the urates inside your snake before they even come out.

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Wow, news to me??? .... Before I had racks I always used UTH's and thermostats in aquariums and plastic cages with great success. Perfect temps for eating and breeding every year.

Contrary to your statment, in my experience, over head heating seemed to scorch the air and thwart any attempts at maintaining good humidity.

Glad that you have a system that works for you!

-adam

overhead heating is good if you can find a way to keep humidity in vai covering the top or a humid hide for shedding. But other than that, yeah, lamps dry the crap out of any cage setup.

One heat lamp with the right wattage bulb and a humidity solution is much more cost-effective than a decent thermostat, heat pad, etc. Thats what I was trying to say, not debating whether it was successful or not. I know both methods are do-able.

I work at a pet shop that specializes in herps and exotics. A few weeks ago a young ball python came in that was horribly impacted- on one of its own urates. Short version of the long story is that the heatpad developed a hot spot, and basically cooked the inside of the snakes bowel. The urate we got of him was like an impression of whatever gland that secretes them. Looked pretty painful...

was the animal burned? seems like it would have to be a pretty hot spot to do that...

It wasn't burned at all, thats what threw us off so much.

One question, bp_pandora: Are you using a glass or plastic cage? If you're using a glass tank, you may not want it to stick. I cracked a glass tank by sticking one of those to the bottom of a tank.