Multiple burms per enclosure?

Alright I have some young burms, all less than 4 feet, all less than 8 months old. If I wanted to house more than one snake in one enclosure, what minimum size enclosure would you recommend and what else would you recommend? Would age/size differences in the snakes create problems? Should they be the same gender or will that not matter? How many burms would be the max to house together?

Thanks.

Why would you want to house them together?

Many on this site do not recommend housing snakes together as it takes a lot of effort to make sure each snake has its needs met correctly. Housing snakes together causes more problems than it solves and for most people, it just isn't worth it. How will you make sure each snake has proper places to thermoregulate. If there is a favorite spot in the cage, the two snakes will compete for it, often stressing the snakes. Some snakes go off feed if housed together. If one regurgitates, how will you know which one it is? If one gets sick, the other is almost guaranteed to get sick as well. You could have aggression issues. If one of your snakes is not sexed properly and you house a female with a male, the female could begin breeding too early.

So many problems and I just don't see any benefit to the snakes being together. My advice is to house them separately.

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Originally Posted by Jay_Bunny

Why would you want to house them together?

Many on this site do not recommend housing snakes together as it takes a lot of effort to make sure each snake has its needs met correctly. Housing snakes together causes more problems than it solves and for most people, it just isn't worth it. How will you make sure each snake has proper places to thermoregulate. If there is a favorite spot in the cage, the two snakes will compete for it, often stressing the snakes. Some snakes go off feed if housed together. If one regurgitates, how will you know which one it is? If one gets sick, the other is almost guaranteed to get sick as well. You could have aggression issues. If one of your snakes is not sexed properly and you house a female with a male, the female could begin breeding too early.

So many problems and I just don't see any benefit to the snakes being together. My advice is to house them separately.

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To be honest I want to house them together because its easier to deal with (physically and financially) one big enclosure as oppose to two slightly smaller enclosures. If I wanted to house two female burms in one 8'x3'x24'' cage it would be easier than one burm per 6'x3'x24'' cage.

As for thermoregulating, if there's a big enough temperature gradient in the cage, how would it be a problem for the snakes to accomplish this? Sexing wouldnt be an issue either because I get my burms screened and sexed by a local vet along with me popping their vent for gender.

It seems like proper husbandry of the snakes would keep a lot of these problems from arising. Please dont take this as me dismissing your post, but maybe it wouldnt be as bad as you think it would be as long as proper husbandry is practiced.

Thanks.

If you put two in the same enclosure you are going to have a big issue come feeding time. Really big issues once they get big. Also, what if one happens to bite and latch onto you? You would not only have to worry about that one but the other one in the cage also with all the action going on at that time. Seems better to me make two 8 foot long enclosure's, put one in each and stack them if your looking to save space?

Proper husbandry won't fix all of the problems. There will still be the issue of the snakes stressing each other out. In the wild, these snakes would not come in such close contact with each other (unless it was breeding season). And feeding time will also be a lot harder. You will have to feed each snake separately. This can become difficult with larger snakes and when you open that cage, its bad enough to have one large, hungry snake ready to eat, imagine two!

In the end, you are going to do what you want to do, but I'm just giving you my opinion.

I appreciate everyone's input, I really do. I will probably just end up getting separate enclosures for each burm. I didnt think it would have been that big of a deal especially when I see a lot of breeders housing multiple burms together with seemingly no problems.

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

I appreciate everyone's input, I really do. I will probably just end up getting separate enclosures for each burm. I didnt think it would have been that big of a deal especially when I see a lot of breeders housing multiple burms together with seemingly no problems.

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I think you made the right choice to house them seperately except while breeding :gj: Just curious as to what breeders you have seen house their burms together all the time? I could be wrong in my assumptions and I am willing to be proven wrong.

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Originally Posted by Boanerges

I think you made the right choice to house them seperately except while breeding :gj: Just curious as to what breeders you have seen house their burms together all the time? I could be wrong in my assumptions and I am willing to be proven wrong.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_BjNHOjU3c

Here is one breeder I found on youtube. He houses both of those burms together and eventually bred them to a decent sized healthy clutch. He also has close to 70 different snakes in his collection of varying species so I feel like he knows his stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZNswPChp44

Here is another breeder housing multiple snakes (not burms however) in single enclosures.


These are just two off the top of my head where multiple snakes are housed together by successful breeders. I felt like if they could do it why not me?

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

If I wanted to house two female burms in one 8'x3'x24'' cage it would be easier than one burm per 6'x3'x24'' cage.

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When I house multiple animals together, I follow this rule:

If a lone animal needs X amount of space, I need a cage that is BIGGER than 2X total space to house 2 animals.

If you could house a female burm in a 6x3x2, by my personal preferences, I'd want at least a 12x3x2 to house two, and preferably bigger.

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_BjNHOjU3c

Here is one breeder I found on youtube. He houses both of those burms together and eventually bred them to a decent sized healthy clutch. He also has close to 70 different snakes in his collection of varying species so I feel like he knows his stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZNswPChp44

Here is another breeder housing multiple snakes (not burms however) in single enclosures.


These are just two off the top of my head where multiple snakes are housed together by successful breeders. I felt like if they could do it why not me?

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First video you posted he says at 39 - 40 secs into the video each snake will have its own big enclousure in a month or something like that. Didn't watch the second one yet. But if you really wanted to do it you could always email the people who are doing it with success asking them what their opinions are on doing it since they will have first hand experience on the pro's and con's of doing it.


Watched the second video and in that video by the way he is talking those boa's are breeding.

If the financial aspect is what makes you house those snakes together (trying to put as many as possible in one enclosure) maybe you should rethink owning multiple snakes :gj:

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How many burms would be the max to house together?

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To be honest I want to house them together because its easier to deal with (physically and financially)

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Originally Posted by Deborah

If the financial aspect is what makes you house those snakes together (trying to put as many as possible in one enclosure) maybe you should rethink owning multiple snakes :gj:

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I was waiting for someone to bring up this point. Its not that I cant afford to own multiple snakes and buy mansions for each snake, I just would like to go a cheaper route. If I avoid spending $4-500 + plus shipping on an enclosure, I will. I live a comfortable lifestyle because I avoid unnecessary spending.

When it comes down to it, you should house your snakes in separate enclosures. It's a necessary action IMO. Even if you have to spend a bit more money. Let your snakes live a comfortable life.

Has anyone that posted here ever housed more than one snake together aside from breeding? I feel like everyone is posting fears based off hearsay and not experience.

If you do a search, you'll find a metric ton of threads telling people why housing two snakes together is a bad idea.

Yes, people have experiance in housing them together and it's normally a bad one. I personally housed some young pythons together when I was starting out, because the pet store said it was fine and I didn't know any better.

The less dominant pythons were always trying to escape, feeding was a nightmare. The dominant pythons would climb over the lesser ones causing stress(that's how they dominate each other, it's not as obvious as dogs snapping at each other) and the less dominant ones would often regurge.

Also, there has been cases of a snake eating the cagemate. I "assume" that would happen after a squable where one actually bites the other, causing the feeding reflex to trigger. Then it would be coil-squeeze-eat time.

I've had a snake bit ITSELF during feeding. It just got excited and missed the strike, hit itself and bit down and coiled up. It was a nightmare to untangle it from itself. And this was with a ball python, less than 4 ft long. With a burmese, I can imagine it would end poorly. And with a second burm in a cage, what would happen with one hitting the other snake by accident? Now you'd REALLY have a mess.

If you want to feed seperately, you'd be moving a snake every week, and it would be a hassle to move a large hungry burmese that can most likely smell the prey you've gotten for it. Then move it back after it's eaten, and hope it doesn't regurge on you(because gross and ewww, slimy regurge).

I'm only laying it all out since you asked "hearsay and not experiance". If you're bound and determined to just do whatever you want despite all the advice, evidence, and help offered to you, then you'll do it. It's your burmese pythons and we can't come to your house and MAKE you house them seperately. BUt if you did, and one of the posted scenarios did happen, how foolish are you going to feel?

We don't sit around thinking of ways to make keeping reptiles cost more or be less fun or be more of a hassle. We post advice based on what we ourselves have gone through, things we've done, things we've seen happen over the years. We only want to help people who have questions! And I count myself as having questions, despite all the reptiles and breeding and such I've done, I still have tons of things I don't know yet and I love having a place to come and ask for advice.

I have never housed my own snakes together but I have known some that do. Sometimes there can be problems, sometimes there won't be. Housing snakes together doesn't gaurantee something bad will happen but there are bad things that can happen by housing them together that would NEVER happen if they are housed seperatly. That is why people always reccomend not to house them together. You could put two snakes together and they could live their whole lives with nothing bad happen or you could house two snakes together and one could be dead in a week. It's the seatbelt rule. You don't wear a seatbelt because you are going to get into an accident, you wear one to save you incase you get into an accident. You could spend you whole life and never get into an accident or you could be in one tomorrow. So basically if you house snakes together you run the risk of something bad happening but if you don't house them together, then those risks can't happen. When you look at how long snakes live, with housing them together, time isn't on you side for something bad to happen.

Like I have said, I have never house any snakes together myself but i have know people that have. Some of them have never had a problem, but there have been some that have had snakes injured and even eatten.

Why would you want to run the risk of something bad happening to save a few bucks when you have mentioned that you could house them all seperatly.

I don't consider giving each snake it's own enclosure "unnecessary spending". If you can't afford to house an animal correctly, why get the animal?

Yes,there are people who have successfully housed two or more snakes together for reasons other than breeding but 99% of the time those were not large species and the keepers had years of experience with each snake and knew how to judge the animals stress levels.

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Originally Posted by van_garret2000

I have never housed my own snakes together but I have known some that do. Sometimes there can be problems, sometimes there won't be. Housing snakes together doesn't gaurantee something bad will happen but there are bad things that can happen by housing them together that would NEVER happen if they are housed seperatly. That is why people always reccomend not to house them together. You could put two snakes together and they could live their whole lives with nothing bad happen or you could house two snakes together and one could be dead in a week. It's the seatbelt rule. You don't wear a seatbelt because you are going to get into an accident, you wear one to save you incase you get into an accident. You could spend you whole life and never get into an accident or you could be in one tomorrow. So basically if you house snakes together you run the risk of something bad happening but if you don't house them together, then those risks can't happen. When you look at how long snakes live, with housing them together, time isn't on you side for something bad to happen.

Like I have said, I have never house any snakes together myself but i have know people that have. Some of them have never had a problem, but there have been some that have had snakes injured and even eatten.

Why would you want to run the risk of something bad happening to save a few bucks when you have mentioned that you could house them all seperatly.

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I wouldnt really house them together for their entire 25+ year life. It would really only be for the next few years so they would actually be separated before either of them got huge.


Thanks for your comment though. You brought up some good points.

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Originally Posted by Jay_Bunny

I don't consider giving each snake it's own enclosure "unnecessary spending". If you can't afford to house an animal correctly, why get the animal?

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I can absolutely afford an enclosure for each animal, no problem. I just think if I can house two together in one enclosure safely then why buy two?

Im 100% for my animal's welfare and health being excellent. This is why I came and asked what you guys thought in the first place.

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

I can absolutely afford an enclosure for each animal, no problem. I just think if I can house two together in one enclosure safely then why buy two?

Im 100% for my animal's welfare and health being excellent. This is why I came and asked what you guys thought in the first place.

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Just buy two enclosures then :)

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

This is why I came and asked what you guys thought in the first place.

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I have a book about consulting firms. Businesses will pay consulting firms for opinions, with the idea that it will make things better.

The book deals with "what happens when the advice you seek is ignored".

In general, if your advice is ignored, it means you didn't charge enough for it. Maybe BP.net members should start charging to give answers in threads, lol.

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

I was waiting for someone to bring up this point. Its not that I cant afford to own multiple snakes and buy mansions for each snake, I just would like to go a cheaper route. If I avoid spending $4-500 + plus shipping on an enclosure, I will. I live a comfortable lifestyle because I avoid unnecessary spending.

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There is not option for a comfortable lifestyle with unnecessary spending when you own burmese pythons. People that go the "cheaper" route are the people that end up on the news and give the good reptile keepers a bad rep. I see no point in housing two pythons in the same cage if there not breeding. Feeding two large pythons in the same cage would not be fun. 400 to 500 dollars is not that bad knowing that you have a quality cage and your burm is happy and safe

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

Has anyone that posted here ever housed more than one snake together aside from breeding? I feel like everyone is posting fears based off hearsay and not experience.

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I accidentally offered a rat to a boa that was in the same enclosure with another boa, and both grabbed on to the rat. Needless to say, it was very tough to separate them. Luckily, neither was hurt, but it could have easily went the other way. If you do decide to house them together, which I don't suggest, make sure you separate them when feeding. This would likely be pretty tough once they get some size to them.

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Originally Posted by Denial

There is not option for a comfortable lifestyle with unnecessary spending when you own burmese pythons. People that go the "cheaper" route are the people that end up on the news and give the good reptile keepers a bad rep.

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Youre going out on a limb comparing me to reptile owners that " end up on the news and give the good reptile keepers a bad rep" considering you and no one on this forum at all knows anyhthing about me other than my 20~ some odd posts.

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Feeding two large pythons in the same cage would not be fun.

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Where did you get the idea that I would be feeding them together?

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Originally Posted by Wh00h0069

I accidentally offered a rat to a boa that was in the same enclosure with another boa, and both grabbed on to the rat. Needless to say, it was very tough to separate them. Luckily, neither was hurt, but it could have easily went the other way. If you do decide to house them together, which I don't suggest, make sure you separate them when feeding. This would likely be pretty tough once they get some size to them.

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There's no way I would feed them together. Just like I told the other poster above you, I dont know where you guys got the idea I would be feeding both snakes at the same time in the same enclosure. I think this is another example of the posters here grasping onto the worst possible situation and trying to use that as a basis for a response instead of experience. The expression Ill use for this is fear mongering

This is getting ridiculous.

tword op, all the advice was excellent you should really take it and use it, there is no less is more with burms what are u gonna feed a 12 foot snake in? and then how are u gonna move it when it still wants to eat for the next 6 hours? my 6ft retic stays in feeding mode for a good 8-12 hours after eating and i couldent imagine touching him simply due to the danger

also i feel u have some seriously wrong info when it comes to burms period, a 6x2 isnt big enough for a female, thats a males size enclosure and alittle on the small side for that. trust me spend the money now and enjoy them at diffrent times very few people can appropriatly house multiple snakes together.. it CAN be done iv seen and read it but it was NEVER done for your reasons... EVER the people who do it have been working with reptiles for years and know their animals and dont simply try to save space or money..

i also noticed u get defencive when money is brought up, bud u didnt get two hamsters your talking 10-15 feet snakes here in the first 2 years there is no skimping theres minimal like racks and what not but u need to be able to support both (which u say u can) so i highly reccommend two diffrent enclosures for the welfare of the animals which u say u care about

Im just saying if you want to go a cheaper route maybe you should of thought more into getting two ball pythons or corn snakes. You came here asking opinions I gave you mine. You want two burms then buy two cages. Theres no reason to house them together other then breeding. Ever seen two large constrictors fight? Its a scary thing. In 2009 I tried to breed two reticulated pythons together. When I put the male in the cage the female flipped out on my male and they started to fight and I had to get in there and get them off of each other. I assumed I had missexed my female and thought it was just two males going at each other but I had three other people sex them and they were a male female pair. Some snakes just dont like each other. If you were going live in a 6X2 box would you want company taking up half of it?

The OP will end up doing whatever he likes in the end.

Why bother to show up and ask advice, if when everyone tells you their opinion based on fact, on things they've seen, on things they were told by others who experianced them... you'll just go "Pfft, you're just fear-mongering!"

I asked about it already, how are you going to move a 12 ft hungry snake to feed it.. then manage to get that 12 ft snake in feeding mode back into the cage with the OTHER feeding mode snake in it, when you aren't even suposed to handle them right after feeding? Why would you want to?

People here (as stated before) are not here to diss you or naysay your idea just because we want to make life difficult. Most everyone on the site are offering you advice because WE CARE ABOUT THE REPTILES. If you aren't thinking of the snake's needs and safety first, then you've missed the point of owning a pet.

You said you'd probably house them seperately, and that's great IF you do it. If you choose to ignore all the advice and house them together and something goes wrong, you won't get a whole lot of sympathy from the herp world. At BEST you'll have a possibly injured snake.. at WORST you will be injured and then we get another headline about how "dangerous" pythons are.

Everyone is telling you it's a bad idea to house them together and that it should not be done. You say you can afford proper housing/care for each snake. Why are you still pushing to house them together? Reading through this thread...I would say your questions have been clearly answered. Best of luck to you.

I said I was going to get separate enclosures, see:

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Originally Posted by Sanchez

I appreciate everyone's input, I really do. I will probably just end up getting separate enclosures for each burm. I didnt think it would have been that big of a deal especially when I see a lot of breeders housing multiple burms together with seemingly no problems.

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Everybody is still making posts so Im just responding to the posts. This is a valid discussion I think and its funny because everyone is getting butthurt over the whole thing. Im getting separate enclosures. There. Im done with this thread.

:rolleyes:

And thus why so many people stop bothering to answer people's questions on forums. "Butthurt" because we respond to comments like "people are just fear-mongering" and accusations that everyone is just making things up after folks take the time to spell out reasons why it's a bad idea.
"Should I do XX?"
"No"

"Why shouldn't I do XX?"
"Answers why"

"Well I think you're making it up"
"Screw off"

That's how it would happen on any less friendly site. On some sites you'd get called names to begin with for suggesting XX in the first place. On the friendly helpful site, people continue to offer advice and reasons why, and get called 'butthurt'.

Thanks for that. Good luck in the future.

i am truly sorry u where able to aquire these animals.. a few things should be cleared up because im assuming these are your first snakes..

1) when you have someone asking if they can house two of any snakes together its bad.. especially a burm.. sorry noone is "butthurt" your talking potentially deadly animals.. not hamsters..

2) your reason was one of the poorest iv seen.. you didnt get two balls.. or corns.. again u got two very expensive animals and when u start looking for ways to cut corners again that is a red flag to the experienced who have posted..

3) your all around attitude like said is the reason youv gotten some of the responses.. you would have seen a huge swing in attitude if we wherent talking about burms or a large boid.. because imo if you get them you should already know these basic husbandry things.. like when a new keeper asks for proper retic temps.. or if they should free handle a hot to tame them down.. these just arnt things that should need an answer if your taking on an animal like this..

so if i where you i would get each its own enclosure and do alot.. ALOT of reading on these types of snakes and dont stop learning and please for the love of the snake dont shoot down the advice of people who know what they are talking about because unlike the goverment and media they tell u the truth and arnt "fear mongering" like u seem to feel

I am not sure if i should enter this debate but I will post what I have seen/experienced.

I have always housed my burms separately.

I have housed baby boas together for a few months with no ill effects (under a year old). I would remove them during feeding time.

I have housed ball pythons for years together with no ill effects... once again, i separated during feeding.

I know of people who have housed burms same size together with no ill effects.

I know of people who housed 6 boas all over 4 ft together in a huge enclosure with no ill effects.

With my burms, I have preferred to keep them in a tupperwear while waiting to purchase a larger enclosure (which is usually a very short amount of time) because they are so large and if an accident ever did happen, i couldn't pull two 10-11 ft snakes off of each other... PLUSSS if something was to happen they are my pets #1 and I would be sad to lose them, #2 they cost me a lot of money, and #3, I don't want to have to rush to the exotic vet which is even MORE money.

Personally, if you had no choice I would separate them and put them in big tubs (which are very cheap at walmart) until you can afford an enclosure... after-all, wouldn't two 6 ft enclosures cost the same as one 12 ft enclosure? In my area, you can find 4ft visions for 80-150 and 6 ft ones for nearly the same price. Keep your eyes open for deals. You don't don't need to take short cuts to save money, you just have to be a savvy shopper.