Ricky's Reptile Enclosure

Hello extremely new here but I was curious if anyone on this site has an enclosure made by Ricky's Reptile Enclosure. What is your thoughts on it?

I know I will, probably, get someone on here to say you should search for it. I did a search and nothing came up so that is why I'm posting.

Also, the reason why Im asking this is because I really like the enclosure he and his company makes but I don't know if it's overpriced for what it is and what not.

And just in case anyone asks, no I do not currently own any snakes at this time. I am wanting to pick up a ball python first and then after about a few months to a year pick up a green tree python. But before I pick up my snake(s) I want to get a damn good enclosure and other essentials I will need in order to make my new friend feel at home.

Sorry for the long ass first post.

Also yes I have owned a snake before. I used to have a corn snake when I was like 6 years old. I gave it away because I didn't know how to properly care for it. I am currently 24 years old and much better suited to own and take care of a snake.

One google search - http://rickysreptileenclosures.com/

As for enclosures I like the Zilla one that you can get from petsmart and I think you can order them from online too. We have our corn in the 30 gallon one and I am lookingto get the 40 gallon for Hera.

And if you haven't already hit up the CARESHEET. And welcome to the forums:welcome:

I have read the care sheet numerous amount of times as well as other people's care sheets as well as watched damn near everyone's youtube videos pertaining to ball pythons. I also ordered The complete Ball Python book.

Thank you for the welcome. I really want a ball python but I am going to wait till the reptile show that is coming to my city next month to talk to some breeders and who knows I may walk out with a ball python as well as a cage and some other things.

Oh and I was wondering if any of YOU have this cage setup and if you do could you explain to me the pros and if any the cons. I saw the videos of peoples set ups for this cage but I wanted to get anymore information from owners of this cage.

Thank you for the information in advance.

Brace yourself for a slam...

It looks really nice, but I see the following negatives:
* Too transparent - 5 of those 6 sides should probably be opaque
* Overpriced
* Too limited - sized only for ball pythons, they should have a more diverse line.
* Nice tagline, but the guy "Ricky" needs to hire someone with more charisma to do their videos, or he should take lessons from the guys at BHB who do Snakebytes. I mean REALLY, compare the two. Ricky reminds me of Sylar from Heroes, in his socially inept watch repair phase.

Two much better, and still good looking enclosure manufactureres come to mind:
Sly Plastics - similar to Boaphile, but with cleaner, more modern aesthetics.
Animal Plastics - VERY well loved, and endorsed by many. Clean aesthetics, and neat in a stack.

Thanks LizardPants. I am checking out those companies now. Also you didn't offend me at al with your comments or the slam wasn't hard. I just wanted a little information on what you all thought of the enclosure. Thanks again.

Also, what is the right size cage I should be going for? This will be a cage That I will keep my BP in for its entire life from young to adult.

Also I like Sly Products and Animal Plastics. Thanks again Lizard for the websites.

i dont think you really want to get a big tank for a baby ball ..... i bought a 17 qt tub for this baby ball and he would not eat in it babies like more of a confined space i down sized the tub and that week he took to eating and been consistent ever since ....ill wait till he grows a few more inches before i upgrade his tub

I would also suggest tubs for neonates to sub-adults. Start off with a shoe box and two hides one cool side, one hot (don't worry about placement too much, 2 of mine move their hides where they want them). Move up to larger size tubs, and hides as your snake grows. This will be very inexpensive, and you'll have more time to shop around for the right enclosure that suits your snake and your needs.

Tubs:
Iris - My favorite because they seem to keep the same design year after year, whereas the other two change: Container Store, office supply stores
Rubbermaid: Target
Sterilite: Target

Hides:
Reptile Basics

I would say a 48x24x(12|18|24) would work for a large adult female at 1400+ g. Put a divider in, and it will hold two sub-adults, one on either side. Don't forget 2 hides each.
Height: your BP doesn't need a lot of height, and will do fine in a tub that is only 6" tall. You can use an enclosure that is 18" tall (rather than 12") so that it is easier to view and clean. If you use a 24" enclosure, you have more versatility later on; if your collection grows and you move the BPs to a rack, you can convert the enclosures to use with arboreal snakes such as GTPs or carpets. The taller you go (24" MAX), the more important it will be to add items to the enclosure to make your BP feel more secure. I wouldn't add items that would allow the BP to climb higher than a few inches.

Thanks for the help. Once I get the snake and the enclosure + everything else for him/her to feel comfortable Ill post pictures of everything.

I already know the color morph I want - Lemon blast. Freakin' love this color morph.

Saw NERDs Granite Yellow Blast and now I dunno if I want the granite one or the regular yellow blast. =D.

I was wondering about Ricky's tanks as well. I think it looks great. I actually emailed him a while back just to ask him some questions about BP's and he called me back! He's really nice. It's a home base business. He reminds me of Ben Steller, from Something About Mary. LOL!

That's awesome. Every time I emailed him I got an email back within 20 minutes. I LOVE that so freakin' much. That's one thing that Im really particular on is customer service since I work in customer server currently. I can't stand poor customer service.

Love the fact when I email someone in a business and I get an email back within minutes or even some time during the same day I email them. Can't stand it when I get an email back a few days later.

Here are some reviews

http://rickysreptileenclosures.com/reviews

Keep well,

Ricky's Reptile Enclosures

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LizardPants

Brace yourself for a slam...

It looks really nice, but I see the following negatives:
* Too transparent - 5 of those 6 sides should probably be opaque
* Overpriced
* Too limited - sized only for ball pythons, they should have a more diverse line.
* Nice tagline, but the guy "Ricky" needs to hire someone with more charisma to do their videos, or he should take lessons from the guys at BHB who do Snakebytes. I mean REALLY, compare the two. Ricky reminds me of Sylar from Heroes, in his socially inept watch repair phase.

Two much better, and still good looking enclosure manufactureres come to mind:
Sly Plastics - similar to Boaphile, but with cleaner, more modern aesthetics.
Animal Plastics - VERY well loved, and endorsed by many. Clean aesthetics, and neat in a stack.

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Hello,

We do make several opaque showcases, the clear is only an option :)

As for size, we have tested several different sizes of our showcases and enclosures and the sizes we stock has proven to be the best! We DO make custom size showcases all the time though.

I agree, I'm not an actor. Actually, the videos are very boring. BUT - they do give proper care information which was the intention :) Brian with SnakebytesTV is much better, but he also has a film crew, editor and production assistants... He also uses one of our clear showcases. Have you seen it in his videos?

Anyhoo... keep well and have an amazing day!

-Ricky

Yes Ricky, but why are the SOO expensive? They seem very over priced. And how have you tested a square box to be better than a longer one? Seriously, I'm asking not slamming on your stuff. Heck you don't see me making anything.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lferg

Yes Ricky, but why are the SOO expensive? They seem very over priced. And how have you tested a square box to be better than a longer one? Seriously, I'm asking not slamming on your stuff. Heck you don't see me making anything.

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Hello,

Well, the price of the showcases are determined by a few things.

Firstly is the materials. The showcases are made from high end acrylic materials, 1/4" thick. The hinge is acrylic also. These materials do cost a fair bit, which obviously makes the show case cost more then PVCX, which is a cheap material.

Second is time. In order to bend a sheet of 1/4" acrylic without it breaking, bubbling or looking messy takes time. Each showcase takes a few hours to make, and is made by very skilled craftsmen/women. PVCX is very simple to bend, which is why PVCX is cheaper then acrylic. This isn't just my opinion - it's a cold hard fact that PVCX is much easier to work with.

Third is packaging. Because the showcases are fragile they require more packaging then PVCX. Each showcase is packaged with foam corners, in a box like any other enclosure on the market. However, they are also crated individually with wood - this costs and takes time.

For some reviews, you can CLICK HERE

Now, the second thing you wanted to know was how we tested.

What we did was produce several sizes of showcase. We then let normal female ball pythons live in the showcases. We tested for eating habits, amount of time doing natural things such as hiding vs looking around. We tested for biting (or aggressive behavior), shedding and defecating. We conducted these tests over a few months. The showcase which we sell proved to be the best in all the categories. And just to be clear... once we got the results we wanted from this size enclosure (20x24x18) we made sure to test it with various snakes to make sure the results were the same...which they were.

We take our products very seriously, and we spend several thousand dollars on testing and prototypes before anything hit the market.

I hope this helps :)

I think for the price of one of their adult cages, you could get a 6 tier rack from Animal Plastics and have 6x the snakes...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kingofspades

I think for the price of one of their adult cages, you could get a 6 tier rack from Animal Plastics and have 6x the snakes...

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Sounds about right! I think for the price of our single door showcase you can also buy 2 from boaphile.

However, you just won't get a genuine high quality Ricky's Reptile Enclosures showcase. You get what you pay for, this is one of those cases.

Why spend 500.00 on an awesome Bumblebee and then hide it in a tub, or throw it in a cheap PVCX enclosure? Why not show it off?

There are lots of enclosures on the market today, but only 1 showcase.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rickyRRE

Sounds about right! I think for the price of our single door showcase you can also buy 2 from boaphile.

However, you just won't get a genuine high quality Ricky's Reptile Enclosures showcase. You get what you pay for, this is one of those cases.

Why spend 500.00 on an awesome Bumblebee and then hide it in a tub, or throw it in a cheap PVCX enclosure? Why not show it off?

There are lots of enclosures on the market today, but only 1 showcase.

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couldn't agree more. it's just somewhat cost-prohibitive for beginners. I plan on purchasing from RRE when I can afford it. in the meantime AP and boaphile both make great cages that are display quality and go for about half the price.

AP cages leak over time and also I've had sagging issues with their larger cages.

Boaphile are decent cages.......great? No. They are fine for the price. I don't think I've ever had one that didn't sag a bit over time either............leakproof - yes. Sag proof - no. In fact for the money, Boaphile and AP aren't even necessarily the nicest option out there. But like many things on the internet, once you repeat something enough times, it apparently becomes true.

I use Freedom Breeder racks now (in addition to some old Sandemar racks that are refugees from another century). They cost more than an comparably sized AP or Boaphile racks, but frankly I got tired of tubs not fitting after a few years with AP and Boaphile due to sagging. I got tired of cracked off pieces of XPVC coming off in my hand when I had to move racks around.

I got tired of long lead times and I got tired of opening my shipping boxes to cracked and busted racks or rack panels. I got tired of unanswered e-mails and unreturned phone calls. I've spent a lot of money on cages and racks and have learned a very important lesson - if would have saved quite a bit of money if I had bit the bullet and spent a bit more money initially.

Some of my Freedom Breeders are very old and have held up beautifully over time. No sagging, no leaking and someone also picks up the phone or answers an e-mail when I need to order more.

I don't know Ricky and I have never purchased one of his cages, but maybe some of you should realize that Boaphile and AP aren't the end all when it comes to caging and rack systems. Not even the more affordable plastic systems.

If you don't want to buy his product, that's your decision. But two pages of belly aching about how expensive they are? Really?

Guys and gals, I have one of his enclosures, and ya, it wasn't cheap, but as an open minded consumer i love my RRE enclosure and so does my Het clown normal male. I did a lot of research and looked over many enclosures, but i kept coming back to the RRE. Since i'v had it i have never had a single laps in feeding schedule he is extremely healthy, has never been aggressive and i literally mist it once a week to keep his humidity at 55%, and he has had perfect sheds. Its a great enclosure and is worth the money. I used to have a job working for a company who purchased acrylic materials and they were VERY expensive but very durable. So i understood why. If you want to buy more affordable things thats fine and we all know sometimes we cant afford things for whatever reason, but don't rag on the fact its expensive because trust me you get what you pay for.