Breeding Season Cool Down

Started our pre breeding season cool down today. I cannot wait for this season to get started! I have some really high hopes.

Nice! I won't be cooling this season, and I already started pairing one of my females. I will start the other 3 Nov. 1st :)

Ive never cooled and have been pairing since july

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I know cooling down our ball pythons is a personal choice that works for me. As long as your method works for you, awesome. I always think there is more than one way for breeding to work. If we all give advice, then it only helps everyone else out. Good luck!

What are your cooling procedures?

I don't cool either. The hot spot stays the same temp year round. The ambient temp may change with the room during the different seasons on it's own, but cold side in the tubs tend to stay 80. Personally, I find that cooling manually is just another unnecessary extra step. But that's just my opinion. And my boyfriend cooled his snake last year. Unfortunately she developed pneumonia. So I would rather just rule out potential illnesses by keeping the same temps year round since they breed fine without cool downs.
I find that barometric pressure has more to do with their breeding behavior than temps anyway. Rain makes them frisky. ;)

I know everyone has their own method so good luck this year!

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I would cool mine down but I am WAY too nervous about RI, pneumonia, etc.

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Originally Posted by Ridinandreptiles

I would cool mine down but I am WAY too nervous about RI, pneumonia, etc.

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I like your answer and wish more beginner hobbyist would do the same, I see more beginners with RI's from cooling their snakes than I care to see.

I allow my room temps to drop to the low 70's so the cool end of my tubs gets down to about 75.
I do not ever lower my hot spot temps.

Hmmm... I still plan to lower my temps at night, down to about 80F, with my herpstat, which will do it automatically. I can't imagine that a hot spot of 80F and ambients temps of 70F will bring on an RI, but of course I could be wrong.

Never had a Ball get RI from cooling...And I keep my stuff way cooler than most...AC is pumping in the snake room right now!

My Ball Pythons have a dedicated room, so if you only have 1 small rack in your
livingroom this may not work for you - but it's worth striving for!! My room has an ambient temperature of 80 degrees 365 days a year. The hot spot in each tub is created using 4" flexwatt heat tape. The heat tape is regulated using a thermostat (I use Spyder Robotics thermostats exclusively) and it set to create a hot spot of around 90 degrees during the day, 365 days a year.

I fluctuate my hot spot to mimic the seasonal changes as follows:

January - Night drop of 6 degrees
February - Night drop of 3 degrees
March - Night drop of 3 degrees
April - Night drop of 2 degrees
May - Night drop of 2 degrees
June - Night drop of 1 degrees
July - Night drop of 0 degrees
August - Night drop of 0 degrees
September - Night drop of 2 degrees
October - Night drop of 2 degrees
November - Night drop of 6 degrees
December - Night drop of 7 degrees

Remember that you must bring the temperature of the hot spot up during the day, or you risk your snake developing a respiratory infection.

During the breeding season I raise the humidity during November, December and January to 70%. By raising the humidity for those 3 months it will help to trick the snakes into thinking it's winter, as winter is the rainy season.

I start pairing on December 1st.

Always nice to hear different opinions. For me, I keep my snake building at 80 degrees year round. Normally, my humidity is at 60% and my thermostat is set to 87 degrees on the hot side. On October 1st, I drop our temps to 81 degrees. For us, that is a significant enough of a temp drop to do the job and we raise the humidity to 65%. I have never had a RI with my ball pythons. Knock on wood! Also, we have had great success for many seasons doing this. I realize that this is just my opinion and as long as your way works, super!

Rick - that is awesome man and makes perfect sense with the temps, and the humidity change makes perfect sense as well. I think that I will be trying out your method starting once I get home in December and will see how it woorks for me.

This will be my first year cooling. I have had issues with slugs in the past so am going to try another approach. I am cooling every week between Oct 1st and Nov 1st. Until daytime hotspot reaches 88 and night time hotspot reaches 85. The room will stay around 73-75 degrees. This should be cool enough to prevent some slug outs but warm enough to hopefully keep any illnesses away, just in case.