substrate

hi guys im new here and im finally getting my first ball in about a month or so. i know that people use news paper as a substrate, but i was wondering if i would be able to use shredded paper from the paper shredder. its cheap and would be thicker than the news paper. any thoughts?

If you're going to use paper just use sheets. It's easier. What is best for you all depends on what kind of caging you are going to have, how you plan to heat it ,also how nice you want it to look. Do you want pretty with some maintenance or do you want minimal and easy to take care of. With just one snake I'd make it look real nice with a natural looking mulch substrate. But one ball python turns to many very fast.

i was planning on getting a 20 gallon glass enclosure with a UTH but with the space in my room i started to think of the plastic tubs

If you're going with tubs then I would just use paper towels for your substrate. If you have high humidity you can just add more holes to the tubs. If humidity is too low you can add a secondary bowl with water and sphagnum moss in it. Easy to clean, easy to manage.

With UTH you have to keep the substrate very thin. Newsprint or paper towels are good for that. When I had my 20gal I had to use Eco Earth for humidity. I made sure to keep the substrate thin, especially in the hides. Because in order for the substrate to get to the 88/90 whatever hotspot you want you have to crank the heat up. Then if they move the substrate they could be sitting on the glass that is hotter than the intended temperature. By keeping it thin you prevent that from happening because you don't have to turn it up like that.

in tubs, paper towels are easy and cheap.

I use newspaper. Its free and it works.

My balls are in tubs with papertowels. My boas are on aspen.

ok ill probably just go with the paper towels or paper thanks alot everyone

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Originally Posted by DooLittle

My balls are in tubs with papertowels. My boas are on aspen.

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Same here.

I switch from aspen to cypress. So far I think I will be sticking with cypress to hold humidity better

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Yes. Why yes I think you should. :-D. Personal preference I guess

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i used news paper for a long time and may go back, but i just recently switched all mine over to aspen just to see how i liked it because i had a huge bag of the stuff lying around. so far i love it and it actually seems like a little less maintenance than the news paper. it just seemed like more of a hassle to take the snake completely out, clean the tub and put paper back in, when with aspen i can just spot clean with a kitty litter scooper. i plan on completely cleaning all the tubs out once a month or as needed if they get nasty, but a quick turd scoop as opposed to cleaning everything in the tub out after every time they go potty is nice. i may eventually go back to newspaper. it's really personal preference. i say try both and see what you like. glass tanks are a lot more of a pain to do a thorough cleaning on than tubs though.

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Originally Posted by Marrissa

With UTH you have to keep the substrate very thin. Newsprint or paper towels are good for that. When I had my 20gal I had to use Eco Earth for humidity. I made sure to keep the substrate thin, especially in the hides. Because in order for the substrate to get to the 88/90 whatever hotspot you want you have to crank the heat up. Then if they move the substrate they could be sitting on the glass that is hotter than the intended temperature. By keeping it thin you prevent that from happening because you don't have to turn it up like that.

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with my guys on aspen i just keep the bottom of the tub around 90-92. sometimes on thick parts of aspen the temp gun will read 84ish in some spots but i've found if they want to get to the heat they'll burrow down in the substrate. keeping the bottom of the tub/glass too hot in order to get the top of the substrate to 90 could possibly be dangerous if they burrow down to it.

Agreed with paper vs any bedding. At the back of the tub depending on the snake and spot in the rack I barely put any bedding.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by DooLittle

My balls are in tubs with papertowels. My boas are on aspen.

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Me too. I use the pre-cut liners from superiorshippingsupplies.com they're like a really thick version of those viva paper towels. I don't think I'll ever switch back to aspen for my guys, it's amazing how much more you can SEE on the paper.