Quick question

One of my ball pythons has been constantly in her water bowl for the past week. She is in shed and does not have mites so I'm not really worried about why she's in there.

The problem is that she has paper towel substrate in her tub and she's a big girl so every time that she climbs in the bowl she floods her enclosure. I've changed out the paper towels 3 times already today. Is it going to negatively affect her if she's in a soaking wet enclosure all night or all day tomorrow while I'm at work? Can scale rot or an RI be caused by extended periods in a soaked environment?

Thanks in advance.

Yes but I think you will be fine during a work shift. Its gonna take more time than that.

Should I even bother changing the paper towels more than once a day?

If she's soaking then her humidity probably isn't high enough. What's her setup like?

You could fix the overflow problem by not filling her water bowl up too full but like the comment above if she doesn't have mites and is soaking in her bowl during a shed then the humidity isn't high enough. So I'd fill the bowl up maybe only half or a quarter full then take a spray bottle and mist the sides of the tub to keep humidity high. Hopefully that will help. Keep us updated


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Frequent soaking is abnormal behavior and I've heard from the most credible sources in the business that if they are regularly soaking then your temps are too high or they have mites. Those are the two main reasons why a BP would spend a lot of time in the water bowl. As Bcr229 pointed out humidity might be the issue as well especially for shedding. If she is just passing over it and causing a mess then that is pretty typical. How much time does she spend soaking? You might also look into getting a different type of water bowl as well as substrate. I wouldn't leave moist substrate in for longer then a few hours for several different reasons.

I have her in my AP economy rack in a 15 qt tub w/ paper towel substrate. The heat source is 4" flexwatt controlled w/ a herpstat 1. I have the thermometer in the middle of the rack and right now it's reading 92 on the flexwatt w/ 81 as ambient temp in the room. The humidity is 50% percent in the room so it should be higher in an enclosed tub w/ a water dish.

Nice set up, I'm jealous. Oh ya my reptile room floats right below 50 percent humidity and I have a pretty hard time getting it below 70 in the tubs. I'm not too worried about it now but come wither time it might be a bigger issue. I am confused though. So it's 92 degrees in the middle of the tub and not on the back side? I know that they say a hot spot of about 90 is good but my BPs don't seem to like hot spots about 90 tops.

Alan, that's interesting about the temps being too high. Maybe she's outgrown the tub and cant thermoregulate properly so shes soaking to cool off? I currently have 4 BPs in thie exact same set up and nobody soaks but her. I have 2 other females about the same size as her in these setups as well and they do fine.

Seems like good logic. Where does the heat tape run according to the tub? Is your water dish toward the front of the tub? Maybe the front of your tub is closer to the 81 degree room temp plus has some cool water so she just goes to cool off from time to time? I really don't know but it would be interesting to see the tub layout and observe the behavior for a couple days just to see if there are any other signs that they are showing.

Here's her set up. Pretty basic but my snakes have done well in it. Sorry the pics a bit blurry.

http://i1381.photobucket.com/albums/...psff36ee8b.jpg

Flexwatt runs through the back btw so the hotspots in the back 4-5 inches of the tub. She hasn't gotten back into the bowl in the last hour so we'll see.

Oh ya her humidity is probably high enough lol... She looks nice what is she? I have larger enclosures as I use 41 qt's which allow me some experimentation but I would probably move her dish to the back corner for a day if she was soaking all the time just so I could see if she just likes the front of the tub. But then you'd have to worry about a bump in humidity and some other things.

Thanks man she's a mojave. Yeah I'm gonna move her water bowl tonight and see if that changes anything. She could use the higher humidity right now anyway due to the shed.

Awesome I'll be watching for updates.

I think the idea that she doesnt have enough room to fully fit in her cool side could be the issue. She certainly looks big enough for an upgrade.

If not, she may just feel like taking a dip. Unlike what someone else said I dont think its abnormal, unusual, or problematic for a snake go thru a period where they like to soak

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Originally Posted by CryHavoc17

I think the idea that she doesnt have enough room to fully fit in her cool side could be the issue. She certainly looks big enough for an upgrade.

If not, she may just feel like taking a dip. Unlike what someone else said I dont think its abnormal, unusual, or problematic for a snake go thru a period where they like to soak

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She definitely looks like she would be ready for an upgrade to a nice 28qt/32qt tub :)


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I like the idea of an upgrade but I'm always quick to say that and feel bad for my big girls in their 41 quarts. I have read in several books one of which was written by some one very reputable in the business for over 25 years and another by some one who's been in zoology for a life time but also my own hours and hours of online research going through old posts, blogs, and general information. I am not saying it's abnormal for a ball python to soak for reasons other then what I stated but if it is a prolonged and frequent thing then I would assume something is off. I would not recommend not inspecting further if I found my ball python soaking for more then a couple days as it is for a fact not a normal thing for them to soak that frequently when all else is correct.

Thanks for all the advice guys.

I'm going to let her finish shedding and I will be upgrading her to a 32 qt once she's finished. Now I have another question along those lines. Paper towels obviously start to be inefficient when you have to cover larger spaces like a 32 qt. Would you guys stick with the paper towels or change to aspen/newspaper/cypress/ etc? If humidity is an issue then I'm assuming cypress would help the most.

I love aspen bedding! So easy to spot clean and tell when it starts to go bad after a month or so. I don't have too much against news paper though as long as it gets changed often. You might consider reading Colin Weaver's article on substrate as a variable on eating habbits and maybe een Justin Kolbylka's.

I put newspaper over the belly heat toward the rear of the tub, and just a few inches of cypress in the front to help bump up humidity, especially in the winter since my house gets very dry. Then I just mist the cypress in the front of the tub so the snake doesn't have to lie on wet paper.

Just a quick update. Upgraded her along with 2 other females to 32 qt tubs today. She is still very much in shed and is whistling up a storm right now. It was nice to see her all stretched out though. I'll post pics when she sheds out.