Cage Cleanings - Minor and Major

How often do you all do cleanings of your BP vivariums, both minor and major.

Minor being spot cleans of feces and urinates, water changing, and general adjustments. Major being full teardowns, like changing all the substrate, cleaning the entire enclosure (like a glass tank), and cleaning and disinfecting all the accessories.

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We spot clean as soon as we catch a bowel movement, and we do a real good disenfecting every 4-6 weeks. Unless we don't catch a poop quick enough and the snake tracks it across the cage.

Depends on how many you have, we went to a program called Reptilescan, and use it to tack everything from feedings to vet visits, to cleanings, and much more. It's worth a look into in my opinion.

Mine are in tubs or PVC enclosures on newspaper. When they make a mess everything comes out, the tub gets cleaned and treated with F10, the snake gets cleaned if needed, then fresh paper and a new clean water bowl and hide go back in. Depending on the snake this could happen as often as every day for a few days, to once a week.

I spot clean daily.

Change their water every few days.

And do a whole thorough cage cleaning every 4-6 weeks.


There are always special circumstances that force me to clean their entire enclosure sooner than normal. 5 weeks ago, my albino pooped one night and slithered in it and had it all over himself, ugh. So I had to wash him and went ahead and cleaned all of their enclosures a little earlier than normal.

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Originally Posted by bcr229

Mine are in tubs or PVC enclosures on newspaper. When they make a mess everything comes out, the tub gets cleaned and treated with F10, the snake gets cleaned if needed, then fresh paper and a new clean water bowl and hide go back in. Depending on the snake this could happen as often as every day for a few days, to once a week.

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Same routine here!
When I did have a few of them in tanks I would spot clean was needed and do a deep cleaning each month.

[QUOTE=Gary P;2369744]I spot clean daily.

Change their water every few days.

And do a whole thorough cage cleaning every 4-6 weeks.


Same here

[QUOTE=Mustang5;2369760]

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Originally Posted by Gary P

I spot clean daily.

Change their water every few days.

And do a whole thorough cage cleaning every 4-6 weeks.


Same here

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Pretty much the same here.


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I try to have a 'No poop in the viv' policy.

no BPs here, but water gets replaced when dirt gets pushed in it, scrub their water bowls once a week and spot clean if the cleaning crew isn't doing their job, other than that no substrate changes for me.

I'm using bioactive substrate, so I don't do any major cleaning. I spot clean as necessary by removing poops when I see 'em and occasionally giving the glass a cleaning. I also clean and refill the water dish every other day.

I change the water and spot clean daily, and do a full tear-down (changing substrate, washing accessories, etc) once a month.

Spot cleaned as needed (for those on newspapaper spot cleaning means full cleaning), substrate replacement for those on Aspen or Cypress is done when needed once every week or every other week.

Tubs and water bowls are cleaned with Chlorhexidine.

Once a month water bowls are completely bleached out.

Any tubs from an animal that is moved to another tub (upgrade) or sold is bleached out same goes for the tub of females that have just laid.

Once a year I do a full major cleaning which means racks are wipe down with Chlorhexidine and tubs are bleached out.

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Originally Posted by jclaiborne

no BPs here, but water gets replaced when dirt gets pushed in it, scrub their water bowls once a week and spot clean if the cleaning crew isn't doing their job, other than that no substrate changes for me.

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Cleanup crew you say? Is your children's python on bioactive? :)

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Originally Posted by Snake Judy

I'm using bioactive substrate, so I don't do any major cleaning. I spot clean as necessary by removing poops when I see 'em and occasionally giving the glass a cleaning. I also clean and refill the water dish every other day.

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Two bioactive-related posts in a row? Love it!

I'm just getting started planning/putting together my first bioactive viv, but I'm really psyched about it and would love to eventually have all my reptiles on bioactive if I can manage it.

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Originally Posted by KitaCat

Cleanup crew you say? Is your children's python on bioactive? :)


Two bioactive-related posts in a row? Love it!

I'm just getting started planning/putting together my first bioactive viv, but I'm really psyched about it and would love to eventually have all my reptiles on bioactive if I can manage it.

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All of my reptiles are now on Bio-Active. I started by moving all of my reptiles to a dirt mix to see how I liked it vs mulch. When I finished my Tegus cage I threw in tons of isopods, sprintails, worms, etc and am still adding to it. It was working so well I decided to add the same mix to all of my cages and haven't looked back since.

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Originally Posted by KitaCat

Cleanup crew you say? Is your children's python on bioactive? :)


Two bioactive-related posts in a row? Love it!

I'm just getting started planning/putting together my first bioactive viv, but I'm really psyched about it and would love to eventually have all my reptiles on bioactive if I can manage it.

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Yeah! I've had mine running for a little over two months and I love it so far. I don't know why it isn't more popular with ball python keepers like it is in some other reptile communities.

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Originally Posted by Snake Judy

Yeah! I've had mine running for a little over two months and I love it so far. I don't know why it isn't more popular with ball python keepers like it is in some other reptile communities.

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My thought is because it goes against most of the basics that is said about care, like not washing/sterilizing wood that you bring in from outside, collecting leaf litter and dirt from your yard, etc.

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Originally Posted by jclaiborne

All of my reptiles are now on Bio-Active. I started by moving all of my reptiles to a dirt mix to see how I liked it vs mulch. When I finished my Tegus cage I threw in tons of isopods, sprintails, worms, etc and am still adding to it. It was working so well I decided to add the same mix to all of my cages and haven't looked back since.

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Slightly off topic but springtails are good? I had a small infestation a couple months ago that I got rid of pretty easily. I always thought that any bugs in your snakes enclosure you should probably get rid of.

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Originally Posted by Mustang5

Slightly off topic but springtails are good? I had a small infestation a couple months ago that I got rid of pretty easily. I always thought that any bugs in your snakes enclosure you should probably get rid of.

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Springtails actually eat mold and fungus, so they're introduced on purpose to bio enclosures to keep them clean, along with isopods.

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Originally Posted by Mustang5

Slightly off topic but springtails are good? I had a small infestation a couple months ago that I got rid of pretty easily. I always thought that any bugs in your snakes enclosure you should probably get rid of.

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In my tegus cage I have 3 different species of springtails, 4 different species of Isopods, Dubias, mealworms, superworms, and night crawlers in there. For my other lizards its the same minus the meal and superworms, and for my snake it is just springtails and some smaller isopods.

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Originally Posted by jclaiborne

My thought is because it goes against most of the basics that is said about care, like not washing/sterilizing wood that you bring in from outside, collecting leaf litter and dirt from your yard, etc.

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Yeah, it's basically "throw everything you've been taught out the window" with Bio... People fear change I guess. :P

This might call for a bioactive thread before we derail this one too badly!

JS- I'd totally learn how to go bio, if it doesn't put the snake at any risk, I vote someone whip up a how-to on bios!! Plz! xx

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Originally Posted by KitaCat

Yeah, it's basically "throw everything you've been taught out the window" with Bio... People fear change I guess. :P

This might call for a bioactive thread before we derail this one too badly!

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If there is enough interest I can start one some time today.

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Originally Posted by jclaiborne

If there is enough interest I can start one some time today.

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Sure that would be an interesting topic

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Originally Posted by KitaCat

Yeah, it's basically "throw everything you've been taught out the window" with Bio... People fear change I guess. :P

This might call for a bioactive thread before we derail this one too badly!

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Originally Posted by tembii

JS- I'd totally learn how to go bio, if it doesn't put the snake at any risk, I vote someone whip up a how-to on bios!! Plz! xx

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Originally Posted by Mustang5

Sure that would be an interesting topic

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Here you go: http://ball-pythons.net/forums/showt...94#post2370694