Ambient heat only is the best

Hey Everyone,

So, I have unplugged all of my UTH and heat lamps, and I am just letting the oil heater provide an ambient temp that peaks to about 84 during the hottest part of the day, and falls to 80 over night. So far my animals have seemed to love it. All have been digesting well, and seem to be much more active and alert. They utilize more of their enclosure space, and their skin is more hydrated.

As of now I highly recommend this technique. I love the flexibility of being able to house snakes in variable sized tubs without having to worry about heat tape or a rack setup.

One heating device, and one thermostat, bam youre done

I plan to move to this when I upgrade my oil heater.

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smart choice

Thanks. Now planning to convert enclosures with UTHs to leopard gecko cages.

Keep in mind: What works in one house may not work out the same in another.
I wouldn't recommend any major changes like this with less than 30 days trial. J/S

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Originally Posted by PitOnTheProwl

Keep in mind: What works in one house may not work out the same in another.
I wouldn't recommend any major changes like this with less than 30 days trial. J/S

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I don’t see this as being any different than setting up a new cage or rack using heat tape, uth etc. The setup should be closely monitored at first in either scenario.

Something to consider in the ambient arrangement using an oil filled heater is that your heat source is putting out a lot more heat than an individual uth or strip of heat tape, mine is 900 watts. This can result in wide variances in even a small room. I use a ceiling fan to keep things balanced. It’s important that the heater not be too close to any given enclosure. I give mine 18-24 inch leeway.

While ambient heating of an entire room may not be the most common method of keeping reptiles, Josh is by no means breaking new ground here. The method is firmly established as safe and effective.

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Originally Posted by DennisM

The method is firmly established as safe and effective.

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I never said it wasn't.

I think what pit was meaning is that it is perhaps not a doable method in each home. For example: I have an older oil heater in a large room. During the height of winter 82 is generally the warmest temp that my room will make it to due to the size of the room and strength of the heater. I still have to run heat tape because of this. Ambient temps do not currently work in my home as the sole source of heat.

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The ambient temperature in my snake room is usually around 72F in winter. In summer it can reach 84F, as I have very large old windows in my room which makes it too difficult to monitor the temperature in the room, which also means controlling the temperature using a source such as a oil heater or even air conditioning is pretty impossible. I also do not have the ability to use a separate heating source other then heat tape simply because of where the room is located and space available. The heat tape does well with providing heat and even heats up the ambient temps in each tub. Using a herpstat, it is well controlled. As your method may work for you, it may not work for everyone else. I am glad though that you found something that works for you!

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Originally Posted by PitOnTheProwl

I never said it wasn't.

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I never said you did. My point is whatever your setup is, it needs to be monitored, thus I am in agreement with you that this is not something to be done casually. And I pointed out a couple considerations about ambient room heating that I haven't previously seen mentioned. We all know there are different means to the same end. On this topic all that really matters is the animal's well being. Everything else, as always, is a matter of keeper preference.

obviously, I am a proponent of ambient room heating. it's worked for me for a long time. equally obvious is that individual enclosure/rack heating has worked for a lot of people for a long time. for a host of reasons ambient room heating may not work or be a reasonable approach for many keepers. any change to husbandry, especially one as significant as this, should not be undertaken lightly. Josh did his homework on a couple of previous threads requesting feedback from those of us who use this approach and decided to give it a try. In his case, because he already had been using the more traditional methods, he is in a good position to fall back if necessary (don't get those geckos just yet Josh). not everything works for everyone, but I would encourage anyone thinking about this to give it a try. but you won't find me on a soapbox stating that it is better (no, no one is being accused of being on a soapbox!)

I should also mention that I had my oil heater running for about 2 months, in addition the heat tape, before I went with ambient heat only. I wanted to make sure that I could control the ambient temps, before I solely relied on them.

Have you considered the temp needs during all stages of the breeding cycle? I know VPI change their setups for gravid females.

Also consider males may need different temps at this time.

I will only be breeding boas this year. Never found a need to oscillate temps for boa breeding.

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Originally Posted by JoshSloane

I should also mention that I had my oil heater running for about 2 months, in addition the heat tape, before I went with ambient heat only. I wanted to make sure that I could control the ambient temps, before I solely relied on them.

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good move, which also happens to be option #3. some folks do this as a permanent setup. bring ambient up to a certain point and then supplement as needed. I can see where this would be an especially useful approach for a collection that contains assorted species with differing heat requirements.

Thanks Dennis. What sold me on ambient only was that after I got my ambient temperatures up to around 82-84, almost all of my snakes completely avoided using the 90 deg hot spot. Especially my boas, they avoided it like the plague.

I observed this behavior for multiple months, and after many feedings, my snakes still didn't use the hot spots.