getting temps and humidity right

I just set up my tank and i cant get the cooler end to 80-84 and the humidity is at 39. I'm using a UTH and a 75 watt infared heat lamp connected to a repti-therm 500R. Should i use other lower wattage lamp for the other side? I don't have my BP yet, I was hoping to have the tank up and running before i get one.Any suggestions would be appreciated

this should help...
http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=32800

also do you have a thermostat controlling the UTH. if not i would recommend one of those. with a UTH just plugged into the wall it can reach temps that are very dangerous to your snake. for a temp solution you can use a rheostat, which is basically a lamp dimmer.

hope this helps

I replied to the thread in General

http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...131#post590131

I am having the same problems and I followed the directions of the tutorial link that is posted here already! So what do I do now to get the temp on the cool side to stay at 80-84? At night the temp drops too low and day it goes up to high? I'm lost and need suggestions!

You could try adding a second UTH, possibly smaller to the cool side of your tank. Like already stated connecting your UTH to a stat/dimmer is a must. You don't want to fry your snake. Do you have a dgital thermometer to read your temps? If not what are you using? As far as humidity levels go, what are you using for substrate? Do you have the majority of your tanks cover covered up to help keep humidty in? I use cypress for substrate and it's very good for keeping your himidity levels up.

Once you get everything dialed in you will be fine. It's no fun in the beginning but it pays off.

ok I will get a second UTH for cooler nights but what do I do on hot days I can't get the temp down? I use digital thermometers and yep most of top is covered and has reflective bottom surface too! I have dimmer already. And where do I find this cypress I have fir bark now and some aspen too in a bag I haven't used it tho!

Will the UTH fry a snake thru the substrate tho? And how much substrate am I supposed to use anyways?

I should make it clear that a thermostat is what is recommended. A dimmer is considered acceptable, but not ideal.

I use a dimmer so I'll tell you about my setup.

I have been able to get consistent, correct gradients. But, it takes a little practice to get a feel for it. Also, I usually tweak the adjustment minute amounts once or twice a day. Whenever you are adjusting the dimmer, make only small adjustments at any one time and give the enclosure at least 20 mins to re-stabilize before adjusting again. This is especially important when you are first starting out with it and don't have any real idea how things will react.

With regard to safety: The ideal would be that, with your UTH fully on, you can place your hand on the bottom of the glass and hold it there. It can feel hot but should not actually cause pain if held indefinately. My basis for this recommendation is that when I first started I had an always-on UTH that passed this test (luckily for my snake). The temperatures weren't controlled well but (also luckily) my snake wasn't too shy to come out and cool off if he got too hot. Sometimes he would burrow down to the glass and sit right over the UTH. It was an unhealthily hot temperature but at least he never got contact burns. My point is you should make sure that, in the worst case scenario where your UTH is left fully on, your snake is not going to be burned. As long as you are keeping an eye on things you should be able to notice the problem and correct it long before he experiences any sort of long-term health risks.

I've had pretty good luck connecting my two UTH's and one heat lamp all to one single dimmer. I was able to get the temperatures to be relatively correct because I have a large UTH on one side and a small UTH on the other. Also, over the small UTH I have a heat lamp. In order to get it all to work out right I had to also bump up the heat lamp to 100W. The nice thing about it is that usually I find that all of the temperature points in the cage tend to drift together (usually in response to room temperature). With a single control I can heat or cool the whole environment. You could also use multiple dimmers. Also, make sure you have enough temperature reading points to let you know that everything is right. Temperatures in the cage can change quite a bit over just a few inches. I think you need at least three temperature readings.

I use the "Credenza" 300W Lamp Dimmer from Lutron
http://www.lutron.com/lampdimmers/Default.asp (shown in the upper left)
I purchased it from Home Depot for about $12

*rant rant rant* I have been struggling for awhile now with what my baby girl is in right now, getting the humidity and heat right. It's a very odd container that her previous owner gave me and decided to try and make work. I should take a pic and post it, it's so weird looking!

Good luck with your temp & humidity! Sorry, I have nothing helpful to add. :oops:

So what will the thermostat do exactly can u set a temp or something and it will keep it there?

Sup Random quick question did you have to take ur girl to the vet to find out it was a girl?

Oh and where can I find the thermostat I have been looking around pet stores and I work at petsmart but I can't find one!

With the thermostat you can set a temperature, a probe is connected to it. Put the probe in the location you're measuring (usually the warm side) and when it reaches the correct temperature, it will cut off the heat source, and come back on when it dips below.

and reptilebasics.com

Yea, its the same basic idea as the thermostat in your house. It will control the power to the UTH to keep the temperature at the probe at whatever level you set.

I personally prefer manual control over automation whenever possible (I drive manual transmission cars for example). Automatic stuff works great - until it screws up.

There are certainly some different issues and gotchas with thermostats so I would ask somebody with experience using them if that's the way you want to go.

Here's the thing... I don't understand why you wouldn't want to use a thermostat... I know I work 8 hours a day, go to the gym for 1 hour, and then I'm finally home after about 10-11 hours total of being away from the house. That gives me one adjustment to make, in the morning, for that entire length of time. In that time I could cook my snake, which is what basically happened (overheating) when I was using a dimmer. Unless you're home the entire day and can continuously check and make adjustments, why wouldn't you want to use a thermostat?

You work at Petsmart? You will probably never find a thermostat there...or at least not a good one. I worked there for a while, till I couldn't take the manager or the crappy animal care policies.

Best place to find a good thermostat would be online. Places like HerpSupplies.com, or a good google search should give you plenty of options.

Thanks for the sites and different views on the subject I am like others work 5 days 8hrs gone plus some. So maybe it will be good for me to use! Thanks I will check out the sites now! What are average prices I hope not too expensive!

Sadly, the lowest price I saw for a good stat was $65. The average seems to be $100. I, in my cheap-student frame of mind, bought a cheap ZooMed thing that everyone here is saying not to use. So, now I am saving up to buy a good quality one. Luckily for me, in the meantime my temps have been pretty stable. Good luck finding an affordable one!

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Originally Posted by darkangel

Here's the thing... I don't understand why you wouldn't want to use a thermostat... I know I work 8 hours a day, go to the gym for 1 hour, and then I'm finally home after about 10-11 hours total of being away from the house. That gives me one adjustment to make, in the morning, for that entire length of time. In that time I could cook my snake, which is what basically happened (overheating) when I was using a dimmer. Unless you're home the entire day and can continuously check and make adjustments, why wouldn't you want to use a thermostat?

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So, my point in posting wasn't to convince anybody not to use a thermostat. It was meant to be helpful information for somebody who was planning on using a dimmer.

Well I'm not like anti-thermostat I just don't feel its warranted for my setup at the moment. Having been a professional engineer for over 10 years its been drilled into my head that you should never introduce more complexity into a system than is needed. My setup never drifts more than a few degrees - most likely because its in a room that is also always 72 +/- 3 degrees or so. I'm considering moving it to a different room that fuctuates quite a bit and I'll surely need a t-stat then.

I would say the most likely cause of drift in dimmer systems is caused by over-adjustment. One thing that can fool you is when your snake has been out and about and just gone into the warm hide. At that point, the warm side readout with drop by 5-10 degrees. If you adjust it right then you'll find its way over temp when you come back an hour later. However, if you note that its running low and give it 15 mins and then check again you'll find its back where its supposed to be.

Yeah I feel you I just moved my tank outta my room cuz my room fluctuates too much from super hot to 70's at night for the cool side! But I found a great atmospheric thermostat check out www.herpsupplies.com click on products icon, then select controls option. Select thermostats and its the first item in the list its made by Green Air Products its a must have for those of us who can't get the cool side down from being too hot! It is $135 but I think it is worth it. It controls your cool side and your heated side and has two separate probes for each side. Plus it is simple to control just set the temp you want your cool side to be and then same for heated and it will regulate everything to keep it at the best temps you can get! I would check it out! I am definitely going to save for it!

Well good night to all and thanks for all the info i will retaain all the advice and use it to help my BP to live it up! I'll see yall tomorrow!

I finally got them right. I'm using a 30g tank, I got everything I thought would make a bp thrive. I went with putting down some repti carpet with the repti bark substrate. I got a UTH and a 75 watt red bulb both connected to a repti therm 500R. The accu-rite digital temp and humidity on the hot end and the flukkers on on the glass in the middle. Then to go over the top I put in another accu-rite on the cool end. I couldn't get the temp right on the cool end, so i got another UTH connected to a rheostat.Then I finally read all the set up sticky and put foil on most of the screen.That got my humidity right. Does this sound good? I hope so, I've been monitoring it for a few days now and everything looks great. Hopefully, I will be bringing my bp saturday. Has anybody ever heard of reptilesden.com? That's is where i plan on going. :rockon:

Having been a tank owner who now is a faithful follower of the tub enclosure method, I don't get how so many people can sink so much money into making a tank "ideal" when it can be done safer and more reliably for so much less...

How would you go about that?

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Originally Posted by Razzle

How would you go about that?

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Setting up a tub instead of a tank? There are many, many threads on this site about that topic..

Basically, you use a storage bin (usually rubbermaid/sterilite/iris) and apply some sort of heating pad/tape to the bottom, then poke holes in one end, and secure the lid with bungee straps or some other method. it's low profile (for a ball python you only need 6" deep tubs), takes up very little space (the 32qt tubs most often recommended are about 2.25'x1.4' in size), and maintain temperature and humidity very effectively. You can control the humidity by adjusting your water bowl placement how many holes you have, and temperature is almost always spot on. They're also very easy to clean, and if done properly will usually make your BP just as if not more happy than your tank.

That isnt sounding like a bad idea right now. I think i got to excited earlier. I think my humidity i going to high. It's up to 70. What do i do to get it down. Whats the max it should ever go to? My book says 60 but another web site said 80????

They'll be ok even up to the 90-95% range for short periods of time, but maintaining for longer periods (more than a day or three) is where you'll start to see problems. Remember, they ARE accustomed to nature's weather, which isn't always 100% stable. Days or weeks of higher than normal humidity do happen, and I'm sure when they do the majority of BP's out there in the wild do just fine...

Thats good info I just got all I need to setup a tub but is it really safe to stick a heating pad under that plastic it won't melt it?

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Originally Posted by Tat&Tu

Thats good info I just got all I need to setup a tub but is it really safe to stick a heating pad under that plastic it won't melt it?

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Most likely not, but you MUST use a thermostat or rheostat (dimmer) to manage the temperature... Better safe than sorry...

How do I know how many holes to start with in the tub

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Originally Posted by CntrlF8

Having been a tank owner who now is a faithful follower of the tub enclosure method, I don't get how so many people can sink so much money into making a tank "ideal" when it can be done safer and more reliably for so much less...

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Because it looks nicer. Some people don't mind working harder for looks. I'm not a breeder, so I can say that. If you have multiples, I can't speak for them.

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Originally Posted by Skoalbasher

Because it looks nicer. Some people don't mind working harder for looks. I'm not a breeder, so I can say that. If you have multiples, I can't speak for them.

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I agree :)