heating a ball ython enclosure

[Shadow]

What are the pros and cons of different heating methods (UTH, Human heating pad, flexwatt, etc.)?
WHat do you use and why?

[daniel1983]

I use flexwatt (it is a type of UTH). It is cheaper than alot of other brand UTHs and works better in my opinion. A UTH heats from the bottom. This is beneficial because your bp is at the bottom of the enclosure and because heat rises you get better temps. Lamps tend to dry out the air. I have used lamps alone, uth alone, and lamps and uth together. They all work fine. I have heard that human heating pads are somewhat unreliable, and why waste you money when flexwatt costs the same. I think what you are using for heating really depends on what type of enclosure you are heating. All heating elements can work just fine (EXCEPT heat rocks) if they are regulated properly wiith a thermostat. That is the only way to ensure that there is a constant temperature in the enclosure.

Hope that helps some

[BALLPYTHON]

i use heat lamps and they do dry out the air way to much. even by misting the tank every other day it still dries out the substrate. if you are using a wooden cage to keep your snake, can you use a uth?? maybe place it under the substrate?
what do you keep your pythons in daniel???

[Smulkin]

Not under the substrate - placing a heating source inside the tank with the snake is just asking for all kinds of bad news. Wish I had something more helpful with that but I confess I have no experience with wooden enclosures

[daniel1983]

here is a link to mgreptiles that is a Q&A page for flexwatt (A UTH). This should help a bit...and matt is the expert on heating.

http://www.mgreptiles.com/FLEXFAQ.html

When I first got into bps, I kept Thor in a 10 gallon tank. Then I moved to a large rubbermaid(that i have now given to my brother to use for a upcoming BCI purchase). Now I have small rack. here are some pic links to my setups:

my small rack(click to make it bigger)


my old setup(click to make it bigger). the lamps were in there to keep the closet air temperature up when my roommate blasts the a/c.

[elevatethis]

I keep a few different types of snakes and utilize a few different methods of heating.

- I have two AP cages where my bps reside. I use belly heat via a built in heat cable, controlled by a thermostat. The setup is a no-brainer, since its on a thermostat, outside changes in air temperate don't affect the cage temps. Also maintains humidity very well. 60% with a decent sized water bowl in there.

- I keep a mexican boa in a glass tank with a 50w red heat bulb, on 24/7. The boa is still pretty small and the tank to a 20gallon long (30"x12"x12" i think). Temperature is constant as long as my room temp is stable, however boa's don't seem to be as sensitive to temperature consistency as ball pythons are (their feeding response will usually stay, and they'll eat, but they'll just regurge if its too cold). Keeping the humidity in that tank is a nightmare though, shed periods require lots of spraying and lots of wet moss. I also cover most of the top with plastic wrap and tape (when done carefully, it can still look alright).

- Before I got my second AP cage, I had the smaller male BP in a rubbermaid container w/ a human heat pad. That setup was unreliable and I'm amazed that he did as well as he did. The heat pad eventually called it quits and stopped working altogether. That was during the winter, and when I woke uo his whole cage was like 68 degrees. Good thing he and my female bp get along, they played roommates until the second AP cage came (luckily only 2 days later).

In conclusion, as you've probably read a million times throughout this site, use a method of heating that creates a STABLE gradient from 80-83 on the cool side to 90-95 on the warm side. If you do that with a lamp, UTH, flexwatt, whatever, then you'll be good to go.