Thoughts on heating my snake room...

[Craiga 01453]

Hey all, I have decided to turn my unused laundry room into my snake room. It's currently being used as my quarantine room, but in a few weeks when the newbies graduate from quarantine I will move the others upstairs instead of moving the newbies downstairs.

It's a much smaller room and it will be solely for the snakes.
My question is this: from a financial standpoint, would it be more economical to use a small space heater and run ambient temps and only provide belly heat where needed?

Or should I just heat using the equipment I already have?

I run ambient temps only in the warm weather months as is, turning off all belly heat.

So to tell you more that may factor into the decision...

I have 6 snakes, so 6 enclosures. The only one that requires a hot spot over 88 is my KSB, but keeping his UTH plugged in is no problem if I go ambient.

The room is small, prob 8x10.

I live in MA where winters can be pretty chilly.

Currently, all but one snake uses bulbs/CHEs which I'm working to ditch anyway.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Obviously, the snakes well being is top priority, with financials being the big question mark here.

Thanks in advance.

[Ax01]

i think that's a hard number to crunch w/o knowing the wattages of your equipment, other variables, etc. you can try a couple different setups over the months and see both the results on your snakes and the electric bill if you have the patience. JodanOrNoDan runs ambient temps only year round. i don't know whether his setup is through heating his overall household or whether is plain ol FL swamp weather.

[Bogertophis]

I agree it's a tough call, & I think Deborah has mentioned that she uses just ambient heat (warm room). Depends on how cold one's climate is & how insulated
your house or that room is (I know you insulate your cages), but it seems it would be more efficient to heat the room. But if your power goes off, those cages
won't be still be insulated, right? (or will they?) So, then they get cold fast, right? Whatever you do, plan for back-up in case of power failures.

[Stewart_Reptiles]

I live in the south so I basically I use heat to my advantage, since the room is under the roof it get's nice and warm and I can heat my snake room for free, the other option would be cool it down and provide a hot spot but to me it's counter productive and not efficient energy wise. I also like not to have to worry about heat tape several months out of the year. During the winter I do use heat (oil filled heater for the ambient temp and heat tape for the warm side)

Many people keep their animals at room temp year round if you calculate the wattage of your heat tape vs just having the room heated it might be worth it you just gonna need to give it a try. It's also nice not to worry about heat tape I will be honest about that.