New BP keeper; hello and a few questions.

[cshouston]

Hi everyone. I spent some time looking for a good reptile/bp community and I'm happy to be here. A little about me... I'm a 27 year old guy who has an all-around love for animals. When I was younger I had wanted a snake, but my parents never let me. Now that I'm older and wiser, I felt it was a good time to finally fulfill that wish and become caretaker to one of these beautiful creatures. I'm brand new to caring for a snake, although I had a friend with a veritable menagerie back in college. I'm just trying my best not to harm the poor guy out of my own mistakes and lack of experience!

First of all, Monty (overused, perhaps, but I'm a huge Monty Python fan ) was captive bred in '08, but I'm not exactly sure what month. I'd estimate he's about 16" long, though. Here he is before I brought him home:



Now, seeing as how I'm a complete newbie to caring for snakes (and reptiles in general, beyond a turtle in middle school), I had a few questions that have been bugging me. I hope someone far more experienced can help me out. First of all, I know that moving my BP to a new home and habitat is stressful, so I'm willing to chalk most of this up to stress seeing as how he just came home with me yesterday afternoon, but like a nervous dad I just like to be sure. We have a local specialty snake shop which set me up with a snake kit: a 10 gallon tank with a screen lid and clips, a 10-20 zoo med UTH, aspen bedding, a water bowl/rock, and a small half log. On top of this, I bought a piece of wood to aid shedding, two aquarium stick on type thermometers (stupid of me, i now realize; i'm going to get better ones this weekend), a hygrometer, a zoo med 20" hood with two incandescent and 1 fluorescent fixture, a 40 watt red heat bulb, a 60 watt day bulb, and a plastic plant.

I live in Miami so the humidity in the vivarium is always between 50-60% without needing to do anything special. My household temperature is generally 74-76F. When I first brought Monty home, I placed him in the vivarium and he was pretty much cruising around the perimeter, trying to scale up the sides, and was pretty well active until the UTH started to finally heat up, at which time he plopped himself down on that side and he has pretty much stayed there for the last 24+ hours. I have yet to see him on the "cool" side. Is this pretty much normal? With the day bulb on, the crappy stick on thermometers show about 85F ambient on the 'warm side' and about 80-82F ambient on the 'cool side', although I'm sure the belly temperature is less on that side (I need to buy myself an infrared thermometer this weekend). With the red light it's a bit less, but not by too much. If I don't have either light on, however, the ambient drops to the upper 70s.

For the most part, he's usually under the half log on the UTH side, but sometimes he'll climb out and sit between the glass and the top of the half log. Still, he just never leaves that area, as far as I have seen. Here's how I found him pretty much all afternoon:



It almost seems as though he's balled up in the stressed out, defensive position or something



I have made some changes to the habitat since I took this photo. I removed the large plant and the water dish because I felt they were too large for the 10 gallon tank and were overcrowding things. I replaced the large dish on the right side with a smaller zoo med corner dish and placed a new small rock cave hide on that side towards the front so that he has a choice of hides on warm and cool side. I'm hoping that might help out a bit.

Of course, it's also possible that he's just stressed out, right? Realistically, aside from switching the lights on and off for the day/night 12hr cycles, should I pretty much avoid even going near the vivarium for a week or so? I almost worry that me walking over to take a look at him might be too much stress.

Essentially, I want to make sure I'm not screwing anything up too royally until I manage to put together the awesome set up that was stickied at the top of the forum. Even then, I may want to wait a while since moving him from one habitat to another *twice* in a week might be too much stress.

Addendum: I was working on this post little by little throughout the night and as of now, 9:49pm, Monty came out of his hide and is climbing up the side of the tank (on the warm side) and seems to be checking things out. Perhaps making things less "busy" was for the better?

Thanks for your time and for reading the ramblings of a newbie!

[echs332000]

Do you have any device to regulate the heat on that UTH?

[DutchHerp]

Main problems:

1) The hide -- BPs like extremely tight fitting hides, with only a small opening hole so they feel secure. Half logs don't provide the proper security they need. You can easily make them out of little plastic boxes, but I personally get them from www.reptilebasics.com and I love them.

2) A minor problem -- The back and sides can be covered so the snake feels more secure, even though this is not a strict necessity.

3) The heat -- How is this regulated? You'll need a thermostat (or at least a dimmer) to provide the proper temperatures.

[cshouston]

No, that's also on the list to pick up tomorrow night, along with the infrared thermometer and the multitude of other items that were listed in the sticky thread. If only I had read that beforehand...!

Side note, he's being relatively active (poking up the side of the tank, climbing around and on the hide) and is stretched out more, but is still just hanging out on top of the half-log and not venturing away from the warm side.

[dsmalex97]

heres what you do!!

Purchase a sterilite 32qt container
add substrate
buy a reptile thermostat to regulate the temperature on the uth to about 90-95.
buy a thermometer from walmart that has a probe to measure the belly heat from the uth, as well as a thermometer to measure ambient temps, and a hygrometer as well. walmart has a 3in1 so see if they have it. Ambient temps are fine in mid 70's so don't worry about them. Also, get another hide thats more cosy for him. Try a hampster igloo or something, mine love em. Hope that helps.

PS if your not familar with tub use, look into it its very common.

[DutchHerp]

Ah, he's just a new snake getting adjusted. It's night time, he'll be active for a little bit. Don't handle him at all for a week or so, then try to feed him an appropriately sized mouse.

Will you feed live, f/t, or p/k?

[Slim]

First off, Welcome to BP.net. You couldn't have found a better on-line community.

Second, please read this:
http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=56846

Basicly, you've made almost every mistake a first timer can make, LOL. Don't let it get you down, we can fix it up in no time.

- If you're going to use a glass cage, you need to cover 3 sides of it with some black foam-core. Helps hold in the heat, and provides security for your BP.

- Please take that log hide back to petstore guy and smack him in the cranium with it...J/K. Those hides are almost worse than nothing at all. You need a hide that the snake can really HIDE in...something like this is the way to go:
http://www.reptilebasics.com/Hide-Boxes-p-1-c-282.html

- Ditch those stick on temp things on the glass. They measure temps in the wrong area, and are very inaccurate anyway. Go to Wally World and pick up an Accurite Temp/Hygrometer combo for $14.

- Please control your UTH with at least a lamp dimmer from Home Depot, or better yet a Thermostat from Herpstat or Helix. UTH's can run up to 125 degrees if left uncontrolled.

- Don't worry about decluttering your cage. Actually, the more stuff in there the better up to a certain point. BPs need to feel cloistered to be secure and happy.

Again, please read the thread I gave you and welcome to BP.net. Please feel free to post any questions you have.

[cshouston]

Main problems:

1) The hide -- BPs like extremely tight fitting hides, with only a small opening hole so they feel secure. Half logs don't provide the proper security they need. You can easily make them out of little plastic boxes, but I personally get them from www.reptilebasics.com and I love them.

2) A minor problem -- The back and sides can be covered so the snake feels more secure, even though this is not a strict necessity.

3) The heat -- How is this regulated? You'll need a thermostat (or at least a dimmer) to provide the proper temperatures.

Thanks! As far as the hide goes, I am going to replace that half log with a small 'rock' cave identical to the one I just placed on the 'cool side', as long as doing so won't further stress him out in such a short time period.

As for regulating the heat... I wasn't aware of a thermostats importance until recently, so I will definitely be picking one up. I mean, I intend to pick up everything that was listed in this thread: http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/p...ad.php?t=56846. For now, I'll definitely grab the thermostat first and some better temperature probes so that I can better regulate each side.

The problem I see is that right now I don't have spot-type lights, but a full spectrum bulb in a hood which I suppose would be more omni-directional than anything else. Therefore, the temperatures on both sides of the tank rise when I use either bulb, proportional to which bulb I'm using (the 40 watt red or the 60 watt day). Should I invest in better lighting right away, as well?

[DutchHerp]

I don't really understand the day/night bulbs...

Is one side heated during the day, and the other side at night?

If so, you're gonna want a constant warm side, and a constant cool side.

[cshouston]

First off, Welcome to BP.net. You couldn't have found a better on-line community.

Second, please read this:
http://www.ball-pythons.net/forums/s...ad.php?t=56846

Basicly, you've made almost every mistake a first timer can make, LOL. Don't let it get you down, we can fix it up in no time.

- If you're going to use a glass cage, you need to cover 3 sides of it with some black foam-core. Helps hold in the heat, and provides security for your BP.

- Please take that log hide back to petstore guy and smack him in the cranium with it...J/K. Those hides are almost worse than nothing at all. You need a hide that the snake can really HIDE in...something like this is the way to go:
http://www.reptilebasics.com/Hide-Boxes-p-1-c-282.html

- Ditch those stick on temp things on the glass. They measure temps in the wrong area, and are very inaccurate anyway. Go to Wally World and pick up an Accurite Temp/Hygrometer combo for $14.

- Please control your UTH with at least a lamp dimmer from Home Depot, or better yet a Thermostat from Herpstat or Helix. UTH's can run up to 125 degrees if left uncontrolled.

- Don't worry about decluttering your cage. Actually, the more stuff in there the better up to a certain point. BPs need to feel cloistered to be secure and happy.

Again, please read the thread I gave you and welcome to BP.net. Please feel free to post any questions you have.

To answer Matt first, my only "role model" has been my old friend who used to feed live or stunned/killed (whacked into a table). Personally, I would prefer to stun or kill it beforehand for the mouse's sake and so my python doesn't get bitten or scratched. When I picked Monty up, I was told he had been live fed, so I wasn't going to venture away from what he was used to.

Thanks for all the great info and the welcome. I'll definitely go out and grab the Accurite, a thermostat, and a better hide tomorrow, then work on the rest from that thread. I probably won't switch him over to the new digs for at least a week or two, though.