Hey everyone hope you are all having a great day so far! My name is Luke and I excited to be a soon to be ball python owner. I've kept lizards in the past, and currently have a reef tank. Since I was a kid I always loved snakes, and knew one day I wanted to own one. But my mom never let me get one until I moved out of the house. Well here we are only 1 month into college and since I am out of the house, well its snake time. :p I contacted a local breeder and I will be meeting him Oct 4 to bring home my new baby. Here are some pics he sent me:


Solo shot

Here he is compared to a normal.

He is a male fire, hatched 2014.

With this thread I am hoping to try and keep a record of his growth and development. As well as if I have any questions I will post them on this thread, or possibly start another specific thread if I don't get enough responses.

Here are the items I've gathered so far:
16qt tub with locking lid
UTH and thermostat (in the mail) [Also I bought a 12" by 9" slate of tile from Home depot to attach the UTH and Tstat probe to, that way it will help prevent overheating as well as make the Zoo Med UTH portable when I need to upgrade the tub and not have to risk damaging the integrity of the heater itself]
Paper towels or aspen for substrate (Haven't decided yet)
Digital temp/humidity gauge
sturdy water dish
2 hides
also fake/plastic plants (These are extra from when I had lizards, will be disinfected. I'm not sure if I will use them. Knowing the more stuff I put in the cage, the more I will have to clean)

Things to buy/do:
I need to pick on what substrate to use, while I would love to create a more natural environment with using aspen, just need to see how cost effective it is and see how easy cleaning is compared to paper towels)
Drill holes for ventilation in the tub.
Purchase a gram weigh-er to measure his weekly weight gain.

Thanks for looking!

Luke