Freak heater accident, lost a lot of snakes...

[NorthernRegius]

Sorry to hear about your loss. Shortly after getting my first BPs I heard of someone losing their whole collection due to heating issues. I only had 3 snakes, but knew I'd be getting more so the first thing I did was plan the heat out.

I have zone room heat (gas) at 78-80, then the racks are controled by double gang on/off t-stats set to 90-94F. I had my 1st double unit fail in the on position about 2 years back & the 2nd 1/2 did what it is designed to do, it shut the thing off. Snakes can handle 80 but continuous high temps will cook them.

If you're using a space heater, you may want to have a fan circulating the heat to prevent a thermal gradient from setting up in the room (especially important if you have high racks like I do). As long as your snakes have belly heat on a really good t-stat, room heat doesn't have to be to hot, at/above 72 will be fine. The temp alert devices mentioned in this thread are very good to have also.

Hope this may prove helpful to you & others who read your thread. No matter how good the equipment we use is, it can & will wear out/fail. So back-ups are necessary.

[DarkComeSoon]

98 degrees is not high enough to kill your snakes

[dsirkle]

I'm sorry for your loss.This is a terrible thing to happen and in the interest of preventing it from happening to someone else I wonder if this heater was plugged into a separate thermostat (not one that is built into the heater) and if so what kind. As far as the 98 degree temp I wonder what kind of thermometer it was. Did it have a probe on the heat source or was it a stick on thermometer mounted to the side of the enclosure or what. My room heater started running too hot at the end of the winter and I had to throw it away. I will have to buy a new one for this winter. If you could give us the specifics of the equipment that you were using maybe others could benefit from the info.

[CBI]

Sorry to hear about your loss.

Freak accident for sure, were you able to get the actual temperature reading inside their cage when it happened? 90 degrees does not seem too extreme considering ball pythons can thrive in 80+ degrees..... who would've guessed....

[omnibus2]

Wow, sorry for your loss.

I hate how they don't make this stuff more reliable, that's what I fear about thermostats/uth

Bulbs, even though they certainly do break at times, don't overheat at least to my knowledge. But ofcourse, those dessicate so yeah.

[ZinniaZ]

Montessa, I'm so sorry. I am sure you are second guessing yourself and doing the "if only" thing to yourself. I hope that after the initial heartbreak lets up a little, you will be able to have a little peace about it. I would not have foreseen this either.

Best wishes to you and the rest of your snakes and thinking of you.

In what state are you located?

[Mike Cavanaugh]

98 degrees is not high enough to kill your snakes

Exactly... even a good bit higher then that shouldn't be enough to kill the snakes in a few hours when we are talking room temperatures. Please let me explain.

What I am saying is if the temps started at 77 degrees (and required a heater to stop temps from dropping further), how can a room heater possibly get hot enough to kill the snakes in 7 hours? Even if the temperature in the room got up to say 110 degrees (which would take several hours if possible at all in a 77 degree room), the temperatures inside the tubs would take a LONG time to get up to that room temperature...

An example of this is my ASF Rat tanks in the garage. My garage in the summer gets up to 95 + degrees during the day. It will stay at this temperature for a few hours. Even after the temperature has been that high for fa few hours, the temperature inside the tanks only has time to get upt to about 87 - 88 degrees... and that is with an open screen top!

To the OP I am sincerely sorry for your loss, I am just trying to understand it so we can all benefit from it.

[Vypyrz]

If you could give us the specifics of the equipment that you were using maybe others could benefit from the info.

I'm sorry to hear this , but I also agree that any info you can provide may help others prevent this. I am also curious as to the type of heater you were using and the size of the room they were in. This is definitely going to make me re-think my winterization plans...


Rob

[derrabe]

WOW!...I am so sorry for your loss. Any idea what cuased the malfunction?

[Montessa Python]

I will get the name brand of the heater when I get home, as I am at work now.
IT was a large room heater with an internal thermostat. You can set the lower temp to turn on the heater when it gets down to that temp, the the upper limiter to turn it off when it hits that temp.
The room was a 9x12 rounded ceiling room with a very LOW ceiling 6.5 feet at the highest point, with hard wood floors, packed with books and book shelves. The snakes were mostly in tubs, with two king snakes in large tanks w/ screen tops. All the snakes and asf's were on wire rack shelves.
The ones I lost were on the top shelves, closest to the ceiling.
The room was at AT LEAST 98 degrees for I would think 6 hours, no fan except the force from the heater, which was large nearly 2 1/2 feet tall.
The temp limiter must have burnt out, it is the only thing I can think of.
My tarantulas were on lower shelves and survived, and the one bp that was on a lower (waist high) shelf survived.
my rats, larger colubrids, t's and one bp survived due to being on the lower shelves where the heat didn't rise.
I started fans immediately and within half an hour to 45 mins, the temp had gone down to 82, I have kept the fans on, and will go home and check them during lunch.
My two larger kings were in their water bowls....And my black mexican king is in the middle of shedding, i soaked her in room temp water in the bathroom for a bit too, and the surviving bp.
I lost Tarantulas once to an over heating which is why I switched to a (I thought) better, more reliable room heater to keep the room at 78-80 degrees...
I think the room size and shortness of ceiling had to do with the heat build up near the top which cooked the snakes....
I want to cry, but am just numb right now... I have had lucille for a few years now and losing her was hard...