I just talked to Tracy Barker at the Houston expo and she said something that may make many of these tips irrelevant. She does not provide belly heat at all except for ovulating females. She keeps the ambient at 81 degrees and they are fine. She even said she doesn't have females hitting the "wall" and refuse to keep eating and thinks that's due to them not being kept as hot as most keepers keep them. She does this with both ball pythons and boa constrictors (not sure about her bloods since she didn't mention those). Obviously the absence of Flexwatt or heat cable means there is no more fire risk than what's in the rest of your house unless you have to use space heaters to get it to 81 degees. What's everybody's thoughts on this? Since I can keep my reptile room at 81 degrees without a space heater (it has a window unit that has heat), I think I'm going to try it but I'm going to lower the belly heat slowly rather than just cutting it off abruptly. Tracy's been breeding longer than pretty much anybody so I trust her take on this. She's obviously doing something right.