Moving...oh dear

[gaiaeagle]

I was offered a job in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, which is about an 11 hour drive from where I am currently living in SE Kansas. I have done this move in the reverse, but at that time, I only had to worry about moving my cat. This time, I have to worry about moving 3 cats and 7 snakes. The male normal ball python is going to the daughter of his original owner who passed away a few months ago.

So my boyfriend and I have it planned that we will be moving via moving truck and he will be driving the truck while pulling his car. I will be driving my car with all the critters. This is going to be interesting. We will be moving in a little under a month.

The cats I am not worried about, but I am wondering what would be a good method to move the snakes in as stress free as possible. This whole move is going to be stressful no matter what, but a little planning, I feel, will go a long way.

Has anyone else moved across country with their animals and how did that fair?

Any advice will be much appreciated.

[rabernet]

Will you be driving straight through or stopping overnight?

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[jbean7916]

I'd bag them and put them in a couple tubs with heat pack.

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[MrLang]

Since during shipping they can be in transit for over 11 hours, get handled by a bunch of people, and get exposed to extreme temp. spikes... I'd say treat them like you're shipping them and you'll be fine.

IE
Put them in something insulated like a cooler or foam lined box so the temps don't spike
Keep the snakes individually wrapped in small containers or bags so they can't hurt themselves
Hot/Cold pack if the temps anywhere along the way spike in a bad direction
Don't feed for a week prior so they don't poop all over themselves or regurg


GL

[BFE Pets]

I bagged mine, left them in the rack, filled tub with packing peanuts, and used a power inverter to run the flexwatt. But i only had a 3 hour drive.

[gaiaeagle]

We will be driving straight through, although we probably won't be moving in until the next day.

The schedule planned so far is:
-Load up everything possible in the truck on Sept. 19th
-Load last minute things and the animals on Sept 20th and drive to Milwaukee
-Spend the night either in a hotel room or with my parents that evening
-Move everything into the new place on Sept 21st
-Have the weekend to start unpacking before I start my new job on Sept 24th

I was planning on keeping them all in bags then putting them all in a tub with a heat pad while we are driving, so I can have the AC on without them getting too chilled. Luckly all of them are small. Most are under a year old, with only my Dumerils being about 2 years old, but he is only about 2 feet long.

I'm also wondering how long can they be without water? Will they be fine for the 11 hour trip? Should I put them back in a tub when we stay somewhere overnight and give them water?

Just want to make sure I have all my basis covered. This is going to be a very complicated move and I would like it to go as smoothly as possible.

[gsarchie]

Sounds like you have a solid plan and I feel like a lot of people here have a tendency to go overboard with moving animals.

The first thing to do is to stop feeding 2 weeks prior to moving, or at least this is what I did. My snakes have been driven from Leavenworth, Kansas, to Colorado Springs, and back. On the way to CO I put them all into 1 large tub and put it in the back seat of my truck, as it was an 8 hour drive and they were going straight into the house when I got to CO. From KS to CO they stayed in their tanks and went straight inside when they got to the house. Balls live, and brace yourself, OUTSIDE in Africa! Are there temperature swings out there? Yes. Do they always have a warm basking spot that is at 92 degrees? Heck no! While they can self regulate their temps outside, there will still be times where they can't get as warm as they'd like, and if they couldn't handle a few hours without perfect conditions they would die in captivity a LOT more often. If your snakes don't have a heat source for 24 hours and the temps don't drop below 75, then you will be absolutely fine. Even a drop below 75 would be fine if it were only for a short time.

As for your question about taking them inside when you stop at night - definitely. The car should get pretty cool at night, which would put undue stress on your snakes. Good luck with everything and let us know how it goes.

Side question - I'm concerned that your Dumerils is only 2' at two years of age? Is he a poor eater?

[gaiaeagle]

Side question - I'm concerned that your Dumerils is only 2' at two years of age? Is he a poor eater?

He is more of a really picky eater. He will only eat live, and here there are not many places that have live feeder rats. We have to drive 45 mins away to a pet store that has them regularly. We tried for a long time to transition him to f/t and he would not take. He also had a RI for a couple of months which he went a few months without eating. Over the past couple of months, we have even out his feeding schedule so he is eating what he will eat. Once we get to a bigger city, we will not have this problem.