Quote Originally Posted by Pug50 View Post
My BP lives in my home and I'm quite frugal with my heating - in the daytime it's heated to 62F and since I got my snake I've programmed the heating to never allow temps to drop below 52F at night and when I'm out of the house.

I have a wooden 3x2x2ft glass fronted enclosure with just a 75w radiant heat panel over the hot side. It needed pillows and a duvet/comforter wrapped around the sides and tops to maintain a 90F hot spot and 77-80F cold end in 53F room temperature (my pulse-proportional t/stat runs at 50-80%). I'd never open the enclosure or handle my snake until the room is heated up though...


With regards to your situation - I have a feeling a classroom might be a scary situation for a BP; you should count on keeping the enclosure covered with an opaque sheet most of the time and have it in an out-of-the-way area.

Also - a healthy BP will tend to sleep/hide all day, and from what I hear they are best fed at night. Are there any other less-nocturnal species that you are considering?
I wouldn't expect a classroom temperature being able to drop that low. They wouldn't be able to get it warm enough for the students in the morning if dropped that low. Most schools I've ever been in, some very old, are probably in the 63-65F area. Maybe a tad lower during winter months. Being that your cage is 2' high, the RHP has to work extra hard to heat the lower portion of that cage. In a pvc enclosure, 80w of RHP is more than plenty to keep the entire thing warm if the ambient temps are 65 degrees.