Last Minute Setup Questions

[RickyNY]

The pinned stickies have been a lot of help but you tend to read and process a lot of info up front; sometimes forgetting or overlooking some details.

I know what you mean, so much info and we forget a specific amount...I would be asking myself: "What was that temp again?
So I started noting everything in this cards:
[IMG][/IMG]

[ccplotner]

I still haven't made the jump to anything digital myself for record keeping. I find note cards are still the easiest way to keep track of things in my collection as well!!

[ckuhn003]

Thanks again for everyone's suggestions. I played with the temps again last night and it's starting to stress me out. Hopefully I'm overreacting....

Steps I took:

Taped the Herpstat probe (electrical tape on cord and not probe) to the underside of the glass area and covered with the Ultratherm UTH (using alum tape).



Set the Herpstat to 103 to achieve a warm spot of 93.1 (using temp gun). I put down minimal substrate (coco soft) which shows a temp of 85. The floor of the other side of the enclosure only reaches 75-76. Will these temps work? If not, any suggestions on how to raise them?

I didn't add any moisture to the substrate so it's very light and easily movable. So I would be afraid to increase the Herpstat setting because the snake would easily come in contact with the bottom of the enclosure and potentially burn.



Any suggestions?


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[RickyNY]

Good progress. I think you temp of 93 is fine. (There are different opinions on this, some say 88-92 other 90-96) I keep mine at 92. Does the probe I see inside is from a Acurite? If it does put the whole unit inside so you can also get an ambient temp (some say don't let this ambient temp fall below 75, other say 80). And what is your humidity?

[ckuhn003]

Good progress. I think you temp of 93 is fine. (There are different opinions on this, some say 88-92 other 90-96) I keep mine at 92. Does the probe I see inside is from a Acurite? If it does put the whole unit inside so you can also get an ambient temp (some say don't let this ambient temp fall below 75, other say 80). And what is your humidity?

The probe is for the TH-100 Digital Thermometer that I purchased from Reptile Basics. The probe is basically sitting in the substrate over the hot spot area. I'm not sure how you keep it from moving once the snake and hides are in place. I don't have a probe for the ambient side. I was just using a tempgun to measure (75ish on substrate).

http://www.reptilebasics.com/thermometers/TH-100/

The humidity was hovering around 50% but I haven't put in any water dishes yet or wet the substrate. I assume that number will increase when I do. I'm also wondering if I should just scrap the small bag of coco soft and go w/ a reptichip or something else to help conditions.

Thanks again for the response.

[RickyNY]

I couldn't tell you, I'm using aspen. And Yes, as soon as you add the water dish your humidity will go up. You need a probe for ambient temp, it doesn't matter if you hot side in a toasty 92F(belly heat) but your enclosure is 65F and the snake is freezing. I'm thinking ahead for my winter months, I don't know where you live.

[RickyNY]

...forgot: I drilled a hole on the side of my tub and fed the probe thru it, then I hot glued the probe to the bottom. (I didn't hot glue the metal tip). I don't know if you want to do it this way.

[ckuhn003]

Spoke w/ the breeder today and he recommended attaching a small UTH to the back wall of the ambient side to try and increase the current cool side which is hovering around 75.

[Zincubus]

The probe is for the TH-100 Digital Thermometer that I purchased from Reptile Basics. The probe is basically sitting in the substrate over the hot spot area. I'm not sure how you keep it from moving once the snake and hides are in place. I don't have a probe for the ambient side. I was just using a tempgun to measure (75ish on substrate).

http://www.reptilebasics.com/thermometers/TH-100/

The humidity was hovering around 50% but I haven't put in any water dishes yet or wet the substrate. I assume that number will increase when I do. I'm also wondering if I should just scrap the small bag of coco soft and go w/ a reptichip or something else to help conditions.

Thanks again for the response.

As regards the thermometer probe I use a 'hot glue gun' to secure probes or branches down in the vivs - the glue sets within seconds and is strong enough to withstand snakes but you can pull or cut it away if and when you want to .