One other thing i do for bedding is i have the hot side stay mostly dry as well the other side is the cool more humid side. The way i accomplish this with coco is with eco earth. Im just a fan cause i feed in the tank n never had an issue, forest floor, aspen, and also the big husks coco all have been sticking out of my snakes nouths at one point or another but this has been fantastic.

Eco earth in the block form (because its the cheapest), then get the bag of it, that is slightly damp but way drier than the block will be and very fine. i love it, its soft looks good smells good its awesome stuff n ive tried it all. First time i went to coco my 7 year old male was literally divining thru the stuff had the majority of his body covered with his head poking out if a snake could tell u he is happy he was doing it that day. I hate the course chunky coco crap that everyone is pushing now. Its rough my snake will get almost like dye marks under him in a few spots from it when he is balled up, hes heavy n i can tell he doesnt like laying on it n having a chunk digging into his side im sure of it.

Anyway the sides with the blue cheap homemade hides are the cool humid sides. The sides with dry coco and store bought hides are the hot sides. My animals have changed for the better. Since changing to this setup. Even if u wanna use the chunky stuff cool try this though pick up a bag of this dry stuff. One big 24 qt bag will last u with that size tank prob 4 to 8 (more towards the higher number) of changes. Also pick urself up a sterolite container that u water the coco with to break it up and use only distilled or at least filtered water n u can store left over in that as well. I only say this cause the left over will not go bad (ur adding a ton of bacteria n crap with tap water believe it or not) n u cant put the lid on it lock it n the rest is ready to go.for however long u leave it. u can also let it dry out n just use that instead of buying the dry bag but this take preperation n i prefer the dry bag for hot side as its superior to the block for sure. Then u put the moist stuff mostly on the cool side the dry stuff on the warm side. I dont have humidity issues n i live in ne pa and have the 7 year old normal male 2 kilos in a 40b critter cage n the other pic is my pastel banana g stripe maybe 10 months old 450 grams in a simple sterolite setup which he loves.i have a bio active terrarium exo terra that im getting my plants going n isopods n springtails its about 5 months old now its a 36 x 18 x 24 which he will go when he is bigger, i know the height isnt needed but it is for the plants i have. Anyway try this if u want since hes already used to coco n u will never have an issue with scale rot or anything like that. U will moisten the cool side to keep the humidity to what u want n thats it. Perfect setup for a ball python im telling u, u wont look back. I do a complete clean out n change every month max (i know it can go way longer but i have 3 snakes so idc about the money part of it). I clean water every 2 or 3 days unless dirty and clean his hides prob every 2 weeks. I ise chlorhexidine for cleaning his hides n stuff dawn for water bowls (idc about opinion here i want them clean ni have never had an issue using that) n f10 sc xd and the chlorhexidine when i clean the tank out as well as rinsing it after n then a light more diluted chlorhexidine to finish it off so it stays killing bacteria even after im done. Get thise 2 cleaners for sure or at least chlorhexidine, amazon a gallon for under 15 bucks to ur house it will last so long it will amaze n can be used many other applications. Awesome products man. F10 is way more expensive but worth it for sure. My hides used to still wreak until i got the f10 that stuff is legit. If ur close enough to me i will give u both lol.

Just came to the conclusion idk how to add a photo so let me know if u wanna see the pics n tell me how to n i will lol. Im terrible at life.