Quote Originally Posted by Hugsplox View Post
Your issue with the thermometer reading differently is caused by having one directly under that heat lamp. The heat is coming straight down on that one so you're seeing a higher temp and a lower humidity. Think of it this way, if I hold a hot dog next to a campfire it won't cook as quickly has if I hold it over a camp fire. Your thermometer on the wall is catching ambient heat, your one on the ground is getting direct heart.




I don't entirely agree with this advice. Belly heat, aka heat generated by a UTH or heat tape, does next to nothing for ambient temperatures in the enclosure. I've also never seen anyone using a bedsheet to hold in heat and humidity. Not saying it's not possible, but the duct tape + aluminum foil method has never failed me. Regardless I wouldn't recommend getting rid of the overhead heat when OP said that room gets pretty cold. If you want to do away with the light generating heat lamp, a ceramic heat emitter is a great option, but I think you'll find many keepers here that have kept snakes under some type of nighttime bulb with no issues.
Thank you so much! I suppose I should have thought of this but honestly I am totally frazzled.
So, going on from this information, if this is the case then my ambient temps on the warm side are too low when they're sitting at 80*. My issue with this IS I *could* move my heat lamp closer to the enclosure (I have it on a stand hovering quite a bit above the enclosure) and I have tried this, which does raise the ambients, but then my surface temps will get too high (I have a thermometer probe measuring this as well). It is a little bit nerve wracking trying to get a perfect balance with the UTH and heat lamp, but I am determined to do just that until I am able to set her up in a PVC enclosure.
So, my temps on the cold side are normally 77-78, ambient (middle) is 77-79, hot side ambient is 80ish, but her surface temps (hot spot) are constantly 88-91.
Would you happen to have any advice on what I could do here? I'm starting to run out of options in my head.