UVB Light for Ball Pythons

[Malum Argenteum]

I will provide what people are potentially referencing when they say ball pythons 'benefit' from UVB, a comment made by reptile keeper Francis Cosquieri:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...iE/mobilebasic

That's a fun read, in spite of being quite a mess. There's a lot to be said about it, but what stood out to me most were the passages where he is conflationary on important issues. For example:

"When you have longevity records for, say, Royal pythons hitting 47 and 62 years, you have to ask - how were THOSE snakes kept? (Answer - not in tubs, and with access to sunlight). Contrast this with one ‘big breeder’ who has let slip his females live 8-10 years on a video, which is ABYSMAL for Royal pythons; you would expect at least 20-30 years. So while that is anecdotal, there certainly is a precedent for healthier snakes to be more likely to live longer."

There are a lot of extra variables there: a breeder pushing females to breed (early and often) is very likely to get short lifespans out of them regardless of UVB provision; the 62 year old snake is a zoo animal, and certainly there are many more important factors in that lifespan than UVB (veterinary attention at the drop of a hat, primarily).

Another conflationary element in Cosquieri's arguments is that he shifts from 'UVB' (in the title) to 'UV' (in later parts of the piece). This is important since much of the behavioral benefit is possibly/probably attributable to UVA. Back in 1990s was the introduction of UV to herp keeping. The first step in usage and hardware availability were lamps with a substantial UVA output; the selling point on these was the behavioral benefits. After UVB lamps (which also have UVA, in roughly the same amount as the earlier lamps had) came into widespread use, we seem to have forgotten this distinction (kind of like "bioactive" peddlers focusing on the benefits of naturalistic enclosures but failing to point out that all those benefits can be had without the microfauna and expensive substrates and drainage layers). Kind of a shame that even sophisticated commentary on UV use fails to consider this.

I couldn't easily check the "citations" for the behavioral studies, since many of them were just name-dropping. Furthermore, out of the six full citations he offers, one is a college project, one is a thesis, one is a dissertation, and another one is unpublished. Two of the five citations he offers in support of the claim that UVB increases D3 levels do not in fact address that connection at all.

If you want to see a poorly designed study, and one that seems to argue against providing UVB, check out Bradwell, Jordan, and Jessica Hackett (cited by Cosquieri). "The Effects of Ultraviolet (UV) Light Exposure on the Physiology And Behaviour of Captive Corn Snakes (Elaphe guttata)." RATEL (2013): 9. here. Each group was three snakes, the study duration was short (7 weeks), experimental housing was marginal (2 year old corn snakes in a 12 x 12 viv, which is a poor layout for thermoregulation, a factor that was not noted); the lamp was either a 10.0% UVB lamp, or provided a UVI of 10 -- the paper is ambiguous on this; the test group also received oral supplements that the control group did not (so we don't actually know which variable caused the effects); one behavioral difference that was noted was "a heightened state of aggressiveness", and the test snakes were in their hides in every single data measurement (the control snakes were in and out of their hides roughly half the time). The behavioral findings in that study are what I would consider patently negative.

His zealotry comes out here when he gets his words tangled: "It is also worth mentioning again that study was the SINGLE UV study performed on reptiles that did not show rather obvious differences between the animals kept under different treatments, and a comparable study using the same methodology and time period was performed on Bearded Dragons (which obviously DO require UV and lots of it) that yielded exactly the same result as for Royal Pythons. In other words, take that result with a pinch of salt." So, there was only one study that showed negative results and it was exactly the same as another study that showed negative results. I get what he's trying to say here (and it is admittedly a good point), but it is revealing that he got ahead of himself in his sales pitch.