How do you clean your BP's home?

[BigCeC43]

I've read through a few different pages regarding this, but I'm looking to see how all of you do it, how frequently, exactly what you clean (hides, water dish, glass or plastic in tank/tub, substrate?, etc..) and with what?

[Evan Jamison]

All of our snakes get a paper cage liner and new deli cup water dish every week. The tubs, hides, and water dish holders are sprayed down with a chlorhexadine solution weekly, and sterilized with bleach occasionally.

-Evan

[Blue Apple Herps]

I use sani-chips for bedding. I check their cages daily and remove any poop, etc as needed. Every couple of months I completely change the bedding and clean out the tubs using a chlorhexidine solution.

Every week I swap out their water water dishes for a clean one - I take their old ones and wash them out using soap and hot water then after that's dried I clean them with chlorhexidine and rinse that thoroughly. They then go into the clean pile of water bowls.

I clean their hides when I completely clean their cages, unless they've soiled them. In which case I clean right away.

[BigCeC43]

Thaks for the quick responses,

Looks like chlorhexidine solution is the stuff to get then. I have aspen bedding which I have no problem completely replacing every couple of months. I have used a very small amount of bleach mixed with hot water to sterilize one of the hides and a piece of driftwood that he relieved himself on. I change and rinse the water bowl daily with very hot water (burns the skin). As far as the chlorhexidine solution goes, is that something that you typically use to soak things in. Or... Evan Jamison, if you spray it directly on the items do you rinse them off after, or are you using a certain %solution that doesn't need to be rinsed.

[Blue Apple Herps]

I just spray the whatever I'm cleaning with the solution and let it sit for a couple of minutes, then wipe it up/away with paper towels. And the chlorhexidine comes in a concetrated solution - one gallon of it makes ~128 gallons of working solution. So a gallon of it will last a loooooooong time.

[aeio540]

I use untreated cypress bark which costs somewhere around $2-$4 dollars at home depot for one of those 45lb-50lb bags so it's pretty cheap and I can afford to replace the bedding on a somewhat regular basis.

The Glass tank:
I remove everything out by hand and throw it out and then I vacuum the inside of the cage completely. I spray some anti-bacterial cleaner in there and let it sit for about 10-15 minutes. I clean it up and then spray it down again and let it sit there for 10-15 minutes and then clean it up. Finally I use some glass cleaner/vinegar mix and make sure everything looks crisp and clean.

The Hides and Plants:
I put those in the bath tub and spray them down with the cleaner and let them sit. After about 10-15 mins I turn on the shower and put the water all the way to "extreme boil". I pat them down with a paper towel to dry or use a hair dryer.

Wood: Wood can be expensive sometimes so what I do is I put it in the oven along with the new bark and cook it for ~1:30hr at about 250 deg F. So far I haven't seen any mold or anything growing on it and it is doing pretty good. I do this about once a month.

I do spot cleaning 1-2 times a week. If he's not in his hide, I check because chances are, he's left me a little surprise. I switch the bark out every month, whether it looks dirty or not. I figure I can't see bacteria so I might as well play it safe. Also, he likes to poop in his hide so if I notice they are dirty, I clean the hides.

So far this has worked for me.

[kurgan]

The great advantage of newspaper is it is easy to clean. It get replaced every week or when it is soiled. Spray the cage with dilute chlorhexedine and wipe down at same time. Hides etc are soaked every few months but sprayed and rinsed weekly.

[JoshJP7]

I also use newspaper... I like this because when you've removed the soiled newspaper youve eliminated the mess completely. I use to use cypress mulch but only bc I was using glass tanks and needed it to keep the humidity up... What Ive noticed with paper is my snakes pee much more than I thought they did. After I remove the newspaper I just wipe their tubs down with a baby wipe and then dry it off with a towel before putting in fresh newspaper. Pretty much free and you know its 100% clean when you change it.

[kc261]

What is chlorhexidine?