Ice Storm in the New England Region/Lost Power

[nca1979]

greetings all......just curious how many folks here were affected by the ice storm in new england last friday....

i was getting very concerned as to what I should do since I was without power for close to 30+ hours. thankfully, i was able to keep the temperature in the cages slightly warmer than what it was in my house, but when the power finally came back on saturday morning, i definatley had some "colder than normal" snakes, which definately concerned me.

i spent most of the morning helping their body temps get up back to normal and making sure their cages were absolutely spot on temp/humid wise. for the rest of the weekend, their behaviour seemed normal and everything seems fine, health wise....thankfully.

but, does anyone have any advice if this happens again? if you live in colder areas of the world, what do you do if you have a power issue and the heaters are off?

thanks

[Freakie_frog]

I have some friends in NH that have been without power for a while. They were hoping to get back up and running today.

[waltah!]

I got lucky and my power was only out for 2 hours. I try to keep a supply of hand warmers at home in case it happens. I also have gas heat so it won't get overly cold anyway.

[OhBalls]

We missed the ice here in Springfield but we have a generator for the snakes when we lose power. I'd rather keep them toasty and put on an extra sweater for myself!

[mooingtricycle]

Never lost power where i live here in Western MA. Some people did, towns more... in the boonies than myself.

[nca1979]

hahah, yeah, same here......

i was wrapping the snake cages with as many blankets as i could find to keep both of them as warm as possible.....and at the same time i had to wear a few extra layers to keep warm because i was using all the blankets on their cages....

thankfully the power wasn't out for too, too long. the area i live in, in central part of massachusetts near NH) is generally really good as far as dealing with weather, it was just this storm that really caused a whole bunch of damage, surprisingly.

[Colin Vestrand]

i have a large generator... we had three ice strorms in one year a couple years back and i finally bit the bullet. now i have zero worry whenever we lose power... best $600 i ever spent.

[lillyorchid]

You may want to look in to getting some heating packs that last 30+ hours that people use ship snakes. They come in real handy when the power goes out!

[SecurityStacey]

Hey there, I live in Western NY - didn't get hit by this ice storm but since I've gotten snakes I've had a couple long power outages.

I wrapped the tank in blankets to keep the warm air in and at the time it first happen I had a couple of those hand warmers from hunting so I wrapped them in papertowels and put them under the substrate and that kept my boy pretty warm. I had to keep an eye on it though, you'd be surprised how hot those things can get!

[ZinniaZ]

Just saw this thread. We did lose power and we were out for five and a half days. Temps at night were in the single digits. We used heat packs but after two or three days, they couldn't keep the snakes warme enough because the house was so cold. It was 41 in the warmest part of the house. So here is my advice.
1. Go buy a generator of some sort as soon as you can. Now. Before the power goes out. You can buy one that uses a car battery for about a hundred bucks that will power a couple of small things (like snake heaters.)
2. If the power goes out and you find that you are in a desperate situation, as we were, put the snakes insisde your clothing. This is a temporary fix, but I felt that our snakes were going to die by the second evening. They were way too cold even with the heat packs.
3. We constructed several garbage can heaters. This is a desperate last resort, and not very safe. But it kept our snakes alive and we used all kinds of caution. Here is how you do it:
-- use a metal garbage can (about 18 inches tall) and a short pillar candle (less than three inches high). We used two candles actually. Light candles and place in can. Place a cookie sheet with a folded towel on it over the opening of the garbage can. Place your snakes in a tub on the cookie sheet. An adult must sit with this set-up ALL the time. You have to monitor the heat on the bottom of the tub. You have to make sure it doesn't get knocked over and set your house on fire. If the candles are too tall it gets too hot. HOWEVER, despite the dangerousness of the set-up, this was the only way we could keep ours warm enough. They went from 51 degrees inside their tubs to 82. All of them survived. We did lose one leopard gecko. I think the stress killed him. But the garbage can method works. It creates a pocket of heated air and stays warm enough to keep the snakes alive. But be super careful.