Reptile & Amphibian Forums

then dont use bleach, chloryxoximalam, or anything else like it. use hot water. let the immune system do its job. hot water has worked for many years, and many species. sterile is bad, clean is good though. a product for every pathogen. what a joke! spend money, kill snakes. do you disagree? im sure some do. let the record reflect. again, sterile = sickness.
joe

I agree 98% the only time sterile is good is when you are treating a sick animal with a severely weakened immune system . Good and clean is best over all . David

Over the decades, I've seen some of the most devastating disease outbreaks in collections that were kept under almost sterile, squeaky-clean conditions. ANY animal's (including humans) immune system needs to be challenged to stay "in shape". How can you fight the big bug hat comes along if you never have to fight the little ones?

That shouldn't be an excuse for dirty cages. I spot-clean DAILY( and I have several hundred snakes), andI still use a weak bleach solution when I do a complete strip-down cleaning at regular intervals.
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Brad Chambers
WWW.HCU-TX.ORG

The Avalanche has already started-it is too late for the pebbles to vote....

It would be a pretty awesome day that hot water alone can easily, in one swipe, get that dried smear of poop that somehow made it along the entire side of one cage...

Bleach is an excellent cleaning solution - and a 10% solution isn't really going to sterilize much (spray some on your clothes and see how effective it still is).

Bleach, dishsoap, chlorihexidine, healthy habitat... It's all meant to do the same thing, just to different degrees. I think in most cases, using chlorihexidine is overkill.
Personally, I prefer healthy habitat and/or bleach. Both are effective at getting dirt, poop, and other kinds of cage funk clean.

~jenny
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"We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words."
- Anna Sewell (1820-1878)

>>Personally, I prefer healthy habitat and/or bleach. Both are effective at getting dirt, poop, and other kinds of cage funk clean.

It should be mentioned that Bleach becomes ineffective at disinfecting poop, dirt, etc. after it has been exposed to it for enough time. It's not so much a cleaner as it is a disinfectant -- better used once the cage has been washed with soap and water.

But the point here is that you're not trying to disinfect the cage, you're trying to clean it.

Bleach is excellent at getting things clean. In this situation, its disinfecting properties don't matter - the goal is not to disinfect, it is to clean.
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"We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words."
- Anna Sewell (1820-1878)

>>But the point here is that you're not trying to disinfect the cage, you're trying to clean it.

Yes, but you said, "Personally, I prefer healthy habitat and/or bleach. Both are effective at getting dirt, poop, and other kinds of cage funk clean."

Bleach doesn't clean poop. Soap, water, and elbow grease does. Bleach at a concentration of about 5% (about 50mL of bleach to 1 L of water) is a good disinfectant once the cage is cleaned with soap and hot water.

>>Bleach is excellent at getting things clean. In this situation, its disinfecting properties don't matter - the goal is not to disinfect, it is to clean.

Again, the intended purpose of using bleach in the vivarium is to disinfect, not clean. If you read the "Disinfectants" chapter in Doug Mader's Reptile Medicine and Surgery (2006 ed.), you will understand my point.

DR

Suboc.com

This isn't surgery or medicine, these are my snake cages, and they don't need to be disinfected when the inhabitants are the same month after month and they are all healthy.

I am using a 10% bleach solution in lieu of soap. I prefer it to soap because it gets the poop off the cage surface faster. Healthy Habitat works just as great.

I can't make it any clearer. I don't care what bleach does to disinfect - I'm not using it as a disinfectant, I'm using it because its corrosive properties make it easy to clean my cages.

Clean and Sterile are not the same thing.

~jenny
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"We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words."
- Anna Sewell (1820-1878)

Okay. This is obviously an argument of semantics. To begin with, it really was not my intention to attack you or your original statement...I was only supplementing it for other readers here to understand that using a dilute disinfectant (such as bleach or chlorhexidine gluconate or whatever) is not a suitable cleaning substitute for a mild soap detergent, hot water, and scrubbing. That was my whole point, and I do think that using a bleach solution (in lieu of soap) all of the time is a bit extreme. Just my humble opinion. And that's what these forums are for, right?

And of course, I know clean and sterile aren't the same thing. (Who said anything about sterilizing anyway?) Disinfected and sterile aren't the same thing either. Clean means removing inorganic and organic matter from a surface. A disinfectant, when used properly, removes some pathogens once a cage has been cleaned. A sterilant or sterilizing technique (such as autoclaving) kills all life -- bacteria, fungi, and viruses. I don't know of anyone who sterilizes their cages in this hobby.

By the way, cool Sewell quote, and I wish you the best with your snakes.

DR

Suboc.com

That is much clearer, and I agree with you on almost everything there.

I prefer to use bleach because it's just worked better for me and tends to be cheaper. Plus, clorox wipes are pretty much the easiest cleaning tool ever. I don't bleach everything down every week - I bleach it when it needs it, and use the wipes whenever there's anything in there a swipe with the papertowel won't pick up.

To each their own. What works for one person might not work in other situations.

~jenny
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"We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words."
- Anna Sewell (1820-1878)

Yes Jenny you are right Healthy Habitat is what I have been using since it first came to my attention and before that a bleach mix. And I’ll say it again good and clean is good enough .David

I don't think anyone is really trying to sterilize their environment - 99% of the time the snake craps in the tub within 5 minutes of cleaning it anyway. The goal is to clean the tubs and remove the stuff that can do harm. Yes soap and hot water work well - a bottle of chlorhexidine isn't any more expensive than a bottle of soap - it's not harmful to the animals. Bleach is certainly cheaper than soap and if used properly is harmless to the animals as well. Both loosen and remove stuck on urates easier than soap and water.

So I guess I'm really not seeing your point?
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Tosha
JET Pythons

i guess my point is that it seems like wasted time, and money to buy chemicals, dilute them (if necessary) then rince over and over agian. hell, you can sandblast your tubs if you want to. but ill just keep using what works for me. good ol' H2O.
joe

I think the only reason I don't alway use hot water (i do most of the time) is because most snakes in the wild don't wallow in their own poop. heck, I don't think most pigs/animals would if they had a choice, so every now and then i will bleach or use a slightly heavier cleaner to fully clean everything up every few months or so. I don't clean up poop the instant they go. If you don't see it immediately, it cakes quite quickly. i think bleach is good to have on hand in any household to clean bathrooms and whatnot, so i just use it the infrequent times i use it because i already have it around... My snakes stay healthy, so I don't worry about it too much!
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http://darkbloodwyvern.deviant.com

I don't think you understand what "sterile" means. You will never have a sterile snake cage or tub in your home. Laboratories spend hundreds of millions of dollars to establish "sterile" sections of labs. You can not ever get something that clean in your home and you will always have some contaminants and some pathogens as long as you work with animals in your home.

Do you have a furnace that heats your house including the room the snakes are in? Central air? Do you have carpet in your home? Do you have a dog, cat, bird or any other animals? Do you wear your shoes into your snake room? Do you have a damp basement? Do you wear the same clothes you leave your house in when you go into the snake room? Do you have a fireplace in your house? All of those are just simple common examples of reasons why you will never have things clean to the extent you think you do in your home and why sterile is miles away.

Well I pretty much agree as well in that I prefer not to use chemicals for regular cleanings. The only problem that I see with using just hot water is that due to surface tension the water may never even come in contact with the surface being cleaned. In reality that is what soaps main purpose is, to break that surface tension and allow the water to do its job. But still I think that disinfecting tubs, bowls and hides is a good idea when switching them between animals. If I move a hatchling from a shoe box up to a 15qt tub I use the Chlorhexadine to clean that shoe box, bowl and any other items used before putting a new snake in there. That also includes the slot of the rack where the tub came out of. I don't like bleach simply due to the odor factor. When I am cleaning I don't want to wait 5-10 minutes or longer for the odor to dissipate before going on to the next animal. And to Phil. Dude I don't know what a ION Hospital is but having work several years in a hospital and other nursing facilities I can tell you that they are far from sterile. In fact more people die in hospital every year from infections that they picked up while in the hospital then what they came in for.

Jeff

I think this is the bottom line here, Do what works for you. Personally I use 10% Bleach solution once a week. So far this works for me. If I screw up I will change.
Link

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ION is a simple spelling error unlike the misunderstanding you had in a job field you WORKED in. Infections don't arise in hospitals due to the cleanliness but rather the high load of disease that enters a hospital that ISN'T killed off and infects patients (who are often immuno compromised). If the cleanliness in hospitals was the killer than a high percentage of surgeries would end in infections and fatalities.

I realized that my last post was aggressive and unkind, for that I apologize. I think this discussion is great and there is no place for comments like that.

The idea that I was trying to convey was to not have a sterile environment but to check your collection for the more virulent pathogens and then treat accordingly. Many collections have animals that harbor disease and aren't symptomatic (IBD, crypto, the list goes on). Obviously they are the most dangerous of the lot because you don't know disease transmission is actually occuring.

Again sorry for the negative outburst, I'm glad there is discussion on these topics.

Phil, you seem to have taken this subject very personally. Why I am not sure. But if you read my original statement you would see that I stated merely that hospitals "are far from sterile". I said nothing about cleanliness. But as you have stated that "Infections don't arise in hospitals due to the cleanliness but rather the high load of disease that enters a hospital". Which in my mind is no different then moving a large volume of animals in and out of a wholesale facility. Which even stresses more the need for good quarantine procedures regardless of what type of disinfectant you use. Lets face it hospitals are clean and common surfaces are disinfected on a regular basis but there is no denying that 100's of thousands of patients get sick every year while staying in health care facilities. As for the surgery deal. They are performed under as sterile a condition as can be reasonably provided but still patients are treated with antibiotics as a precautionary measure. And please I am not trying to start a war, just stating my opinion on this subject.

Jeff

P.S. Also, my reference to ION was a mistake on my part. I even goggled it with solid no results. DUH!!

I am interested and invested in this subject as I have been breeding reptiles and amphibians for many years as well as working in the captive animal field. Your posts added to the discussion where as one of mine was less than productive. I work with a variety of herpetologists/scientists and some of them feel as if the average hobbiest is meaningless (having said that I think that the majority hold a positive opinion or none at all). As a hobbiest myself I defend fellow herpetoculturalists and become a little jaded if/when I feel that the hobbiest is more concerned with turning a buck than learning about the amazing animals that they keep (including how to recognize illness and reduce transmission).

I hope my one post doesn't make it sound like I was trying to start something negative with you. Again I hope everybody has a great 2008 season.

Phil

Phil, No need to apologize to me. Perhaps Chonjoe, but not me. I have worked with and around professionals for near 26 years. In that time have come to understand that there is always someone that feels they are better or more important then someone else. Just a fact of society. What I find interesting though is that at the end of the original post below; after expressing your thoughts, ask and I quote "What does everyone else think?????". Good luck with your 2008 season as well.

Jeff