Posted by:
PHLdyPayne
at Tue Aug 29 17:32:45 2006 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by PHLdyPayne ]
Heating pads or undertank heaters can be used to heat plastic containers. It is best to get a theromstate to regulate the heat from the heating pads (this will deffinitely help prevent the pads from overheating and melting the containers and possibly severely burning your snake, or setting your house on fire).
You can use a human heating pad that has several heat settings (ie high, medium, low). I would set on the low setting (medium at the highest, never use the high setting) this should give you a hot enough warm spot for the python. If you need a higher setting than low, I deffinitely recommend getting a thermostate or rheostate to regulate it.
HOuse yuor snakes separately, especially if you don't want to breed (normally pythons won't breed if htey are not properly cooled..well, they may copulate but both need the cooling period to stimulate proper egg and sperm production). IT is best to house separately as this prevents any stress on the snakes, makes it easier to monitor regular bowel movements, snakes from fighting, etc. Also, it is more tricker to feed snakes when they are housed together. You have to feed outside the cage and separately but even then, they may strike at eachother as they catch prey scent on their cage mate.
Size of rat to feed should be about the same size (or a bit smaller) than the thickest girth of your snake (girth of rat = or less than girth of snake). remember the fur of the rat will make it look thicker than it actually is, so matching girth to girth is probably best, this way you do know the rat will be a bit smaller due to fur.
As these snakes are not full grown, feed once every 5-7 days. After they are about 2-3 years old, cut back to once every 10-15 days. You can feed once every 10 days now, though it will take longer for them to reach adult size.
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