Posted by:
JP
at Thu Feb 8 09:37:37 2007 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by JP ]
In my opinion, your temps are a little to warm for the "cooling" period. In fact, your temps may be a little high for the "warm" season (again, my opinion, and I'll qualify by saying that I've kept and bred snakes for more than 15 years, and have been working with Balls for ten).
During the spring/summer/fall, I keep my temps in the mid to high 80s on the warm end, high 70s on the cool end (with room temps in the high 70s most of the time).
During the winter, the room cools down into the mid 60s to high. I keep the warm end of the cage in the mid 80s, with a night drop down to the ambient room temps for about 8 hours.
We've had this debate here before, but balls simply do not require temps in the mid 90s, even if just a "hot spot". Remember that ball are nocturnal animals, that spend the entire warm part of the day under gound or other suitable shelter. I cant see how a wild ball python would normally encounter temps of 95 degrees or more.
Again, in more than 10 years with BPs, I've never maintained a hot spot greater than 88-90 degrees. I've never had an RI, and have not even had a single death by natural causes. Also, I don't worry about humidity at all, other than during shed cycles and a nightly misting during breeding. My humidty routinely stays in the 40% range. The idea that BPs need high humidity is another popular myth, IMO.
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