I've kept rat snakess on aspen and carefresh primarily, but recently made the switch to sani chips. I like substrates that clump to fecal waste and dry it so I can spot clean rather than changing out a whole smelly sheet of newspaper. This is especially true with rat snakes considering how much some of mine poop.

I like the sani chips better than anything else I've used so far, but they're so small that they stick to thawed rodents like crazy. I've tried feeding on a piece of newspaper or in a hide, but some of my snakes drag their food around and still get chips stuck to it. It's not so convenient for me to pull them all out to feed in a substrate-less container considering all the time that takes to go through the whole collection.

Is there some other clumping substrate I should try that I wouldn't have to worry about the snakes ingesting? Or am I just being too cautious about them occasionally swallowing some sani chips? If they can digest mouse bones and bird beaks, I wouldn't think a few small pieces of wood would cause them too much trouble but I've been very careful to avoid testing that idea so far.

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• Substrate of choice? - Kevin Saunders, Sun May 1 21:53:58 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - pinelandsghost, Sun May 1 22:31:18 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - markg, Mon May 2 17:36:01 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - pinelandsghost, Tue May 3 01:10:02 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - markg, Tue May 3 12:41:25 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - DMong, Tue May 3 12:53:03 2011
• Thanks for weighing in (more) - Kevin Saunders, Tue May 3 16:25:27 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - DMong, Tue May 3 21:22:21 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - Kevin Saunders, Tue May 3 23:08:23 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - DMong, Wed May 4 12:59:50 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - markg, Thu May 5 15:06:17 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - Kevin Saunders, Thu May 5 22:59:16 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - markg, Fri May 6 14:47:41 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - wildlines, Wed May 25 13:38:52 2011
• RE: Thanks for weighing in (more) - DannyBoy9, Wed May 4 20:59:06 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - BillMcgElaphe, Thu May 5 17:06:20 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - pinelandsghost, Fri May 6 02:23:57 2011
• RE: Substrate of choice? - randywhittington, Sat May 14 00:59:08 2011