ALthough it is generally of the opinion of most to rear hatchling burms (and any snake) in cages/containers that allow you to easily manage the animal, see the animal, and work with the animal. Having raised many myself, it is generally easier to keep a baby burm in a smaller sized cage where they feel secure and don't have to travel too far to find their optimal microclimate. With that being said, the answers that you have recieved, in your first post, reveal some level of ignorance of basic herp natural behavior (for which you even answered one of them yourself). If you want to keep your baby burm in a large, adult sized cage, just take the following into consideration:



1. LOTS OF SMALL, TIGHT hiding areas: make sure you provide a number of hide areas on the warm, cool (no lower than 80 deg F) and mid zones of your large cage. Ideally, if the snake can travel from one zone to another w/out going into the open, it will feel secure. BUT, this also means that when you do have to remove the snake, you will be spending some time finding it.



2. Along the same lines as multiple hide areas, I would also recommend multiple basking areas. This will prevent your burm from spending too much time in suboptimal temp gradients should they occur. I would recommend: 1. One long length of flex watt or similar thermostatically controlled heat tape running the entire width of the cage making sure that less than half the cage bottom is heated. 2. In addition to the heat tape, I would recommend a pro product radiant heat panel covering 1/3 of the inside roof of the cage to provide overhead heat while also boosting ambient air temps.



3. Feeding: Once you know where your burm is resting, offer frozen thawed prey via long hemostats; most likely, your baby burm will greetily take the food in its cozy hide area. Too many folks make the mistake of yanking their burms from their hide areas only to say "golly, why won't my snake eat?". DUH!



4. Humidity Hide Areas: baby burms are more prone to dessication issues than adults. Make sure the entire cage is warm misted every other day. You can also provide high humid hide areas by using various sized food storage containers with holes cut in the lids and filled with dampened spaghnum moss; many burms will seek these areas out during shed cycles. Just make sure that the entire cage is not damp; just small, localized microclimates. I keep my burms on newspaper and there's nothing better.



Hope this helps.



Rob Carmichael, Curator

The Wildlife Discovery Center

Lake Forest, IL





>>This is a pretty generic question that could apply to any species of snake but I know I'll probably get some good answers here.

>>

>>Anyway, is it safe and comfortable for a hatchling snake to be put into a cage sized for an adult of that species?

>>

>>With that asked, here are some of the answers I've recieved and why they still leave me questioning.

>>

>>1. The hatchling will be stressed out in the open.

>>Would multiple hideboxes, artificial terrain and foliage counteract that?

>>

>>2. The hatchling would get lost in there.

>>Does that mean aesthetically lost to the human eye, or does it mean that the little critter wouldn't be able to make its way around the cage/basking spot/hide boxes etc?

>>

>>3. It wouldn't be able to find it's food.

>>Assuming I can leave a f/t item at the entrance of it's current hiding spot, would it's food being able to find it be enough?

>>

>>In case you're wondering, yes, I'm biased. I'd rather buy one good cage once than go in steps. But I'll go with whatever benefits my as of yet hypothetical critter.

>>Anyway, thank you very much for any feedback.

>>-----

>>0.2 chickens (Falcon & Condor)

>>0.2 dog mutts (half ownership, only mine when they misbehave, Lucy & Amy)

>>0.1 Halflinger horse (Crissy)

>>0.0 Arizona Mountain Kingsnake (coming soon)

>>1.1 parents

>>Still searching for 1.0 WC human
-----
Rob Carmichael, Curator

The Wildlife Discovery Center at Elawa Farm

Lake Forest, IL

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