Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My karma is so good that when I wanted one snake for my 11 year old son, we now have two!!! Teriyaki is a Rosy Boa, Nagini is a Corn. Each cage has an under heater. I've now added an overhead RED lamp and want to know

1) Why was I told to buy RED bulb?
2) Do I set on timer? Daytime on, or nightime on?
3) How often remove all from cage and seriously scrub out?
(Teriyaki came in cage with 5-8 clumps of fecal matter
and "sticky" chips. This was a no-brainer and got
cleaned the next day!)
4) Do snakes exhibit some behaviour when they want to eat?
5) I'm looking for digital temp probe, reportedly @ Wal-Mart.
Which dept?
6) Don't these guys need vitamins, vegies, crickets...Something??? (previous reptile, Bearded Dragon)

Thank You for your time....
Teriyaki's Mom

1) Why was I told to buy RED bulb?
Red is supposed to be undetectable to snakes.

2) Do I set on timer? Daytime on, or nightime on?
You can leave the red light on 24/7 unless it gets too warm.

3) How often remove all from cage and seriously scrub out?
Depends what sort of bedding you use. With newspaper (which is what I use) I average a full cleaning every 7-10 days.

4) Do snakes exhibit some behaviour when they want to eat?
Sometimes but you will want to have them on a set schedule for the most part, like every week to 2 weeks.

5) I'm looking for digital temp probe, reportedly @ Wal-Mart.
Which dept?
My local wal mart keeps digital thermometers in the lightbulb/fixtures section.

6) Don't these guys need vitamins, vegies, crickets...Something??? (previous reptile, Bearded Dragon)
No, whole feeders (rats/mice) will have everything they need.
-----
Randall L Turner Jr.
Boas make the world go round.

Thank you very much for the info! "T's Mom"

np.
-----
Randall L Turner Jr.
Boas make the world go round.

Here's a few other pointers-

I am not too sure about the rosy boa, but for the corn snake an under take heater and a heat lamp might be over kill. The snake will need to be able to find a warm area and a cooler area. If you are only keeping the two snakes I doubt you are using a thermostat. Placing the Under Tank Heater on one end of the tank will let that side of the tank be warm and the opposite be cooler.

I keep my snakes on Aspen shavings. I spot clean them ever time I check on them, just about every day. I completely clean them all monthly. I fill the enclosures with very diluted bleach and water, and let the hide boxes and water dishes soak in it too. Then I rinse it all very well with cool water and air dry. If your using glass dry it with a paper towel and let it air out before placing the snakes back in.

Avoid pine or cedar shavings. The Corn snake may start prowling around the tank looking for food when it’s hungry. Unlike us snakes eat an entire meal at one time. A safe bet is to feed them 2 or 3 days after they defecate. You can be assured that after they defecate their system is pretty much empty.

The red light or now they sell blue lights are supposedly not to interfere with reptiles day/night cycle. If you want the lighting so you can observe them at night it’s fine, just don’t keep it so close as to over heat the snakes.

Cute picture of your snake!!! The corn is in quite a large cage, home-make a while back for a Bearded Dragon, so the underheater and overhead red are on the same side. It is quite a tall cage, so the warm side sort of needs the red lamp to keep temp around 80 degress. (It's only 25 watts) My cool side has the water container and a hide.

The Rost Boa is in a smaller cage. His 25 watt red bulb I turn on and off according to the temp guage. (It's starting to get hot here in So. calif.

Sadly, I cannot see your post to refere to it as I reply. Hope I answered your comments and resonded well.

I am amazed at the variation of feeding schedules!!! Both snakes approx 3 years old, and I've heard everything from 1 week to 3 weeks inbetween feedings.

They seem much less "fussy" that Bearded Dragons. This is good?

What about raising mice to feed these two?

Thanks AMS

You could try to raise your own mice. Personally I tried it and couldn't get it right. I keep and breed roughly 50 snakes with no problems, but couldn't get the mice down...go figure.

In three attempts of a trio of mice: 2 ended in canibalism and one just ate and [bleep] and that was it. So I gave up. I much prefer to feed frozen thawed.