Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i want to get a pueblan,honduran and a albino nelson how should cage them ? should i use a rack system? and wat king should i get.

thanx in advance

If you want to enjoy these snakes as pets, I suggest either an aquarium with a metal screen lid (if you're on a budget) or one of the nice molded plastic front opening cages (if money is no object). I find 20 gallon long aquariums work well. You can get them for about $29 at PetSmart, but you might want to order the metal lids from petmountain.com. Their prices are MUCH better. I order my bedding from them, too. It's about half the price that the local pet shop charges. Don't forget metal clips to keep the lids on!
If you want to go with a rack setup and you are only going to house three or four snakes, you might want to try making your own to save cash. I use 41qt Sterilite tubs from Wal-Mart/Target (about $6 each) and 16x36 melamine shelves from Lowes/Home Depot. I use a cheap $1 soldering iron to burn air holes in the sides of the plastic tubs. Since the tubs are slightly wider than the shelves, I attach a 1x2 to each edge to increase the width. Then I just use 1x4 vertical boards as supports. It's working well for me. Everything is attached with wood screws. For heating I use pads attached to the ends of the tubs with velcro. I haven't used Flexwatt yet.
To keep the tubs from sliding too far back, I used mirror clips (see photo).
I use a similar setup for my hatchlings and yearlings. Also, any unused tubs make excellent drawers for various supplies like bedding, extra heat pads, hemostats, etc..
The downside of the racks is that you can't enjoy watching the snakes. Upside is that my snakes seem to feel more secure in a rack system. The rack setup holds humidity well, too.
In the end, it's up to you.
Good luck!

thank u so much

o also do u have any problems with plastic getting to hot or fire issues thanx

No problems with the 4x5 heat pads attached to the back or sides. I wouldn't put the pad under the tub, though. I tried it and it got very hot (no melting, but I think it was too hot for the snakes' safety). I will eventually try Flexwatt, but this setup is working fine for now.
Two things I forgot to mention: The price to build this rack was about $65 without the tubs and heat, so it was substantially less than a manufactured rack, but not super-cheap. And it's expandable by adding more layers as your collection grows. The other thing is that the melamine shelves are HEAVY! They're solid and sturdy, but the rack I built weighs about 50 lbs.