Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Just took some updated pics of both of my snake rooms.

My original room used to house my entire collection before it outgrew the space allotted to it. Now it houses the entire BRB collection and all the babies from both my BRB's and my BCI's.

Here's a graphic layout of the rainbow room, entrance to the left, is actually the downstairs bedroom. The house was originally built with this room designed as a "in-laws quarters". One really nice design point is it's fully insulated for sound dampening.....

View from the door...

Working my way clockwise around the room, a 48 slot melamine hatchling rack, followed by a 45 slot AP rack, then My home made BRB breeding cage #2....

Both of my home made BRB cages, #2 on the left and #1 on the right....

A stack of Boaphile cages, 3ea 421 Condo's on top and 3ea 421 Townhouses on the bottom...

To the right of the Boaphile stack is the bedroom closet. This pic shows one of my two home made Sterilite 1754/1765 racks on the left and a three high stack of Boaphile 30 slot Rhinoraxx...

A more straight on look at the closet (also shows the second Sterilite rack)....

Continuing on, there are two racks I had designed by Animal Plastics to house 10 each Iris CB110 tubs (you can only see the top 6 tubs in this pic) And on the right of those are three more Boaphile 30 slot Rhinoraxx hatchling racks..

Last stop around the perimeter are two Sandmar Industries "stacks" on the bottom are 4 deeper tubs and on top is a combination cage/tub with a plugable access hole between them.

In the center of the room is this custom workbench/96 slot hatchling rack...

It's actually built as two separate racks that are normally joined together....

Like I said earlier, the collection grew beyond the capability of the original room to house so I carved out some space from the single car side of my three car garage. Built this room to house the BCI collection and left some space still in the garage proper to house the rodent factory.

In this layout drawing, the exterior rollup door (insulated and unused) is to the right, entry door toward the bottom (opens to the double car side of the garage) and off to the left outside the room but still in the garage is the rodent factory. The "squares" on the floor are one foot each...

A couple of images from the doorway....

Clockwise around the room, first are two breeding cage stacks, on the bottom of each stack are three Sandmar Industries 48" x 32" x 18" cages with roller hardware, keylocked bypass doors. Originally all 6 were fitted with caged ceramic heat emitters and each one had one of the 6" pedestals still on the bottom ones. That made the overall height of three cages 6'. I removed four of the pedestals and switched all six over to RHP's. Without the extra pedestals, there was room for another cage on top so I added a couple of Boaphile 421D's on top = two more cages in the same stacks!!! (Lotsa breeding going on in there right now)

On the exterior wall, a small stack of Sweater box tubs, a full stack of Boaphile 421D's.

And up against the rollup door is a stack of blanket box tubs and two more of the same AP 10 high CB110 tub racks.

Phew, hope you liked the virtual tour!!!!
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count (05/26/2009):
36.51 BRB
29.42 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

All I can think is WOW!!!!!!!

As a hobbiest I can't imagine the work that goes into keeping all those snakes healthy!

I would ask if you have any snakes that you consider pets? Or are they all intended for buisness?

A local wholesaler here is not at the same level you are at since he has feeders as his main buisness but I thought the collection he had was inpressive untill I saw your layout.

If you don't mind answering I was currious what the income potential of a set up like this could be anualy?

Once again WOW!!!!!!!!!!!
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JWilmot

0.1 Wife
0.1 BRB
1.1 Leopard Gecko
2.0 Mutts

Thanks!!

I'm still kinda in-between hobbiest and full time breeder. Still have a day job and yeah, lotsa hours go into cleaning and re-cleaning the cages. This weekend I went through a major clean, pretty much every cage, every tub was cleaned. Phew, was probably on the order of 16 hours spent on it.

That's a hard question re pets. There are many I'm attached to and will always have a home with me. And yeah, there are even more that are kept for their breeding potential, to be sold and traded up as time goes on. My goal being to improve the quality of my breeders and babies over time.

Income potential is very subjective, which litters take,which litter do not. What kind of babies are produced normals vs morphs. Retail vs wholesale etc. etc. Using every breeding cage I have, I could produce as many as 24 litters of BRB's and 14 litters of BCI. Excluding some of the really small litters I've produced litters with potential income ranging from $1K to $15K. I could see some litters be worth even more.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count (05/26/2009):
36.51 BRB
29.42 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Dave only one question. When can I move in and be your snake room janitor

I Cant wait until I have the space and$ to house and care for a collection that large. Thanks for the pics, they sure perked up my day. Things have been a little crazy again in the adventures of life

Well, there is an open CB110 tub, will that be large enough for you?

Really, it's a matter of time and re-investing the capital from sales back into more animals, cages and thermostats. (lol, just thought about it and I have thousands of $$ in thermostats alone.

Glad I could perk up your day...
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count (05/26/2009):
36.51 BRB
29.42 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

np

You have quite a few more snakes than I had imagined.
Your set up looks very user friendly and space efficient.

I really like the hatchling racks that double as a workspace.
A workspace like this is almost critical when you start dealing with increased numbers of animals.

When I get around to it, I will try to do the same type of thing to show a slightly different set up both inside and out. My rooms have changed a lot over the past decade, and I am always trying to find the best layout. My next project is to have a large restaurant style Stainless Steel Sink and countertop in each room (by the window). I want double or triple sinks. I want a sink for disinfectant that drains to the sewer and the other sinks plumbed to the outside landscape or my compost piles. The urate deposits are high in nitrogen and are a great fertilizer. I compost almost all of my snake wastes and kitchen scraps (including any uneaten dead rats…from the snakes…not from me), and keeping these piles moist every time you dump and rinse the water bowls will make the composting process work even that much better. Keeping the disinfectant out of the compost piles is very important or else you will kill all the microbes breaking down the carbon bonds in the organic matter.

Most cages will work fine if at the proper temperatures, so the 1,000's you have spent in thermostats are the second best investment you can make...After a good temp gun.

Soooo....... When do you sleep??
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Bryan Hummel
www.rainbowboas.com

cmon Bryan, take some pictures.
I know your a busy man ,but i would love to see some pictures and information about your collection.
You wrote that you were surprised about the size of daves collection, and i have the feeling you will surprise us all with the size of yours!!

cheers dave from finland
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Dave

11.17 brbs
2.4 crbs