Reptile & Amphibian Forums

In regard to the recent PE fire, I feel that I should share my experience with a close call that happened over a year ago. The cause of the PE fire probably has nothing to do with what I experienced, but I feel that others should be aware.

I was using plastic racks with heat cables from a well-known manufacturer. It is possible that PE was using the same, as some of the destroyed racks look like what I would imagine mine would look like after a fire (they have 6 posts in a CB70 rack, and the posts remained upright while the shelves melted away from the posts).

I had a few rats escape (open cage, and I turned my back for a few moments)in the room and then go under the racks. I had to move the racks around but finally got the rats an hour or two later. When I came back into the room about 1/2 hour later, the room was full of smoke. I realized smoke was billowing from the racks, so I unplugged them.

After the smoke cleared, I determined that the heat cables had been chewed by the rats, but only chewed enough to expose metal in a couple of small places. This created a situation in which the cords got hot enough to melt parts of the plastic racks. I do not understand why the thermostat didn't turn off the cables, but maybe the entire cord didn't heat up - the melted section of the rack was the bottom shelf.

Had I not come into the room, there would have either been a fire, or at least enough smoke to kill the collection. Fortunately, no snakes died.

Again, this probably had nothing to do with what happened at PE. I still use racks with heat cables, but I live in fear of rodents chewing them. I am gradually switching over to heat tape racks. Maybe the same thing is possible with them? I think it's important that anyone who knows how to improve the safety of heating equipment should share what they know.

I do not intend to cast aspersions at heat cable manufacturers, but I am now leery about the safety of these heating devices, as rodents love to chew them, and just a few small chews (in my case at least) was enough to cause a potentially catastrophic meltdown.

That's one reason I switched to room heat...now all I have is an oil filled heater plugged into a thermostat (and an air conditioner in the summer). I know its not an option for everyone, but I know I'm not the only one doing it either. I don't know what would happen if the rats chewed the flexwatt...but I would imagine having them chew up any wiring is probably somewhat of a fire hazard.

I have considered the whole room heating method, and in fact I do that with ambient heat already. But The problem is that the snakes would lose the ability to choose the temps they wanted.

In the case of whole room heat, do you do 90 day and 80 night, 12/12?

I switched because a friend who had a pretty large collection tried it and loved it. Our room is 80 to 82 at night and 83 to 86 daytime. It varies a bit depending on time of day. This is the first year I didn't provide supplimental heat for hatchlings. I always thought they needed it but they are doing great without...8 clutches out so far and only 2 babies have taken more than 2 offerings to eat...they ate on the third try. All my adults do really well too.

Loose rodents chewing through any wiring can cause problems - whether it's heat tape, cable or the lamp that is in your snake room. If they are out long enough they can get into your walls and then do some real damage. Is a good reason to switch to frozen thawed
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Tosha
JET Pythons

nihil facimus sed id bene facimus

That was a close call you had. I use a group of AP racks in my
juvenile room. I house all snakes separate from rodents. Rodents have their own building with no heat cables or flextape, they have just one heat/AC unit. All they have chewed in that building is the telephone wire, and they have done that multiple times!
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Susan Sentman
SSNAKES Reptiles
susan@ssnakes.com

I feed f/t. So, no live rodents kept at our house.
A year ago, we had a new furnace and air conditioner installed. They didnt screen off the vent leading outside, and we got mice in our walls. They got into the ceiling, and chewed wires on one of the bathroom exhaust fans. We had previously heard suspicious noises, but when we went to replace the fan that suddenly didnt work, we saw the evidence....& that wasnt the only damage.
We ended up trapping 4 of them, and they were probably in the house for about a couple weeks. Thank God they didnt start a fire.