Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My Fla Kings have both just completed their shed and they both had some trouble. Just lots of little pieces all over the cage. Humidity around 45%, large bowls for soaking in (both spent majority of their time in their bowls for 2 days prior to shed). Male eating fuzzy rats and female (baby) on pinky mice. Room temp is 70 and each enclosure has UTH and heatlamp. I also have a pair of Hondo's that shed normally last week.
I found a chart with avg humidity in Fla. Seems low end is around the lower to mid 50's and high end in the upper 80's to 90's. Got a humidifier for the room. Raised to 58%. I will say, all the snakes seem a little more active! Also will be making "shed boxes" out of tupperware & moist paper towels next shed cycle. Any other suggestions? Where do you folks like keep your humidity%?

>>My Fla Kings have both just completed their shed and they both had some trouble. Just lots of little pieces all over the cage. Humidity around 45%, large bowls for soaking in (both spent majority of their time in their bowls for 2 days prior to shed). Male eating fuzzy rats and female (baby) on pinky mice. Room temp is 70 and each enclosure has UTH and heatlamp. I also have a pair of Hondo's that shed normally last week.
>>I found a chart with avg humidity in Fla. Seems low end is around the lower to mid 50's and high end in the upper 80's to 90's. Got a humidifier for the room. Raised to 58%. I will say, all the snakes seem a little more active! Also will be making "shed boxes" out of tupperware & moist paper towels next shed cycle. Any other suggestions? Where do you folks like keep your humidity%?

Humidity should not be constant IMO....
Providing a humidity gradient along with a temperature gradient is optimal.
I provide a shoebox full of moist sphagnum moss. I set this lengthwise in the enclosure so that warm, moist and cool, moist are options....
I haven't checked with a hygrometer in a long time but I remember the humidity to be 90% on the warm, moist area and 50% or less in the "dry" areas....
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...

Use Spagnum moss instead of paper towels. Change it when it starts to look funky. That should help a lot. If you give them a long one, lay one end over the heat pad like John suggests, to give a temp gradient inside the moist hie. Good luck.
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What's wrong with using CAUTION?!?!?!
King Snakes! Who can make a better mouse trap?
Jorge Sierra

45% is very low for Florida kings, they do much better with higher humidity. You are doing the right thing by adding humidity boxes and raising the ambient humidity a bit.

I agree that sphagnum works better than paper towels. Paper dries out too fast, sphagnum dries more slowly. You can let it dry out between mistings. Doing that prevents any mold from growing. You can even use a deep Glad food container and fill the whole thing with the moss. Don't even need a lid on it if it is deep enough. Your kings will love it. All kings/milks do.

Thank you all for your quick replies and suggestions. Ambient humidity in the reptile room is now at 65% and I am gathering supplies for "shed boxes". All snakes seem quite happy and comfortable today. Thanks again for the help, I want the best for these little guys!