Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Tony and John,

I also think that your temps are too high. It just occurred to me when I read down below that you were both from down south.

I have some beautiful fertile clutches from two mex mex females and two getula females. I kept heat on them all winter and fed them all winter. Room temps average 65F or so.

The mex mex are kept (a group of 4 individuals) on deep sandy substrate and have a single 65 watt flood on 24/7. So far I have two very nice clutches (5 eggs and 10 eggs) from two females.

The getula (a splendida pair and cal king pair) are kept in pairs in a BP-70 tub style rack. They also have heat cable with a thermostat and fed all winter. The cal king female laid 7 nice eggs and the splendida laid 10 eggs. So far all the eggs look good, and I can get 100% hatches nesting them in these tubs.

However it is harder in general to nest the females and consistently get nice fertile eggs in the tubs than with deep substrate. I know this because the females don't look as "spent" after laying when nested properly.

It is pretty funny, I knew my small mex mex female was gravid and laid about 6 weeks ago, but the other larger female was late in shed, and then after she shed I started wondering if she was even gravid, it was weird and I thought to myself WTF?

Within a few days a friend came by and wanted me to show off the snakes to his kids, so the mex mex cage was closest, and I went in and dug them up (something I usually never do), and walla 10 beautiful eggs! HAHAHAHAHHAHAHA - The female you could never tell!
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

Just a couple quick questions for you. How hot is their hot spot? Do you keep constant ambient temps at 65F all year? Are there any physical changes in their keeping to induce a cycle? Are they kept this way all year?

You stated that John and Tony's temps are to high, what is to high? Ambient temps? or Hot spot temps?

Is this their first year breeding or have this proved to be the case for a few years?
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Hi Kc

Ambients are too high IMO.

The hotspot ranges from 110F to 135F and it depends on the ambients and the age of the bulb, they kind of cool off as they get old and I don't always notice, but it doesn't matter with these snakes as there is plenty of heat. That is for the Mex mex. In the winter I may have had a 38 watt regular incandescent for a month or two during the coldest weather, I cannot remember.

The ambient is average at 65F but that fluctuates. It might get down to 58 or 55 in the dead of winter. I live in Eastern WA at ~3000 feet. My ambient temps are never hotter than 80-82 F and only for a few hours a day on the hottest days of the year.

They are kept this way all year. I have been running these experiments since this debate started about three years ago. I bought all these snakes as hatchlings and have been raising them up. I got them in 2010 the mex mex first bred this year, and the getula gave me eggs last year. However the first winter I did not provide heat, and lost a female mex mex and a couple getula. I was keeping them in a cold room during the winter and it got too cold for too long and It was a huge mistake.

Since then I have kept them the same. The getula in the rack and the mex mex in the deep substrate options type cage.

The getula are in a rack system, and the heat cable is set to 90F right now, but in the winter I had it lower at around 80F. I should also mention that last year I struggled to get nice full clutches in the rack system and I had some cases where the males ate eggs. The cal kings had a lower hatch rate, and overall nesting was an issue.

This year I made some adjustments and nesting was much better in the tubs, but I would say that consistently with the deep nesting so far the results are superior in terms of growth, and I would say there is a learning curve involved there too. I will get better at nesting them in this way too as I make the needed adjustment and correct the mistakes that I make.
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

Great info Dobry.....thanks for sharing that......
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...

Dobry, Thanks but let me dig a little further into your set up because this is interesting.

"The hotspot ranges from 110F to 135F and it depends on the ambients and the age of the bulb, they kind of cool off as they get old and I don't always notice, but it doesn't matter with these snakes as there is plenty of heat."

If your offering a hot spot that high, How large is their set up? Let's say for sh!ts and giggles it's 65F ambient temp what is the coolest part of their cage? How deep is the sandy substrate? Do you contain the hot spot to a small area?

"My ambient temps are never hotter than 80-82 F and only for a few hours a day on the hottest days of the year. "

See this is where I have an issue and have to artificially cool my stuff. 80-82 would be pretty much year round for us living on the Gulf coast.

"However the first winter I did not provide heat, and lost a female mex mex and a couple getula. I was keeping them in a cold room during the winter and it got too cold for too long and It was a huge mistake. "

Did you lose your snakes because you fed them or because it got below your lowest ambient temps of 55-58? I kept all my adults for 3 full months at temps 10 degrees cooler than that on empty bellies and the were fine...

"The getula are in a rack system, and the heat cable is set to 90F right now, but in the winter I had it lower at around 80F"
So you are not offering your getula a spot higher than 90? I can see where this set up works for getula and may not work for other species. I am pretty sure this will work for scarlet kings, floridana, corns etc... For L.m.greeri maybe not so much...

When you talk about nesting are you talking for egg disposition sites or just a regular nest area that snakes create in deep substrates? Is it moist or dry or both? Was their photo period natural or artificial?

BTW, congrats on the 2 nice clutches!
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I would copy and paste so I can respond directly, but I am having issues with word count. Did KS change something with the forums and how much you can type?

The ambient temps of the substrate in my cages is usually 2-3 degrees lower than the room temps - this can cause me problems sometimes because my nesting can easily be too cold.

I lived in Ft. Walton Beach, so I know about the Gulf Coast temps, but I forget how different it is. I was recently down in El Paso during the winter, and it was 80 degrees. Even when it is 80 degrees here it is still colder because my ground temps are in the 60's, so once the sun goes away temps drop quickly.

When I lost some kings the ambient temps got down in the 20's. I had ice in the water bowls. I had a oil heater to keep the room from freezing but it was not enough. I was doing some renovation work and my snakes were in a room with no heat. We had a cold front come through an the outside temps got to -20F. I was very disappointed in myself. Gotta learn and move on.

With the getula in the rack system. I also have corns, nelsons milks, pueblan milks and a bunch of BP's in that rack. The thermostat is set to 90F but that is set up to keep the rack from getting too hot. I think that the snakes can actually get up to 95ish in there in small localized areas.

Some more in a bit.....
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

D I doubt that my ambient temps ever get over 75. I would say the seasonal fux is between 60 and 75 as a limitation of my room's heating and cooling. The room is connected to the home central system but has no return and instead is vented. Its also balanced to be cooler because its lower than the rest of the zone. In the summer it tends to be pretty cool in there and I might have to shutter the register. In the winter I might have to turn on supplemental heat to keep it at 60 again because of the elevation difference between the room and the rest of the zone and the fact that the vent is in the ceiling.

When I hibernate I do it in a separate area. On really cold days it'll go down to the 40s but its generally in the 50s unless its unseasonably warm outside.

I haven't measured the hot spot of late but I'm guessing its around 95 - 100
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

WWW.TDSNAKES.BLOGSPOT.COM

I think your answewing your own questions. Your looking for some set temps, which as mentioned varies depending on how, who and where they are bing kept.

The answer is this, if warm temps allow digestion but rended the snakes infertile, they are to hot, not matter what a thermostat says.

The system we are talkig about here, tries to allow the animals to pick what they need, when they need it. Exact temps are not a concern as long as they can use what they want.

For instance, I used this type method here in tucson and up in Seattle. In Seattle, they could breed over most of the summer and into fall. But here in Tucson, its gets way to warm, so by mid summer, we do not add any heat, and its much to hot for them to reproduce. We cannot keep it cool enough, but no worries, as they have already done their thing. Good luck

Frank, I wasn't looking for set temps to apply to my way. He was very vague in his description of temps.Did he keep his ambient temps at 65F all the time artificially??? I artificially control my temps. I live in FL and my snake room is a constant 69F-72F and the snakes are offered a spot into the mid to upper 80's.

I have back heat on most of my racks and due to the length the backs on the top three cages run 87-90 the middle 3 range 82-86 and the bottom to rarely get over 82-83F. The snakes are always offered a space towards the front of the tub between 69-72 all summer. In order to offer lower than that temps in the middle of summer I will need another central air just for one room.LOL. I keep certain species at certain levels and always keep the Mountain King males at the lowest levels.

"Exact temps are not a concern as long as they can use what they want.
So how do you know what they like if you don't document the temperature ranges they are being offered?

I understand the system you are using and trying to explain. I like to document most every slightest little change and if I need to tweak something a little better I can.
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Hi Kc,

I do not artificially keep the room at 65F. In fact I do not have a AC unit at my house at all. I do have a space heater I turn on to keep the temps from getting too low in the winter, but that is not for my snakes, it is for other reptiles.

My heater is set to keep the house at 68F in the main part of the house, but my reptiles are in a walkout type daylight basement area and it is not directly linked to the house thermostat.

Right now my outside temps are 45F, and it is June 5th 4:30pm, I am running the heater in my house! Those of you down in FL and TX are hitting high 90's. This is a huge difference!

I think if I only tried to give a hot spot of 85F that would not be enough and I could have fertility issues as well.

Something to think about..... If I have a flood light shining onto a piece of plywood and the surface of that plywood is 125F, but the snake is sitting underneath that piece of plywood in the humid dark area and the temp there is only 100F what is the "hotspot" the snake is using?
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

"I think if I only tried to give a hot spot of 85F that would not be enough and I could have fertility issues as well"

Fertility issues for whom? the female or male or both? Maybe I am reading this wrong but what your telling me is, that males and females need access to 85F plus to produce vial clutches?

"Something to think about..... If I have a flood light shining onto a piece of plywood and the surface of that plywood is 125F, but the snake is sitting underneath that piece of plywood in the humid dark area and the temp there is only 100F what is the "hotspot" the snake is using?"

I understand about heat dispersion and the different types of mass used to disperse heat acts differently. Density of material used, how porous the material may be, insulating factors, etc.

If you are using a light bulb and the surface temps 20" away on that piece of plywood are 125F that light bulb (Flood light bulb) will have to be quite hot to keep that plywood at 125F. Not only that it will be extremely hot if constant air flow(depending on velocity of the flow, or amount of air inside the cage) is 65F all around.
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I wrote: "Something to think about..... If I have a flood light shining onto a piece of plywood and the surface of that plywood is 125F, but the snake is sitting underneath that piece of plywood in the humid dark area and the temp there is only 100F what is the "hotspot" the snake is using?"

You wrote: "I understand about heat dispersion and the different types of mass used to disperse heat acts differently. Density of material used, how porous the material may be, insulating factors, etc.

If you are using a light bulb and the surface temps 20" away on that piece of plywood are 125F that light bulb (Flood light bulb) will have to be quite hot to keep that plywood at 125F. Not only that it will be extremely hot if constant air flow(depending on velocity of the flow, or amount of air inside the cage) is 65F all around."

I am not sure that I understand your point, unless your asserting that I cannot do what I said above. Irregardless of that you did not address my question at all and then made a series of assumptions which are not true.

I can and do achieve those conditions, but that was not the question.
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

To me spending a bunch of time trying to find out if there are fertility issues with this individual or that is a waste of time. I think that fertility issues are largely related to the female and her stress levels when she is laying the eggs.

She is shelling the eggs as she lays them and it is believed that they are fertilized at that time as well. My guess is that most of the time when the eggs are half fertile or a large percentage does not hatch, then the female is the issue. She was in a rush or stressed and the fertilizing, shelling timing is off - that is my theory about that.
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"We are challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations" George W.

Again, I am only guessing as to what occurs in your conditions and each of us are different.

I can tell you, I made my own racks and did modify them to not hold heat. Most racks enclose or insulate the box, I had to make racks that allowed a greater temp range. The reason was, I too lived in an area that may not have any winter what so ever.

So if you have a rack system that encloses the box the snakes are in, It makes it very difficult but not impossible to work with. That insulation, Keeps heat in and does not allow for a decent temp range within a box.

In my case, I made racks that only enclosed 1/3 of the box and left the rest to attain room temperature.

Where there is a problem with this type of thinking is about approach and application. Which is clearly why I explain these problems, but do not try to cure them for each different person.

If you know and understand what your trying to get, you can do that in application that fits you. Most here are not doing that, they are again using a recipe type approach that fits someone else.

Most of this is all about language, that is, to comunicate information. In this case, air temps are what keepers try to use, the problem is, air temps are fairly meaningless to snakes, They do not use them, they without question use mass temps. That is the language they understand. So while your thinking in terms of air temps, these animals behave in the use of mass temps.

In this case, infrared heat guns is the proper tool with the proper language.

In this case, if you measure the temp range IN your cages with a temp gun, then it will be in a way that will help you understand your snakes behavior.

I can guarantee you one thing. Mass temps are different then air temps.

ALso no reptile uses the temps they require to attain the temps they acquire. That is, if the snake is wanting to be 82F, it uses temps above 82F to achieve that. In nature, their behavior is based on reaching their goals with conditions that are always above and below what they are needing at the time.

The lower temps are more based on ambient temps, that is, they settle in areas that are at the low temps. That is, shelter in areas that are in that range. And let me guarantee you again, if you check 15 base temp shelters in nature, you will see a range of temps, all cool, but all different, but within a few degrees.

The hot spots in nature without question are normally way above the temps they seek, that way, they can acquire the temps they need and move to cool to manage it. That is their natural behavior.

There is nothing wrong with cool choices in the mid sixties, In that area, a few winter(cool season) feedings is all it takes to maintain energy reserves. Which is the goal of cool choices, TO MAINTAIN ENERGY RESERVES.

As you can imagine, the snakes outside of your south texas house or my house, rarely have mass temps that are that low. As you move south into mex and central america, its nearly impossible to find temps in the low fifties, yet, all you folks think you have to HIBERNATE them too.

Enough for now, good luck and best wishes.

Sounds like there were some other variances too. Each situation is different and different species act differently. I for instance have never been able to breed alterna but have had fantastic results working with mexicana under identical conditions. Go figure!
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

WWW.TDSNAKES.BLOGSPOT.COM

>>Sounds like there were some other variances too. Each situation is different and different species act differently. I for instance have never been able to breed alterna but have had fantastic results working with mexicana under identical conditions. Go figure!
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>>�Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.� Emmerson
>>
>>WWW.TDSNAKES.BLOGSPOT.COM

I as well have had great success with thayeri, alterna, Mex Mex and getula.........my trouble species are ruthveni, knoblochi and pyros, but I have a good fertile clutch of knobs being laid right now......

I don't think my temps have been hot at all this year.......in October I dropped their temps into the low 50s.......I brought them out of brumation in March and they have not experienced temps over 75 yet........except for the nesting females who's nests are close to 80F, but I do not put those females in nesting enclosures until they go into the blue just prior to egg laying......
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John Lassiter
Poor planning and procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part...

Congrats on the clutch of knobs man! Hopefully fertility stays high for you this year.

I haven't had much trouble this year either with knoblochi,greeri, or ruthveni. I just can't seem to get a clutch of pyro's for some reason. Hmmm......doing something wrong with them. I'll figure it out some time.
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I've had no problem with pyros either. Interesting however because your current or post hibernation temps seem cool to me but if its not broken I don't see any reason to try and fix it!
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“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Emmerson

WWW.TDSNAKES.BLOGSPOT.COM

Hi Tony, Your post is very telling, You said, can't breed alterna, but you can mexicana. Hmmmmmmmmmmm They are the same.

Giving them choices, You can breed all of them and much much more. I know I did.

If your husbandry is that picky, that means its very marginal.

All these species require just about the exact same support, they may go about obtaining that support a bit differently.

If your conditions that its hit or miss with such closely related species, then I would work on your husbandry, Once you get it right, it will work better on the ones you can breed now. Cheers

The temps in texas are very high indeed. You do need to create an brumation chamber for consistant results. I know john does... I did a natural brumation this year with poor results on getula. I could hav.e exposed them to temps as low as 45 degrees but decided that could be fatal considering the next days high was 85. That's what "winter" is like here. 50 then 85. Then 45 then 88.... the results were an infertile clutch of nine eggs. "Average". Room temp was 65 to 70. It sounds like the temps in the fifties and average year round temps of 65. Spells success for you.