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ok well i have a 55 gallon tank all ready for a baby burm id like a male cuz i dont want too big of a snake...i have a hide box on each side of the tank a bowl of water n a climbing branch...one side bout half the tank is 90f and the other bout 80f during the day and 80f and 75f at night. is all of that rite? and how long before i have to move the snake to its permanent cage how fast do they grown and is a 8'x30"x18" ok for a small adult male and 1 more thing wit do i feed n how often im sri for all the questions but please help me thanks

Hi first I want to say that your age should not be an excuse for your ability to find the information you need. I feel that the youth of today have gotten lazy and would like all the answers to everything just given to them. It is very easy to search the net and find out all the information you need about nearly every species of snake out there. Go to all the main breeders and they all have care sheets and such. Most are exceptionally well written. Plus the satisfaction on will receive from personally gaining this knowledge is much more rewarding then jsut others giving it to you. With this said and by reading your question it lloks atleast like you have done some research. Your daytime temps look fine but I think your nighttime low is just a little bit too low. I would aim towards 78 or so. Also I would not use the 55 gallon aquiriam for very long. First I am assuming it has some form of screen top. This makes it hard to maintain humidity. Second I have noticed that Burms that are kept in top opening cages stay timid and/or snippy longer. They fear things coming down at them from above so it is harder for you to convince it you are not a threat to it. How fast they grow has a lot of variables. First is genetics. Some snakes are jsut destined to be bigger then others. Second and the one that you can control is how they are fed. If you feed your snake appropriate sized meals once a week you should expect somewhere in the range of five foot growth the first year and then after that it will slow down. If you feed a little more aggressivley such as every five days then it is relatively common for female burms to obtain 8' or more the first year. Males fed this way will probably reach over 6'. As soon as your baby snake is comfortable and docile I would switch it over to the larger cage. I think it will be more handlable and approachable in a front opening cage.
A lot of this information is just my opinion and what I have learned and found works well for me. Sorry for the rant at the beginning but that is just a pet peeve of mine. Good luck with your new snake. Todd

Keeping a large constrictor entails a good deal of responsibility, as well as a good deal of 'ability'. It's not cheap, it's not intuitive (reptiles being so much unlike ourselves (unlike dogs, for instance, which are at least mammals and are easier to identify with)). It's hard for me to imagine how a 15 year old 'young adult' has the resources or experience to keep one of the largest constrictors in the world. I know I certainly wasn't able to when I was 15.

One has to be prepared to invest the time, care, money, space, and attention it takes to keep a large constrictor - or what you will wind up with is a large, unhealthy, unhappy monster.

Do look around on the web. There is A LOT of information out there. Though I have to admit, it was smart to come here (the KS Burm forum) to look for information. One thing I HIGHLY HIGHLY recommed is to find some PHOTOS online that show just how large burmese pythons can get. The photos are out there and not hard to find (just ask me if you can't find them on your own). Take a good long look at these photos, again and again, until you are 100% positive that you are completely confident that you will be able to take care of this animal once it matures. They grow fast - like lightning; and that's just with regular (not power) feeding.

I just want people to be sure about what they are doing because I hate to see burms being 'put up for adoption' (dumped) left and right, or what's worse is that so many eventually wind up becoming "rescues". It's cruel and I'd like to see it end.

Looks like I'm ranting too (sorry about that),
Thanks for reading,
- Mark

>>Hi first I want to say that your age should not be an excuse for your ability to find the information you need. I feel that the youth of today have gotten lazy and would like all the answers to everything just given to them. It is very easy to search the net and find out all the information you need about nearly every species of snake out there. Go to all the main breeders and they all have care sheets and such. Most are exceptionally well written. Plus the satisfaction on will receive from personally gaining this knowledge is much more rewarding then jsut others giving it to you. With this said and by reading your question it lloks atleast like you have done some research. Your daytime temps look fine but I think your nighttime low is just a little bit too low. I would aim towards 78 or so. Also I would not use the 55 gallon aquiriam for very long. First I am assuming it has some form of screen top. This makes it hard to maintain humidity. Second I have noticed that Burms that are kept in top opening cages stay timid and/or snippy longer. They fear things coming down at them from above so it is harder for you to convince it you are not a threat to it. How fast they grow has a lot of variables. First is genetics. Some snakes are jsut destined to be bigger then others. Second and the one that you can control is how they are fed. If you feed your snake appropriate sized meals once a week you should expect somewhere in the range of five foot growth the first year and then after that it will slow down. If you feed a little more aggressivley such as every five days then it is relatively common for female burms to obtain 8' or more the first year. Males fed this way will probably reach over 6'. As soon as your baby snake is comfortable and docile I would switch it over to the larger cage. I think it will be more handlable and approachable in a front opening cage.
>> A lot of this information is just my opinion and what I have learned and found works well for me. Sorry for the rant at the beginning but that is just a pet peeve of mine. Good luck with your new snake. Todd

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~ANTEGY~
www.antegy.com
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ok mark well my 6 foot ball python just died thats y im getting a burm. i know how big these burms can get thats for 1 y i will get a male which shouldnt get over 12 feet. and no snake scares me (except venemous) but i am pretty calm around large constricters and i work at the local pet store and we sell many lare ones there and i have experience dealing and handling large burms just not keeping them. And i have done lots of research i just want tother burm keepers advise. thanks

>>....well my 6 foot ball python just died thats y im getting a burm.

I'm partial to ball pythons, so I'm just curious how long you had it and why it died. The two snakes I've had the longest I got at a pet store on the same day in 1979 (9 years before you were born! ) - one is a male ball python, the other a male Burmese.

-Joan

P.S., I know Rob Carmichael probably sounds like an old stick in the mud to you, but you really ought to pay attention to his advice.

Joan, I guess I am getting to be quite an old stick (the gray on my beard, as I like to say, makes me look distinguished!). If this person is 15 and their ball python died that makes me VERY suspect as to whether this person is ready to take on a burm or not...I take that back, they are not ready. Bp's are perhaps one of the hardiest snakes to keep. I have one that is over 35 years old and several that are in their 20's; and some of these came to me after they were severely neglected! Burms are FAR more susceptible to such things as RI, liver disease, etc. With so many wonderful types of pythons available, this person would be doing himself a favor by looking at something else...borneos, bloods, carpets, olives, macklotts, savus, childrens, heck, try a ball python again, etc. But, I know how kids are and I, too, probably wouldn't have listened back then and this person will just have to learn one of those valuable lessons in life. Cheers, Rob

haha ya um i had him for bout 5 years he died because i went on vacation n my mom left the back door open n shut the lampsoff cuz shes an idiot so it froze i no big mistake will never make it agian

I've got a rattler and a stiletto snake, but the idea of a snake that can kill me through brute force scares the heck out of me. And yes, a male burm will get big enough to do that, people have been killed by 11 footers.

PS (Not that I wouldn't ever GET a big python, but I've got nothing like the amount of room I'd need. Well, I would, but I've got too many other snakes. I've just got a blood right now)
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Peter: It's OK, I'll handle it. I read a book about something like this.
Brian: Are you sure it was a book? Are you sure it wasn't NOTHING?

thanks todd u have been a lot of help n seem to know what ur talking about