Reptile & Amphibian Forums

WHAT THE HELL is it with freaks from the mid-west getting hospitalized or killed by thier Bushmaster, Cobra, Rhino Viper, Fill in the blank deadly snake in thier livingroom aquarium? Thats like 4 since October!

news. no wonder my state is looking at banning venomous keeping state wide. No wonder ( for what ever reason ) states are wanting you to register your venomous. AND with let goes of a non-native venomous snake in a certain state park ( over 9 have been found as of now )in my state...........

Well, at least Herping in that park is getting alot more interesting.

Maybe its just me but I doubt it becasue I've brought this subject up here before but I dont see anything wrong with using a glass aquarium as a hot tank if you take certain precautions and within reason..
#1 No kids
#2 No friends near the tank, lid expecially
#3 The tank is of resonable size for the snake
I can keep going...

Not everything has to be in a sealed, locked, rubberized, bombproof, room isolated from civilization...You just have to keep your smarts about you...(granted some people don't have any smarts never the less keep them)

BTW what Park are you guys talking about and what species are being let loose?

"Not everything has to be in a sealed, locked, rubberized, bombproof, room isolated from civilization."

>When you're talking about venomous snakes, yes everything does.
Don't you think snakes have made the news enough this year?
So why take the chance of having one escape and making more? Or do you not think a snake can escape from an aquarium?
Is it because it saves a few bucks? If you are skimping, you shouldn't be keeping venomous. What about pets? What happens when a pet knocks the aquarium over and breaks the glass? God knows pets aren't curious at all. Oh, and friends, do you take your aquariums with you when you leave the room or do you really trust that their curiosity won't be peaked? We should be taking every precaution at this point to make sure there are no more negative headlines, so I'm surprised to see how lax you are about the subject. We should also be taking every precaution to show the general public that we are trying to safe guard them when we keep these animals. It's posts like this that makes me stop questioning why venomous snakes are being banned.

WHOA there buddy... you don't know me so ease up there.... I never said I was lax about ANYTHING...I have smart enough friends to stay away from my animals and keep a safe distance from the tank.... you tell me how an animal is going to knock over a tank when it has 2 ft of space on every side of it and has a WIDE footprint....I don't mess around with "security" issues when it comes to this kinda stuff... I like anyone else don't wanna do any harm to this hobby

you tell me how a snake is going to escape when there is no furnichings it can get near the top with even if it stretches from said furnishings to reach the top and it will stay that way...

Look at all the SHHS sponsered websites that have pictures of people keeping hots in aquariums...

I'm not by any means the best spoken person with typing and I realize that thats the only way you can judge me is by the way I type and what I type...

Search the forums here and you'll find others that agree with me on this issue

http://forums.kingsnake.com/viewarch.php?id=374242,374242&key=2004

Please rear the entire thread

I agree... I have all my elapids in modified aquariums that are as safe or safer than anything I've seen elsewhere. I have two screen lids that lock down on either side of a slit which accesses a track where I slide a partition down when I want to secure one side or the other. On top of all this I have another metal screen that cover the entire top and has four locks that secure it even further. The typical aquarium is 6 feet long and two feet deep, and two-three feet high. They rest on top of a heavy duty table that is four feet deep and a little over 6 feet long. I consider that much safer than a Rubbermaid, with a mere snap top than can pop off easily. And if you're housing elapids in a Rubbermaid, good luck when you pop off the top. I've had my set up like this for years and have never even had a close call. This is no way in hell anything is getting out of my double screen tops.

We are all talking about different things. An aquarium with a sliding feature and locking mechanism isn't what I'm referring to. On another forum there is a person who has a design for a glass aquarium with those features, I think he uses it to house pygmies. The design looks flawless. What I'm talking about are the dum@asses that keep cobras in an aquarium with a screen top and a rock on top of it. Or a person that keeps a five foot gaboon, which is easily capable of breaking the glass with it's strike, in a 100 gallon. Tell me these aren't recipes for disaster? To answer the person's question as to how a snake can escape, I don't know how, but sometimes they manage to do so. They are capable of amazing feats. My whole point is, why take the chance? Especially with all of the negative press that's been happening over the past year. At this point we should be doing anything and everything to safeguard ourselves, the snakes, and the public from any possible accidents. The fact that there has been escapes and bites in the press shows that we are not. Regardless if it's you or not, all negative press effects us all, so once again, why take the chance?

In the case of the guy in Michigan, I heard he entered the enclosure to clean it, like he probably had done many times before, with no barrier between him and the bushmaster. Looking at what appears to be the enclosure the bushmaster was in, it didn't have provisions for a safe area. It's really no wonder he got tagged.

I hear what you're saying on the enclosures. To answer the question on how some snakes escape in what should be a secure enclosure, I think it happens when the owner performs maintenance/feeding and probably does it at the same time with other enclosures, then fails to properly secure one of them, thinking he had already done so. Like leaving a sliding partition open, "thinking" it was closed; placing the screen lid on and not paying attention to the far corner, where it didn't snap down or answering the phone, forgetting that the first enclosure was wide open. Just simple carelessness. I have locks on each one-- that I don't need to secure the door-- as the final step before walking away. It's just a way to double check the security. I need that at least so I know I've gone through all the steps.

thats purely a fabrication of an active imagination. However, I DO agree with you about keeping venomous (or any other herp) in a FISH tank with a screen lid weighted down with rocks. It's pure stupidity, over time the screen will wear out and tear. They were not meant to SUPPORT WEIGHT. If for one reason or another, someone feels the need to use a fish tank and devise a Macguyver-like rig to keep the top on, I suppose thats their business. Personally though, I wouldn't reccomend it.

It's actually not that laughable, unless you're easily amused, which may be the case. Check out snakegetters website, they mention it somewhere on there. I've also heard of it happening elsewhere, although I can't reference Joe Blow having a gaboon strike the glass of his 1/2 inch tempered glass aquarium at 1600hrs on such and such day....yada yada. I've never seen an aquarium that had glass that was 1/2 inch thick, either. Must be pretty sturdy.

I find most rumors to be utterly dissapointing or rewarding when disproven, depending on which side you are on. I have had this same discussion with a friend, different animal but the results will disprove any claims of 1/2" tempered glass tank busting capability in the form of a strike by anything in the snake world. What I did to disprove it, was to put a BRICK in my hand and proceed to attempt to break 1/2" thick tempered glass with it. Being 6'1" 225lbs athletic build, with a red brick in my hand and a 90 gallon fish tank in front of me, want to guess what happened? The brick broke in half. I absolutely laughed my @ss off....My friend picked up one half and tried it himself, he failed. The 3rd shot by myself, finally did it. Using the CORNER of half of a brick i succeeeded in breaking the glass. Seeing as Gaboons heads do not weigh 3lbs or more, they do not have hard corners on their face, and if you were to tie a brick on a gaboons head I doubt it would be able to strike at all, I would say that NO, a gaboon cannot break 1/2" glass with its soft face. I challenge you to try a similar experiment, only try using something to simulate an adult gaboons head and neck structure. Good luck.

...to think that ANY snake is capable of breaking 1/2" tempered glass. That is simply not possible. I've NEVER seen 1/2" tempered glass used on any home aquarium. The thickest I've ever seen was 1/4"...and no Gaboon in the world could break that either. I have several big sheets of 1/4" tempered glass. I'm 6' and 200 lb. and I can span that glass across 2 4x4s and WALK across it and it won't break. Tempered glass is very, very strong stuff.

I had a big Monacled Cobra that was completely psychotic and continually hit the glass on the front of his cage HARD. It was 1/8" regular window glass and he never even came close to breaking itIt didn't do his nose a lot of good...I finally had to cover his cage with a piece of cardboard so he couldn't see me so he would quit it.
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We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children. Ralph Waldo Emerson

I have never seen 1/2 inch tempered glass aquariums, either. If it is actually 1/2 inch, I'd say no, a snake couldn't break through the glass. But the 20 gallon I keep my non-hots in, I feel, could EASILY be shattered. Have I seen it done? No. I've only heard about, but seeing as though I have watched tempered glass crumble on a few occasions, I believe it. Regardless, why take the chance?

was, and I quote "Or a person that keeps a five foot gaboon, which is easily capable of breaking the glass with it's strike, in a 100 gallon."

Any aquarium over 75 Gallons has 1/2" thick glass. There are no exceptions. The reason behind it is water pressure. An aquarium that size contains hundreds of pounds of water pressure inside. Thinner glass would easily break under such pressure. Had you been speaking about a "critter cage" (with the sliding top) your claim would be a little more believable. The critter cage is a terrarium and was not designed to withstand the pressure that an aquarium is. Therefore the glass used in critter cages is much thinner gauge, typically 1/8". If the critter cage is the type of enclosure you were referring to, this whole disagreement is based on miscommunication.

I made that many posts and didnt catch that one. My basis for not agreeing was the "experiment" I did with the 90 gallon tank which has ***1/4"**** glass, same as a 100 gallon. I'm not sure how I got it in my head that it was 1/2" though...

they may be critter cages, I'm not sure. The 100 gallon my friend had that he kept his red tailed boa in was thin, thinner than 1/2 inch. The ones I have are 1/4 inch, they seem very flimsy, like a good pop of a fist could break them. The one thing I know for sure, tempered glass is very prone to cold. I had a piece literally crumble into a line when I touched it to the floor.

Tempered glass is not more inherently prone to breakage from cold than annealed glass is...in fact the opposite is true under normal circumstances. Tempered glass is much more resistant to impact and thermal breakage then annealed glass. That is one of the reasons that tempered glass is used in things like fireplace doors, supermarket freezer display doors, etc. Another reason it is used for these applications is the fact that when it does break, it shatters into very small harmless pieces (hence the name Safety-Glass). The safety glass used in autombile windows and windshields is made of two lites of safety glass with a thin layer of plastic sandwiched between them.

What causes thermal breakage is uneven heating or cooling. A cold piece of glass is no more likely to shatter than a warm piece as long as the whole piece of glass is at about the same temperature. When there is a large difference in temperature from one part of the piece of glass to the other, thermal breakage can occur.

One thing that will cause "spontaneous" breakage of tempered glass is Nickel Sulfide inclusion, combined with constant solar heating and cooling after installation. These inclusions are a byproduct of the glassmaking process. When the glass is tempered, the inclusions are modified and "grow". The heating and cooling the glass is normally subjected to can cause tiny fractures around the inclusion. If the fracture penetrates the tension layer of the glass, breakage can occur. All tempered glass will have some Nickel Sulfide inclusion, but better quality tempered glass will have levels of inclusion low enough as to not pose any problems.

Tempered glass is NOT "unbreakable". It can break, but it is about 5 times stronger than annealed glass of the same thickness. A piece of 1/4", good quality tempered glass is very strong. Certainly, it would be strong enough that a Gaboon Viper would not be able to shatter it under any circumstances. Most applications such as aquariums less than about 75 gallons use either 1/8", 3/16", or 1/4" annealed glass. The 75 gallon tanks I have are made of 5/16" tempered glass. They are definitely strong enough to withstand the best shot from any Gaboon Viper.
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We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children. Ralph Waldo Emerson

I have no kids, a wife who understands the hobby, and an indoor cat. I keep the snakes in aquariums (critter cages with sliding tops, not MUCH different than tanks with metal screen tops and weights on them). My snakeroom door always stays closed, and all my "friends" that come over are either into herps, or dont want anything to do with them, so Im not worried about MY snakes in MY situation. The cat is never allowed in the snakeroom ever.

Im not saying keep your snakes in a paper bag either though, so dont get me wrong. I'd be interested to hear a story of when a snake "busted the glass out of an aquarium and got loose". This seems to be a common fear, but I've never heard of where it's rooted from.
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Tom
TCJ Herps
"The more people I meet, the more I like my snakes"