Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Do you think nature bark by four paws is ok? or are they harmful to corn snakes? i've do some research and found out that they are made of Fir Bark. And i read up care sheets in the internet. Some says that Fir is totally harmful to corn snakes and others says its ok..

i search up on Nature Bark By Four Paws and heres the information:
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Description
Made entirely of the natural ground bark of fir trees and is specially heat treated to help eliminate potentially harmful parasites. Excellent for high-humidity loving reptiles.
Use Nature Bark for reptiles like green iguanas, anoles (american chameleons), gold skinks, prehensile skinks, day geckos, flying geckos, house geckos, striped geckos, tokay geckos, indonesian giant tree frogs, ameiva lizards, basilisk lizards, long tail grass lizards, adult tiger salamanders, toads, tarantulas, millipedes, hermit crabs, water dragons, green sailfin dragons, tree boas (emerald, cooks, garden, green tree, solomon island), anacondas, and blood pythons.

Also use for turtles like spiney hill turtles, asian land box turtles, and box turtles such as the three toad, eastern, ornate, and gulf coast turtle. All of these turtles can live on Nature Bark, however, when feeding your turtle, you must feed them in a separate terrarium or container that has no bedding material or substrate that your turtle could ingest.

Technical Information
Directions For Use: Pour Four Paws Nature Bark into your terrarium and spread it so that it is at least 1/2" thick. When used in heated terrariums, Nature Bark will create humidity which is beneficial to your reptile's health.

Ingredients
Fir bark.
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so what do you guys think? is it ok to use?? i'm using new paper currently but i want to have a natural looks so i'm planning to get naturebark. i prefer it to aspen shavings as they look more natural. if it isnt ok then i'll get aspen shavings.

that trees concentrate whatever insect repellent they can muster up in their bark, since that is where insects attack most. So I tend to play it safe. I doubt that it would outright kill your snake or they probably would have taken it off the market. But I don't think most of these products have been on the market for years and years to see long term effects. For instance, I used pine shavings on my corns for about 10 years before I discovered aspen. They did well and I didn't have major problems. But many of my older adults started displaying slightly gaping mouths. I believe it might have been due to some scar tissue forming in the nasal passages because of all of the years of exposure to the pine resins. But that is only my guess, I really don't know. But it took many years of exposure to find that out. Keep in mind that cages with holes melted or drilled in them will have less ventilation (and more exposure) than screen top cages, and could affect the health of your animals.

Perhaps there is somebody reading this who actually used some type of fir bark bedding for at leat several years on a large group of snakes. If so, then I would like to hear their comments. But I wouldn't want to make my snakes the guinea pigs without hearing more.

BTW, I have used aspen shavings for many years, as have many other breeders, and I am quite happy with it.

from the research i've done, the bark of the tree does not contain the aromatic oils that can be bad for snakes.. different stuff than the pesticides they produce. thats what i've determined... may not be true, however. I just wouldn't use it personally... if its what i'm thinking about it comes in bigger chunks... and corns can't burrow through that very well. and we all know they love to burrow.
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-Chris

The reason mainstream thought is thought of as a stream is because it's so shallow. -George Carlin

A fool doesn't learn. A smart man learns from his mistakes. A wise man learns from the mistakes of others. Which one are you?

My Website
N. American Rat/Corn snake care sheet I wrote
Information on substrates

Current snakes:
0.1 Licorice Stick Black Rat (Lola)
1.0 Black Rat (Frankie)
0.1 Texas Bairdi (Rosa)
0.1 Blue Beauty (Brunhilde)
1.0 Green Tree Python (Monty)

We had a reptile pet shop and we sold the bark products mentioned. Our customers started having problems and we steered them away from the bark products and on to the aspen we use. Once we got our customers away from the bark products, their snakes improved. This was not a double blind study under clinical conditions, but it was enough for me. I personally saw the improvement of the animals and the ONLY change made was the bark to aspen bedding. Why take a chance with bark? Remember, snakes are considered one of the "indicator species" when evaluating ecosystems for polution. This is because they absorb what they're in contact with. You could say that when you put them on bark bedding, it's like giving them a PINE or FIR patch for slow dose induction. They're absorbing it in their skin every minute of the day.

Like Kathy, we've been using aspen for many years and find it to be a perfectly safe, asthetic and functional substrate. Bark is not as absorbent as the pulp products like aspen bedding so there's less "animal" odor with aspen. Bark often has dust on it that stains the snake. Any dust that will stain the skin of a snake can't be good for the inside of their lungs. If those bark chunks get into their water, they release the chemicals the tree uses for pest defense. What Kathy said about the first line of defense for trees is true. If not for some repelling properties that kill or disuade predation from parasites, many trees would be extinct. I wouldn't be surprised if that bark is what gives trees some of their flame retarding properties as well. Swallowing pine "chunks" Vs aspen bedding. It's obvious to me that it would be easier to digest a flat piece of aspen pulp than a square of bark. Several of our customers had their snakes necropsied and in two cases I can remember, the snake had a piece of the bark lodged in the stomach. It was the vet's opinion that those two had died of digestive impaction from the pine/fir bark piece they found in their stomachs.

Personally, I go with experience on most things when deciding what to use. When you decide on which washing machine to buy, you might be sorry you got the wrong one, but nobody died over your decision. When it comes to caring for my animals, I don't take ANY chances. If I know of just one or two incidences where a snake died from bark, that's enough to disuade me from using it. Also, in my case, this isn't second-hand data. I personally saw the adverse affects of using pine/fir bark as serpent bedding. In the case where an animal's health/life is potentially threatened, don't reinvent the wheel. Let the losses of others' snakes be the price you don't have to pay to offer a safer environment for your pet.

Don
www.cornsnake.NET
South Mountain Reptiles