Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I just acquired a pair of Dulzura rosy boas and Bay of LA Rosys. I have not dealt with these particular rosy boas and was curious as to if people had some input on the average adult size of these ones and what temps they like whether its going to be like the mountain boas of certain locales or the desert boas of others.

So far I have them in the same rack as my female pyros and they are being kepts from 76 - 78 and are active and eating great. They each have access to two 16 qt tubs.
Thanks for any information!

Rosyboas, generally speaking, utilize the same preferred temps across their range. What that means is the temps a coastal boa like Dulzura looks for and a Baja boa like Bay of LA looks for are likely about the same, or close enough anyway for what we can offer. The best thing to do is offer a range of temps from cool to warm as best you can.

I can tell you that your warm side temps are borderline or low at least for digestion of sizeable meals and for sure for females gestating young if you ever decide to breed them. Rosies can easily handle cool temps at night and a cool area in the cage during the day, but your warm side should be at the very least 82 deg, even if it is just a narrow strip of heater that that temperature. I used a strip heater in the 84-88 deg range. This is true as long as your room temps are below 80. If room temps reach above 80 and stay there much of the time, then I would turn heaters off during that time.

Your temps 76-78 could possibly result regurgitation if the food item is on the larger side. If not now then maybe one day. And with rosies you do not want a regurge, because you will have to proceed carefully after that to prevent further regurges. Rosies need sometimes 2 weeks after a regurge to get back on track and build up their digestive bacteria and enzymes that the original regurge may have negatively affected.

I had a power outage once after I had fed a handful of rosies and a group of montane kings including thayeri, pyro and mex-mex. The room temp was about 65 deg and the outage lasted about around 24 hrs. All the montane kings easily handled the temps and digested just fine in spite of no heat for the 24 hrs. All the rosies puked. Fortunately, the puking happened quickly was only temp-related so the rosies fed again a week later and successfully digested those meals. But that goes to show you a difference between rosies and montane kings.

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Mark

hmmm... well I would not guess that to be true seeming as the areas where we find rosies here in AZ where I live reach 100 very early in the year where as the areas in the san gabriels or san bernardinos dont reach high temps until half way through. When I herp in cali in april and may temps are still staying in the 70s.

So does what your saying apply to all or just the two that you compared?? Also... If you don't brumate fully but you lower temps just slightly, do you still feed??

Two things about what you said:
First, rosies can warm up their internal body temps even if the air is cooler, as long as they have access to sun-warmed rock or soil. And rocks can maintain warmth for hours after the sun goes down. I've hopped around rosy habitat in the San Bernardinos, and I guarantee they can easily find suitable temps even when it is rather cool out. In fact, that is where you find the snakes - in those areas that heat up best.

Also, those coastal rosies get pretty chunky. Lots of mass, once heated, retains heat better than a smaller snake. They do that too - warm up for awhile, then go underground and conserve that warmth as best they can. No rosy wants to be out in the open for too long.

As for Ariz rosies, they can easily thermoregulate and not ever see that 100 deg. So yes, the temps they choose are surprisingly similar from CA to AZ to Mexico.

I will say this, humidity can differ. I've been to triv triv habitat in Baja where the humidity was moderately high much of the time. Won't see that in many other locales. Desert rosies do not like too much humidity for too long, whereas Mexican rosies tolerate it better, and coastal CA rosies are inbetween. However, all do best with cages with lots of ventilation, so again they are surprisingly similar in captive needs.

Adequate ventilation plus a basking area of suitable temperature and you can keep any locality rosy healthy and happy. There very well may be differences among locality rosies, but if you give them a choice of temps instead of the narrow range of 76-78 deg and you give them ventilation, they will do best no matter what locality they are from.
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Mark

I've bred rosies where the cages had a heated end but the rest got darn cool in Winter. Some of those snakes would feed sometimes, some did not feed much at all. I got babies from that setup.

I have also done the brumation thing, no heat. Got babies from that too. A few yrs I cooled them to 65 deg, other yrs it was more in the 55-60 range. I really don't think there was much difference in results. But definitely darken the cages during that time.

The best litters were from females that were around 3 yrs or older and had access to 85-90 deg heat during gestation at least during the day. Thats when I got big chunk babies.

My smallest litters/skinniest babies came from females that were kept at only 80 deg. I admit I did not do an exact study or anything like that. It was simply evident that the females would use higher temps than 80 if offered, so I offered. And if a female is choosing that, then she wants it obviously, and she knows better than you and me what she needs.
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Mark