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After 20 months of dinking around. I started my first hognose cage.



The top part of the cage is rockwork, only because its here and nice. later I hope to change that to a diorama of their natural habitat. It has 3 to 4inches of substrate, from their natural habitat. And two Drawers, 15 by 22 inches and 7 inches deep. They will have acess to the drawers and the top or can be confined to the drawers. One drawer will be the nesting cage(hopefully) Heck maybe both. I do plan on doing mostly four footers, but this three footer was ready to modify and will work for testing. overall size is, 36 inches long, 24 inches deep and 30 inches high.
As mentioned, I will include and heating/cooling unit, to control temps when needed. It will be a slow process or not. Depending on my field and work load. At least I started today.

Frank,
Nice work. Bob Applegate does this. Think he has been doing it for many years.

Steve Osborne build some long before Bob and I did before Steve.
A fella named Bob Mackin, had some vaccum formed drawer cages somewhere in the late seventies. I built mine in the early seventies. STeve Osbornes cages were a great approach and well done. He built a hardwood wall of cages.
After I had used them for years, I was asked at a IHS meeting, what I had learned from this type cage. I said, you don't need the cage part. All you "need" is the drawer. The cage part, is the fun part. Now its all about the drawer, sans the fun part.
I have some old pics somewhere of three and four alterna heads sticking out of the hole at the same time. They would sit in the drawers and watch the outside world.
What I am hoping for with these cages is the ability to utilize the temps we see in the field. The average hog found crawling feels warm to hot. The hogs in my cages at aprox. 85F feel cool to the touch. I have recorded body temps as high as 106F with in situ hogs. Most are in the ninties. Once they cool from there, they go down. I will be able to mimic underground and surface temps.
I believe Bob did all manner of interesting cages, like tubes leading to other cages and to outside areas.
Just going back to our roots.

if I may, The drawer cages, were very much like many steps I instigated. At the time, others thought fought tooth and claw. But a few keepers, worked them.
What occurred was important and interesting, husbandry took a giant step. It was not that the drawer cages were the giant step. They were a stimulus that caused what your doing now. The start of rack system. Immediately after the drawer cages were know, the first racks of sweater boxes took place. And the rest is history.
The point is, for commercial breeders, rack systems are mandatory. And without question, no fun, and do not teach the keeper. The keeper must know, THE RECIPE. With other types of cages, the snakes are enjoyable and teach us about them. But we do have to be fluid and add and play and change. A base recipe, plus the ability to express many areas of snake life and behavior. But we keepers, must change the conditions, if we want to see more. Sorry for the rant.
Vid from yesterday
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Man I like that cage! I thought my caging was cutting edge with 8 inches of topsoil with bark and plants. I can't post my cage its shamful!!

I want to see it, PLease.

Okay there is nothing "fancy"....yet no false drawer and nothing covering the sides. I have yet to figure out how to make that look good.

It's plain dirt from outside and some potted plants from a nursery. a log for looks and leaves from outside. Nothing is sterilized. Lots of springtails really help.

Frank and David, great post, great looking cages.
Frank, if you have any pics of those old school tanks, could you post them please.
David, what kind of snake is that in the cage pictured?

reako45

I do, but I sure as heck do not have time to dig up slides, and sort thru thousands upon thousands. At least not as long as my legs work and I can go herping. Theres all manner of interesting stuff, like the nose of the first albino cal king ever hatched in captivity. And noses of many many captive firsts.
My old cages, were nothing fancy. Basically wooden cages with a subfloor and large sheet metal drawers. Oddly, my first year in college I was a mill and cabinet major. Which is where I learned how to THINK. Which brings up why I am who I am. We designed a class, year long project, made outlines, blueprints, drawings etc, taking all those classes at the same time. Then mid term, we turned in our projects. If accepted, and mine was, the teacher instructed us to "MAKE THE TOOLS" TO MAKE OUR PROJECTS AND MAKE THE PROJECTS. That one marvelous act by a teacher, taught me to not confine myself to what exists. If whats needed does not exist, make it. Its really that simple. dang it, I should be on the Harley hoggin right now, guess I will work on the cages.

reako45

Its a kinkgsnake. I know its not the exact habitat type.. but the cage conditions are the same I think.

No matter how you dress it up FR its still just a cage with walls just like every other cage. Nice work though.

Your still just a person. Why does everything you write have to disparage. Even mass murderers have a good side. But thanks for the hidden compliment.
The real point is, all my stuff isn't about the END product, what a forum is for is the journey. The start, the middle and progress along the way. But you cannot wait for any of that, as it would hinder what you do. To disparage.
With life experience you understand, the journey is far more important then the end.
I never asked you or anyone to be part of my journey, or believe, or not, what I do or will do. What I do, is for me.
And I do believe that's the part that scares so many of you. What I do is not about you, or the concensus, or what others do or think. I explained that on the first day. I said then and again now, I do I for me and anyothers that are INTERESTED. As I said one million times, if your not interested, then don't even read my posts.
Oddly, my first hognose cage is going to have deep nesting(at all times, deep substrate, and a real nice looking cage, Temp control for the bottom layer and a different system for the top. The next version will have all this, and more. Or I can keep them in a drawer if needed. And still be fun to look at and observe. And, I will be building some racks for my son. As that's how he wants to keep them.

With such a nice cage I would be tempted to use it at all times.

If I had that cage I would get asian vine snakes and make super tropical and tree snake friendly and then keep a tropical ground snake like the tri color hogs with the drawer part as there home. Save space and twice as much to look at.

Hi David, I was told by a college field herper that tri colored hogs come from xeric areas just like Around me. Sonoran desert. He brought back the first ones I saw, back in the seventies. He gave them to folks around here. I knew his brother well and also went to some of his talks. Anyway, that's what he reported.

That makes sense if you think about it. the digging lifestyle does not make much sense in consistently wet rain forest. Even southern hogs live in the dry sand ridges of central FL.

I would imagine as long as the air humidity is high enough for the vine snakes to survive. Then tri-colors would do fine. The point I was making is the cage gives a tree snake a home in the air and it gives a ground snake a home in the drawer of soil. And it gives the keeper something really nice to look at.

Yes, communal cages(housing different species) can be lots of fun and bring bring you lots of enjoyment.
My friend, owns the chiricahua desert museum.(click on link) Has many communal cages, including a vinesnake/green rat exhibit.
By the way, I built the reptile enclosures for him and are doing more now.
Also, for fun, the Museum is located in Hognose habitat and we find them on the property and even on the doorstep(large female earlier this year) Last week another large female was found across the street in another building.
I think what you will find out is, burrowing snakes will climb and climbing snakes(vinesnakes) will burrow if given the opportunity.
I kept vinesnakes for a short while and They would bury themselves in the leaf litter, then in the mourning periscope up and look around, like some manner of sprouting plant. Have fun and don't be afraid to try what you want.
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