A point and an important point is, air temps have little to do with snakes. There is a relationship, but its loose. For instance, the coolest air temp when finding an active hog crossing the road was 54F and one at 58F. but that does not reflect the body temps of the snakes, they were much higher.(in the seventies) This is true across the board. Whats important is mass and reflective temps. Mass is how they regulate 95% of the time and reflective is basking to raise their temps above mass and air temps. Temps guns are perfect for understanding how reptiles use their environment and internal body temps.

With a temp gun, the reflective temps, pointing the gun at the snake, is very accurate, but not exactly. With neonates, its plus or minus a degree or two. with larger snakes, the internal body temps can be 4 or 5 degrees lower then the skin temps. Depending on how long they have been out.

Here and on my sites, grasslands, there is little shade, so sun temps are much higher then air temps. In shaded forest, thick foliage the temps are not so different. But, eastern hogs, prefer open sandy areas with sun exposure. I lived there too, hhahahahahahahaha I use to work at Ross Allens up to the last year he was there. My oldest daughters first snake capture was an adult southern in our driveway. She was 10 months old.

What I am saying is, use common sense, snakes biologically are pretty much all the same. That is, use the same range of temps etc. What is different if the ethology, that is, how they attain their needs.

Heres the thought for today, and I am not being mean. Its a real thought and a real question. Salamanders do utilize a much lower temp range then snakes and lizards, so why do you force your snakes to live at Salamander temps?

The truth is, theres a million ways to skin a cat, same for heating snake cages. You do not have to heat up the room and make the sallies suffer, but you still can heat up your cages and allow them to be snakes.

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