Kid and Garter Snake - GerryT (flickr)

#1) They harbor salmonella
Snakes, like all reptiles, carry salmonella on their skin. Your child needs to be old enough to know better than to lick the animal, or handle it and then chew on his or her fingers. They say 3 or under is too young, but I don’t believe that is the case. It depends on the child and only you know your kid well enough. I’ve seen full grown adults who shouldn’t be handling snakes because they pick their noses and bite their nails without considering the animal they were holding a few minutes before.

#2) Some are simply inappropriate for children
All snakes are incredibly and deceptively strong, but there are some that just have no business around kids. I’m talking about full grown Burmese Pythons, Reticulated Pythons, Boa Constrictors, and others like those. Even adults should only handle them with assistance, but kids should never be responsible for animals of that size. Another type of snake, regardless of size, that you should avoid giving to a child are venomous ones. Not that we need to get into a great deal of discussion about “hots” in this article but we do need to make mention of it.

#3) Age isn’t just a number when it comes to snakes
Keeping any pet is a major obligation for a kid. But a snake is a whole new level of responsibility both for the child and for the parent or guardian. More than age it requires maturity. I’m going out on a limb here and assuming you’re not interested in cleaning up snake poop, feeding dead rodents to a snake, disinfecting the cage, or any of the rest of the mundane activities required for your child’s snake to thrive. But is your son or daughter mature enough to do it?

#4) They cost more than you think
First you have to buy all the supplies necessary to properly house a snake. Next you have to buy the snake itself. Finally you need to be prepared to continually invest in the animal. Food, bedding, electric to keep the heat and humidity right, vet bills, and all the rest of it. If your kid isn’t working you will be paying for all of those things. Don’t get me wrong I believe it is well worth the investment but if your budget is already thin getting a snake might be more expensive than you are prepared for.

This article did not cover every concern you could possibly have and it wasn’t meant to. It’s purpose is to get you to think about a few things you might not have as you’ve started looking into getting a snake for your kid. I’d like to recommend the following snakes as good candidates for children. I’ve also included a link to appropriate reading materials about the species on Amazon.

• Ball Pythons:
  Small, docile, and relatively easy to care for. These are great children’s snakes. A great reference for parents and guardians is – The Complete Ball Python: A Comprehensive Guide to Care, Breeding and Genetic Mutations
• Corn Snakes:
  Even easier to care for than Ball Pythons! Written by Kathy Love one of the foremost experts on Corn Snakes in the pet trade – Corn Snakes: The Comprehensive Owner’s Guide

Related posts:

1. What you should buy for your pet snake before you bring it home
2. Where to buy a pet snake
3. Responsible snake ownership

So you’ve finally decided to get your first snake. That’s great to hear but before you run down to the store to pick it up (or purchase it from an online vendor) you need to be certain everything is in place and ready to go for your snakes arrival. Reptiles are very unforgiving animals when it comes to their living environment and not having everything setup ahead of time is a big mistake when it comes to caring for a snake. This is what you should have ready.

A terrarium for your pet snake
In the past we’ve advocated making your own snake cage out of a plastic bin and for many people due to the low cost and ease of use that is still the best option. However we also recognize that there are those who would like to spend a little extra money and have their snake in a glass display case. Some people will buy a glass aquarium, put some lights on it, tape a heat pad to the bottom, secure the top down and call it good. That’s fine but you’ll often find yourself fighting with humidity and dryness issues. Instead you should consider purchasing an Exo Terra AllGlass Terrarium – 18 x 18 x 18 Inches. These kits a pre-made and take all of the guess work out of setting your animal up properly. Plus the peace of mind they give as far as security goes is unbeatable.

Heat source
Because snakes can not regulate their own body temperature providing sources of heat is important. A common method of heating is to use an under the tank heater (UTH) such as the Zoo Med ReptiTherm® Under Tank Heater, Medium. The UTH provides a spot for the snake to bask which aids in the digestion of meals.

In addition to the UTH you will need a heating lamp. Snakes unlike lizards do not require UVA/B lighting, but getting a bulb that gives off those wavelengths isn’t going to hurt anything. You want to be sure to get Zoo Med Daylight Blue Incandescent Reptile Bulb 15 Watts and one for Zoo Med Nightlight Red Reptile Bulb 60 Wattsuse at night. You can also Zoo Med Zoo Med Day and Night Reptile Bulb Combo Pack (Pack of 2 60 Watt Bulbs)that has one bulb for night and one bulb for day usage.

If you are using an exoterra terrarium system they usually have lamps built in that just need bulbs. On the other hand if you are using an old aquarium you’ll have to buy your own Zoo Med Clamp Light Fixtureto hold the bulbs.

Keeping track of the temperature and humidity
After you have heating elements you need to be able to keep track of temperature and humidity. One of the best tools to use for doing this is a Chaney Instruments Acu-Rite 00891A1 Indoor and Outdoor Thermometer with Humidity.

The remote probe allows you to place the main body of the instrument at the end away from the heating pad and then put the probe over the heating pad. That way you can see both the ambient temperature inside the enclosure as well as the basking temperature.

Miscellaneous items you should have on hand
You should also have the following items ready to go when your snake gets there.

• Phone numbers for exotic animal vets in your area
• A good reference source (such as pet-snakes.com)
• A large bowl. It should be shallow but wide to help speed up evaporation

Related posts:

1. Where to buy a pet snake
2. Kids and snakes 4 things you should consider before you buy one (a snake that is)
3. Beginners guide to heating your snake tank

Properly and adequately heating a snakes cage is paramount to its well being. There are several methods that can be used to ensure the proper temperatures are reached and maintained. You want to avoid going to extremes either higher or lower than the optimal temperature ranges for the species of snakes you are keeping. It should also be noted that regardless of the type of heating you decide to use the temperatures must be carefully monitored to ensure that it is maintained. A properly operating thermostat is essential for all methods of heating described below.

#1 – Ambient room temperature
If you are able to raise the air temperature of the room that the snake’s cage is setup in that is a great way to heat the cage. This is best accomplished by using a space heater in a smaller space to avoid forcing the rest of the house to endure unseasonably warm temperatures in the summer. During the winter people don’t seem to complain quite as much about the extra heat. Be certain to read and understand all safety precautions related to any space heater you decide to use. We can not be held responsible if anything goes wrong. Also beware of your heating bill. I’ve found a small space heater with a thermostat and an overheat safety is a good method of heating small room such as a guest bedroom, or walk-in closet.

#2 – Heat Lamp
A heat lamp situated to focus in the cage can provide your snakes with additional heat. If you decide to use a heat lamp to keep the cage warm you’ll need to either get to decide if you want to use two bulbs; one for night and one for day, or just one bulb for both. ‘Before you decide either way consider the implications of each approach.

Get two of them. One for day time and one for night time. The night one provides heat and lets you observe your snake but the light is filtered through a coating that makes it invisible to your snake’s eyes. You can get either red or blue. The red ones provide a marginal amount of UVB benefits, which is wasted on snakes because they don’t need it. The UVB won’t harm the snakes it just isn’t an additional buying point.

Get one bulb, a red or blue one, and use it for both day and night. During the day the light provided to your snakes is natural sun light that gets into the room, or whatever overhead lights you use are. The heat lamp still has to be left on to help maintain the proper temperatures.

Whatever setup you decide here is some information about the bulbs themselves.

• Incandescent Bulbs:
  These bulbs are what you generally see in overhead lights in a room. They are cheap, provide a high heat output and are easily obtainable. Their heat output can be significant so it is important to monitor your temperatures closely.
• Compact Florescent Bulbs (CFLs):
  CFLs are those energy saver bulbs that look like spirals and the manufacturers often claim to last much longer than traditional light bulbs. I’ve not had as many hours out of them as the claims I’ve heard others make but they definitely cut down on my electrical bills when used. They are often significantly more expensive than incandescent bulbs. They also contain mercury which complicates disposal.
• Fluorescent Bulbs:
  These lights require special hoods to be fitted on the top of a snake’s cage in order to be used. They are the long bulbs often found in classrooms and office buildings. They are precursors to the CFLs. There are a multitude of issues with these types of bulbs that go beyond the fact that they also contain mercury. For instance -
  • Frequently turning them off and on leads to much shorter lifespans
  • They hum, an effect caused by minor faults in the electromagnetic ballast, which could could disturb your snakes
  • Air temperature effects their operation. The cooler the air is the less efficient they are at heating, the longer it takes them to come on, and sometimes if it’s cold enough they won’t work at all. But if it’s that cold chances are it’s too late to help many types of snakes anyhow.

Heat lamps have a few disadvantages that you should keep in mind as well.

1. They dry out the air making humidity more of an issue
2. In order for them to heat they have to be left on 24/7 which can be stressful on your snake
3. They can be expensive both in terms of bulb cost and electricity

#3 – Ceramic Heat Bulbs (CHB)
I’ve separated this kind of heating element from the rest of the heat lamps because they give off heat but no light. This allows your snakes to take advantage of natural light cycles (photo periods). CHBs use Infrared (IR) to heat the objects in the tank. This is how sunlight works, it mainly heats objects and to a lesser extent the air around us. They become extremely hot and require a special light fixtures designed for the high amount of heat they generate. Due to this extreme heat they should never come into contact with your snakes or any other object. These bulbs dry out the air in your terrarium like the others do so you’ll need to compensate for that as well.

#4 – Radiant Heat Panel (RHP)
These employ the same concept as the ceramic heat lamps in that they both take advantage of infrared (IR) heat to heat the air inside of your snake’s cage. Unlike CHBs the surface of the RHPs do not get nearly as hot. They can still put off a great deal of heat. Don’t be fooled by their relatively cool exterior. The temperature inside the cage, particularly the objects being heated by the IR can be significantly higher. There are several claims made about the RHPs made by pro-products.com that one can’t help but consider. Some of them include:

• Can’t catch on or cause a fire, period
• Can be safely mounted directly against any type of surface
• Made from completely non-combustible materials
• Safe to the touch for both humans and snakes
• 80% more efficient than any other kind of heating source
• 10 year warranty, with a 50+ year expected life

#5 – FlexWatt heat tape
For a long time FlexWatt has been the standard used in heating snake racks. It’s not seen in most homes unless the person happens to have a rack or a larger cage that it came pre-installed in. In order to use it safely you MUST use a thermostat to regulate the output otherwise it just gets hotter and hotter until it burns out, causes a fire, kills your snakes, and sometimes all of the above. It is very effective and safe when used properly. If you chose to use FlexWatt you should request the supplier wire it for you unless you are comfortable working with electrical components.

Addendum:
Like to thanks Kaorte for pointing out that I left off under tank heaters (UTH). Not sure how that happened, but it did. Anyhow a UTH is heater that adheres to the bottom of the snake’s tank and provides belly warmth. This heat is in addition to keeping the ambient air temperature in the cage at proper levels, and helps the snake to digest its meals. While they get very hot and should be regulated with a thermostat they can’t be relied on to heat a tank without any other devices helping. The principle is similar to FlexWatt except each cage requires it’s own UTH and each UTH it’s own power receptacle. They work great for one or two tanks, but if you have much more than that it makes sense to go with FlexWatt as one piece can be used with multiple tanks. I you watch my video on building your own snake tank you’ll see a UTH in it.

Related posts:

1. The right cage for pet snakes
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3. What makes a good room for your collection of pet snakes

If you are like many other snake keepers you’ll quickly find your one pet turns into several pets. When this happens you’ll often discover you simply don’t have a big enough dresser to keep their habitats on and you need to find a space in your home that can be dedicated to them. Sometimes it will be a specific corner of one room, other times it will be a closet, or a room all to themselves. In this article we will discuss what makes a good snake room.

A dedicated room for keeping your snake’s in needs to be more than an empty space. It needs to meet certain requirements in order to function properly.

• Appropriate size
  
  A snake room needs to be large enough to hold your entire collection as adults. It also doesn’t hurt if it allows for expansion of your collection as well. On the other hand it shouldn’t be too large as this will prove more difficult to maintain. Most people keep more than just snakes in their snake room. They also keep all the paraphanelia that goes along with collecting snakes in it. Not to mention they often have a habit of spontanesously causing different types of reptiles to appear. My own snake room for example has suddenly started collecting pairs of Tokay Geckos.
• Power outlets and reliable circuitry
  
  Various pieces of equipment that help keep your snakes alive and healthy require power. The more snakes you have the more equipment will need to use that power. If you have electrical circuits that can’t handle the load you’ll find yourself having all kinds of problems. You also need to make sure that there are an appropriate number of outlets and they are conviently located in the room.

  I made the mistake of turning an old walk-in closet into my snake room. It wasn’t until after everything was moved in that I realized there was no outlet in there. When I ran an extension cord to the nearest outlet it tripped the breaker. Needless to say that didn’t become my snake room. Had I bothered to look I would have seen that there were no electrical outlets in that closet and wouldn’t have tried to set it up there.

• Ability to maintain the temperature
  
  Because most snakes that people keep as pets require specific temperature ranges you need to be able to heat and cool it as appropriate. It’s not a big deal to keep one cage appropriately heated (or cooled) even when the room it is located in isn’t anywhere near that temperature, but when you have dozens of cages it becomes much more difficult. It is best to have a room that you can keep at a uniform temperature and then use a product like heat tape to tweak the temperatures. My snake room stays around 80 to 83 degrees at all times. I don’t need special heat lamps to do this, just a space heater set appropriately.

  During the summer because of how the room sits in my house I’m able to unplug the space heater most of the time and the room holds the appropriate temperature. When it needs additional cooling I just open a window and set a fan next to it. It doesn’t take any additional effort to maintain the temperature.

• Convience for the keeper
  
  The snake room needs to be conviently located. If you have to get in your winter clothes to walk across the yard to your shed that you’ve turned into a snake room you might not think it is such a good idea in the middle of a -10 degree night because you’ve just realized you forgot to take care of something important. More than just distance needs to be considered for a snake room. Not many homes are built with a room dedicated to pets. Consider what the actual, or original intent of the room is and decide if you can sacrifice that intent. If you can great, but if not or if you believe you’ll need to use it as intended soon then you should look for another room.
• Consider you own collection
  
  You need to keep in mind what kind of snakes you keep and what kind you expect to keep in the future. A room that is appropriate for a corn snake collection is often not the same room that is appropriate for a reticulated python collection. On top of the type of snakes you keep consider what others snakes you are likely to get and how large you are likely to let your collection grow. If you’re going to buy 12 dozen breeding pair of ball pythons and put them in a spare closet you might well find yourself relocating sooner than expected if they start hatching out eggs.

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A thermostat is an important part of any snake owners setup. Keeping the temperatures properly regulated can mean the difference between your animal thriving or just surviving. Thermostats are devices used to maintain a specific temperature within an environment. Nearly every modern house has a thermostat that can be turned up or down to raise
or lower the heat as desired. Your pet snake also needs a thermostat to keep the temperatures at the appropriate levels for them to be comfortable. The thermostat you use for your snakes is much the same as the thermostat you use for your home except they generally aren’t mounted to the wall and for the safety of your reptiles they often have safety features such as shutting the heating device down completely if there is a malfunction.

How it works

The mechanics of a thermostat is fairly basic. There’s a thermometer inside that reads the temperature and then depending on if it is mechanical or digital it sends an electrical current to the heating device that either keeps it running, turns it on, or turns it off. The mechanical thermostat does this by way of mercury switch. A digital thermostat is different in that they rely on a resistor that’s resistance changes due depending on the temperature.

Types of thermostats used for reptiles

Due to their specialized needs you shouldn’t just throw any old thermostat on your snake’s tank. I’m sure it’s possible if you’re inclined to do the wiring, but I don’t know that I’d trust the average household Wal-Mart or Home Depot thermostats to be able to make the adjustments that are needed as quickly as they are needed for the purpose of keeping your pet snake healthy. That’s why you should consider a thermostat that is designed for use with reptiles. In order to make the best choice as to which kind thermostat to use you’ll need to know a little bit about them.

• On/Off
  
  This is a very simple design. When the temperature reaches the proper level it shuts off and when the temperature drops below that level it turns back on. These work fine for general husbandry practices but aren’t well suited for incubation because they often allow the temperature to go a few degrees above or below the set-point before they turn on or off. Jeff Ronne of Boaphile Plastics has written an article on his site advocating the on/off thermostat as a money saver. You can read the article for yourself, but essentially he points out that all the microadjustments the proportional thermostat does causes more energy to be used than is necessary.
• Proportional
  
  This type of thermostat micromanages the temperature by constantly adjusting the current that is going to the heating device. It works great for incubation purposes because if it is working properly it will keep the temperature exactly at what you’ve set it for.

Choosing the right one for your pet snake

If money is no issue go for the proportional thermostat. Even if you don’t have an incubator to run with it you might one day. If money is an issue buy the best on/off thermostat you can afford. Normally I’m an advocate of doing things cheaply, but not when it comes to the health of your animals. It’s not always true, but in the case of a thermostat you really do get what you pay for.

When you buy a thermostat you want to make use it has some specific features:

• Remote probe of an appropriate length
  
  At this point I believe all thermostats that are designed for use with reptiles come with a remote temperature probe. It’s a necessity and if you see one that doesn’t use a remote probe look elsewhere. The probe needs to be long enough to reach from the thermostat to the snakes’s cage. Most are between 3 and 6 feet in length.
• Remote probe of an appropriate size
  
  Because you’re going to be putting the probe against the heat pad/tape you need to be sure it can fit through any openings you need it to. I’ve yet to find one that either doesn’t fit or that the opening in the cage can’t be enlarged to accomodate, but just keep it in mind.
• Digital display
  
  While there are still a few models floating around out there that use analog dials to set your temperatures you are much better off using one that has a digital display. You want to be sure it increments the numbers by one and doesn’t do them by fives or something similar. I’m not aware of any that do this, but be sure to ask before buying one.
• Capacity to handle the load
  
  For the average keeper of pet snakes, with a small home setup this won’t be an issue, but if you are controlling multiple racks of snakes your choosen thermostat needs to be able to handle the load you place on it. Which means you need to keep track of how much power you need and see to it that your thermostat of choice can provide it.

We won’t get into how to properly use the thermostat because each one is different and the manufacturer should have provided those instructions to you. I’ll just close by saying that the purpose of the thermostat is to regulate the temperature of your snake’s basking spot, not the ambient air temperature. With that in mind you’ll need to mount the probe inside the tank directly over the heating element which is most likely to be an Under Tank Heater (UTH) or flexwatt heat tape. Be sure to mount it directly over it and not off to the side. After you’ve mounted the probe then put your substrate of choice down over the top of it. It should be noted that I’ve seen a few people advise that it should be mounted outside the tank, directly against the heating element. I don’t see the reasoning in doing it this way as the snake isn’t going to be hanging outside the tank, attached to the bottom of it.

Related posts:

1. What makes a good room for your collection of pet snakes
2. 5 ways to heat your snakes cage
3. Hides for pet snakes