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ceramic heat discs

R

rockinghorsedemon

New member
My snake is amel and I've seen threads saying that heat lights damage there eyes if there not infrared. So I'm gunna replace the lights with ceramic disks for heating. Is this a good idea? Or will my snake be fine with the lights it has. It has a dayglow light and a infrared for night time. The infrared is made by all living things.
 
Here is my Lil guy
be8b6d3f66aea9f9e668e8af18ceb22e.jpg
 
Corns need underbelly heat to help with digestion, overhead lights are not only unnecessary but dangerous. The bulbs are expensive (and break easily), have been know to start fires and, as you mentioned, cause blindness or burns.

You need a UTH (under tank heater) with a thermostat set to about 87° and a digital thermometer on top of the glass directly over the UTH to ensure your heat measurements are correct. This will help gradiate down to the cool side an approximate temp of about 75°.

Also, add LOTS of hides, plastic and silk plants and vines, the little guys especially need to feel secure. I like to smoosh one end of toilet paper tubes and angle them down into the substrate. This creates a little "cave" which the babies love, and for older ones you can find lots of boxes around your house you can use (as long as they are strictly for holding, say, a tube of toothpaste that is non-toxic). By have 4 or 5 of these hides your little beastie can choose the hide and temperature he is happiest with.

There are a lot of "stickies" at the top of each topic, please read them all and you will learn a lot! Also, if you haven't already, Kathy Love and Don Soderberg, two of the best breeders with more experience than I will ever have, each have a book out on corn snakes. The greatest info is in them, I suggest you get each. I am in the hobby just over 2 years and still refer to them once in a while!

Here is a care sheet I made up for another member, it has some great tips and links. I hope it helps! Good luck!
 
rockinghorsedemon said:
Awesome thank you I haven't used it yet and will return it tomorrow. I'll buy one of those heating rocks or a under tank peace
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Please do not get a heating rock. Heating rocks can burn your snake.

An under tank heater is what your want for a corn snake. You want the right size under tank heater. The generally, rule is the heater is put towards one end and covers 25 to 33% of the tank bottom. You want to put it on the glass on the outside of your tank. You also want a hide over the heater. Many of us use a fake cave for our warm hides, but you can use a snake safe half log (hardwood or cork, no pine or cedar), a plastic hide or a homemade hide. You need a thermometer in the hide and it should be about 85 degrees F in there. It helps to have a thermostat though some experts simply control the temperature by the depth of the substrate. Others say to monitor the glass temperature under the substrate and have that temp at 87 degrees using a thermostat.

If properly done your snake may spend most of its time in the warm hide, especially after eating.
 
I wish I could edit so I could just add this to what's I've aorewdy posted but I cant.

Your snake is beautiful and the hide in the picture would make a very nice warm hide. You still need a cool hide and hides in between the two. Like smigon (who is very experienced and whose advice I really appreciate) said, the more hides, the better. You will have a healthier and calmer snake the more hides you give your little corn.
 
rockinghorsedemon said:
I've got 3 hides and I got the proper size heat mat by pet med. Thank you for your help. I feel kinda silly and sorry for my snake
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Make sure you have a thermostat (not to be confused with a thermometer) to control the heat of your uth. You don't want the uth getting the floor directly above it warmer than 87-89F.
 
rockinghorsedemon said:
I've got 3 hides and I got the proper size heat mat by pet med. Thank you for your help. I feel kinda silly and sorry for my snake
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First, please excuse my typos tonight. My iPad spellchecker is very creative, too.

Second please don't feel silly. You are asking the right questions and getting the right information. There are many ways to get it wrong but there are also a number of ways to get it right.

Even though I studied for year before I got my snake, last month, I made some mistakes and found better ways to do things thanks to the help I've recieved here. Smigon and others helped me. I was using an unnecessary light along with my under tank heater, and I too needed more hides.

We are all here to learn and to help. Your snake will be fine. You are asking the right questions and you care. If everyone who had a snake cared like you do, the world would be filled with happy healthy snakes.
 
Thank you guys so much. I'll get a picture of my new setup when I get home on here. And I looked for the thermostat for the mat but u couldn't find any. Is there a plug or something I could use to make sure it doesn't get to hot. Or even have it on a timer to turn of every once in awhile?
 
Look on Amazon for the Hydrofarm thermostat. It is a thermostat made for plants, but works very well with under tank heaters for reptiles. It costs about $33. I just bought one myself.
 
rockinghorsedemon said:
And how do I adjust it
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The thermostat comes with instructions, but it's digital so you just set the temperature you want your under tank heat mat it to hold. I found out about it reading posts on this forum so if you search on Hydrofarm you will find more information. You still need a thermometer in the hide to make sure the temp is actually what it should be.

In the meantime, use the thickness of your substrate to get to 85F in the hide where the snake actually sits until you get your thermostat. Thicker=cooler, and thinner=hotter. You absolutely need to measure the temp inside the warm hide.
 
DollysMom said:
The thermostat comes with instructions, but it's digital so you just set the temperature you want your under tank heat mat it to hold. I found out about it reading posts on this forum so if you search on Hydrofarm you will find more information. You still need a thermometer in the hide to make sure the temp is actually what it should be.

In the meantime, use the thickness of your substrate to get to 85F in the hide where the snake actually sits until you get your thermostat. Thicker=cooler, and thinner=hotter. You absolutely need to measure the temp inside the warm hide.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately using the substrate to try and control the temp is not going to work. The snake will burrow under the substrate, so the fact that it is 85 on the top is somewhat irrelevant. The temp does not need to be measured inside the warm hide, it needs to be measured on the floor of the viv directly above the middle of the uth. Yes, your warm hide should be on the uth, but will probably not cover the entire uth.

rockinghorsedemon, further to DollysMom's comments about the thermostat, the thermostat comes with a temperature probe. This probe must be fastened directly on the glass of your viv - placed in the center of the uth. Setup should look like this: uth, viv floor, thermostat probe, substrate. You can use a hot glue gun or aquarium grade silicon to attach the probe to the floor.

The uth plugs into the thermostat and the thermostat into the wall. You set the themostat to given temp - it will cut power to the uth when the desire temp is reached and will turn uth back on when temp gets too low. The thermostat has a temp readout on it, you need to monitor this initially to make sure the temp does not get too high. I set my hydrofarm to 84, this keeps the temp between about 83 and 89.

As DollysMom indicated, using a separate digital thermometer (with probe - fastened next to thermostat probe) to confirm temps is a good idea. That said, I have found that the two hydro farm's I've been using for the last number of years are accurate enough and have stopped using a second thermometer.

While you are waiting for the thermostat to arrive, you need to get the temperature of the viv floor directly above the uth. If it is much above 87-89F, I would unplug it and do without for the meantime. I wouldn't feed though, until you have the uth properly set up.

Here is a link to the unit:
http://www.amazon.com/Hydrofarm-MTP...UTF8&qid=1428412326&sr=8-2&keywords=hydrofarm
 
foghat said:
rockinghorsedemon, further to DollysMom's comments about the thermostat, the thermostat comes with a temperature probe. This probe must be fastened directly on the glass of your viv - placed in the center of the uth. Setup should look like this: uth, viv floor, thermostat probe, substrate. You can use a hot glue gun or aquarium grade silicon to attach the probe to the floor.

The uth plugs into the thermostat and the thermostat into the wall. You set the themostat to given temp - it will cut power to the uth when the desire temp is reached and will turn uth back on when temp gets too low. The thermostat has a temp readout on it, you need to monitor this initially to make sure the temp does not get too high. I set my hydrofarm to 84, this keeps the temp between about 83 and 89.

As DollysMom indicated, using a separate digital thermometer (with probe - fastened next to thermostat probe) to confirm temps is a good idea. That said, I have found that the two hydro farm's I've been using for the last number of years are accurate enough and have stopped using a second thermometer.

While you are waiting for the thermostat to arrive, you need to get the temperature of the viv floor directly above the uth. If it is much above 87-89F, I would unplug it and do without for the meantime. I wouldn't feed though, until you have the uth properly set up.

Here is a link to the unit:
http://www.amazon.com/Hydrofarm-MTP...UTF8&qid=1428412326&sr=8-2&keywords=hydrofarm
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Great visual on the order, and that is everything I was going to say!

Yes, NO heat rocks. They are geared more towards tortoises and lizards.

If you ordered the Thermostat and UTH from Amazon it should be there within a day or two. They are excellent at shipping times, so no need to do anything for the next couple of days.

Here is a tip for your UTH: Take a sheet of aluminum foil that is twice the size of the UTH and lay it on the table. Peel the sticky protector sheet from the back and line up the bottom of the UTH with the bottom of the foil (not totally crucial, it just looks nicer and works a bit better). Fold the sides and the top over the sticky side in a nice little packet. Use any kind of tape to attach it to the bottom of the viv on the side you want to be the warm side.

When you want to remove the UTH and relocate it to another viv or want to really scrub the viv with water and need to remove the UTH so it doesn't get wet you will peel the tape off and if the foil tears, no problem, it's an easy fix. If you don't have it wrapped the sticky stuff is really strong and hard to remove from the glass and you may destroy the mat or the wiring inside. This protects it and saves you about $30! Also, the foil will NOT hinder the UTH from performing the way it should.
 
Foghat, I only suggest the substrate depth as a temporary measure until the thermostat arrives. If I was unclear about that please, please. I'm not suggesting the substrate method, even for temporary use, from an iffy source. I'm getting it from a well known Don Soderberg post on this board. As a non expert myself, I will not encourage that method long term, but if you have nothing else until the thermostat arrives, the other option is no heat. If that is the better option you all have my apology for suggesting Mr. Soderberg's method even temporarily.
 
DollysMom said:
Foghat, I only suggest the substrate depth as a temporary measure until the thermostat arrives. If I was unclear about that please, please. I'm not suggesting the substrate method, even for temporary use, from an iffy source. I'm getting it from a well known Don Soderberg post on this board. As a non expert myself, I will not encourage that method long term, but if you have nothing else until the thermostat arrives, the other option is no heat. If that is the better option you all have my apology for suggesting Mr. Soderberg's method even temporarily.
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No need to apologize for anything. I am certainly no expert either. However, with the choice between no heat or too much heat, I'd take no heat (and no feeding) - given that we are talking short term here until the thermostat arrives.

Only way to tell if it will be too much heat is to take the temp at the glass above the uth.
 
foghat said:
No need to apologize for anything. I am certainly no expert either. However, with the choice between no heat or too much heat, I'd take no heat (and no feeding) - given that we are talking short term here until the thermostat arrives.

Only way to tell if it will be too much heat is to take the temp at the glass above the uth.
Click to expand...

Thanks, foghat. The no feeding without heat is a really important point. The only goal here best possible care of our snake buddies that's an awesome uniting force.
 
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