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How old to switch tank?

anonhat

anonhat

New member
Hey everyone, I just have a quick question.

I've been looking around for a 30-40 gallon long tank after finding that my father's old goldfish breeder tank went mysteriously missing (aka- the brother took it after leaving the 100 gallon at his old apartment) Unfortunately, a 30-40 gallon tank seems hard to find (unless brand new) and the next size up 55+ is well out of my price range because I had planned on the tank being free from my father. (Less money I have to spend on the tank- more money to find the perfect pip with)

I was going to pick up a cheap ten gallon with a locking lid to give me some more time to find the bigger permanent home. How long will I have until I have to switch the snake over? As soon as I can? up to a year?

Just wondering if I should skip the idea entirely and just shovel out that 50+ extra bucks for the bigger tank now, or if I'll have a decent amount of time to find one that's less expensive.
 
Well keep in mind that a pip as you say will be around 10” long and will weight between 10 to 15 grams. Lets say 12 grams just for the sake of simplicity. If you multiply the length times the weight you will get 120 inch grams. It is easier if you convert this to metric so that would then be 3048 mm-grams. A 10 aquarium is 2314 cubic inches. Again in metric that would be 37,919,666 cubic millimeters. OK, are you with me so far? Lets change that last number to 37,920 cubic centimeters, just to make it less cumbersome. One cubic centimeter of water weighs one gram which has nothing to do with snakes. If you divide the volume of the aquarium in cubic centimeters buy the millimeter gram equivalent of the snake you will get 12.44 which is easy to remember.

I hope I have answered your question.
 
I have a 2008 snake who is in a 10 gallon, and he still has plenty of room. He's about 55 grams. (He was a half-sized runt, though...) When I think of my next smallest snake, at 150 grams, she would fit in a ten, but would be happier in a larger viv. So you have at least a year. I think babies do okay in 20Ls, if that's what you have, but a 40 breeder would be huge, though doable.
 
Nanci said:
I have a 2008 snake who is in a 10 gallon, and he still has plenty of room. He's about 55 grams. (He was a half-sized runt, though...) When I think of my next smallest snake, at 150 grams, she would fit in a ten, but would be happier in a larger viv. So you have at least a year. I think babies do okay in 20Ls, if that's what you have, but a 40 breeder would be huge, though doable.
Click to expand...

Thanks. That's what I thought. If I was to buy the larger tank, I would've put in a temp divider so the tank wasn't so enormous and stress out the little one.

Thanks for the quick replies too!
 
anonhat said:
Thanks. That's what I thought. If I was to buy the larger tank, I would've put in a temp divider so the tank wasn't so enormous and stress out the little one.

Thanks for the quick replies too!
Click to expand...

Most of the time dividers dont work very well. The snakes end up finding ways up and over or around them. If you are going to go with the 40 right off the bat just make sure you go a little overboard on the hides and decorations to make each part of the viv appear smaller. As long as he doesnt think he is in a wide open space and vulnerable he should be happy and healthy. Usually works better with less headaches than a small snake finding a way in to the side they arent supposed to be.
 
If you are going to use a lot of hides and decorations, you need to take the space they require into consideration. The easiest way to do that is to submerge them into water. Well back up, fill a large graduated cylinder about half full of water. Say it was a 5 liter cylinder, fill it to exactly 3 liters. Now submerge the hide in the water and note the about the water rose. This is equal to the actual volume occupied by the hide. Your reading will be in milliliters, which can be easily converted to cubic centimeters. You must subtract this amount from the volume of the tank in the earlier equation.
 
Murdoc- I'd use the extra plexiglass laying around and marine caulk it into the tank. When the time came to open the tank, I'd just peel it out. I know snakies have their way of finding themselves in nooks and crannies!

Wade- Never thought of doing that! The boy's tank is set up with a rather large bridge with foliage underneath, then a few scattered paper rolls and another large foliage hanging. Our snow Theron was a little bit antsy until we put in the foliage and he loves cruising the tank now we changed the substrate to aspen. (he looks like a little earthworm!) So I should fill up the large tank with enough stuff so it reads out the square inch of a ten gallon?
 
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