Re: Cali kingsnake - bunch of questions

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Posted by hotshot on March 05, 2003 at 11:41:50:

In Reply to: Re: Cali kingsnake - bunch of questions posted by krapylet on March 05, 2003 at 05:24:19:

:Okay, thanks a lot. The male got so extremely aggressive yesterday (struck 5 times) so I separated them immediately. I was wondering though, I have a 240 litre tank for the male alone now. I've read some places that they should be kept in a smaller tank when young, but I was kinda hoping he would do fine in the big one, because then he would grow up in it and get used to it, and it would save me the enormous expense of continuously buying new tanks. (This is norway. It's insanely expensive. One pinkie costs nearly $2)

Wow, $2 a pink?? Now that is expensive. I hate paying $.75 for them when I run out of frozen!!

As far as the tank size, some snakes it doesnt really matter. I have a black rat snake that moved up to a 20 gallon long when he was maybe a year old and he did fine. As long as the snake has plenty of hides so it can feel secure, it should do fine. One other thing I forgot to mention, you may want to put a piece of driftwood or a medium sized rock in the cage to help the snake shed once it is ready to do so. I have rocks in all of my snakes cages, I leave them there all the time.

Check your temps and make sure it is not too hot. That may be why the male is so aggressive. It could also be he is just not settled in yet. Give him some time. Once you seperate them, he may calm down. I would leave him alone for 3 or 4 days after you seperate them, let him adjust to his new home and environment. He could also just be nippy, and the only thing that will calm him down is once he is has had time to adjust and settle in, is regular handling. Babies tend to be more nippy than adults, so that is pretty normal. He should calm down in time.

:The female is completely docile, and I handled her for a long time yesterday, with no signs of aggression at all, not even a flicker of the tail.

:So I absolutely need to remove the heating rock? It's not that warm, it just feels slightly warm to the touch. It said on the package it came in that it was fitting for kingsnakes, too. I don't know, I'm the newbie..

Yes I would remove the heat rock. Those things are notorious for overheating. The problem with them is they do not produce an even heating. So if it is cool in the snakes cage, the snake will wrap around and lay ontop of the heatrock. A snake that is cool, will not have the feeling and reaction needed to move away from a heatrock that is uneavenly heated. This could burn your snake.

This is why a heating element under the snakes cage is soooo much better. I have my heating pads placed under one end of a cage, heating about 1/3 of the cage. I have aspen as a substrate for the adults, and a rock on the warm end. I use fairly flat rocks. The reason I do this is to simulate how a snake would warm itself in the wild. They will lay on a road or rock that is in the sun, warming their undersides as well as letting the sun warm them from above.

I have a small floodlamp on top of my enclosures with a 40 watt bulb to help warm the ambient temp as well as the heating pad that heats the bottom of the cage.

:So no sand either? I use the sand because I figure the snake will feel more comfy in it, and of course because it looks a lot better. For security, I do have a top on the tank, they've crept out of certain air hatches, but I've "patched" them up, and I even saw him try to escape and fail.

Sand is not really that good. I have known people to use it, and I have heard of snakes getting sand stuck in their nostrils.
Baby snakes should not be on sand, as they tend to burrow more than adults, and would probably be more apt to get sand stuck in their nostrils. Sand is hard to keep clean as well.

I used to keep Mali Uromastyx (a type of desert lizard), and they are kept on sand. The sand doesnt absorb any type of moisture, and it tends to smell if you dont clean it as soon as the animal defecates. With sand, you have to replace it once every week, or clean it. Cleaning it really sucks, and economically is cheaper to replace. The other bad thing about sand, is it is way heavier than aspen or newspaper/paper towels.

For me aspen is just an all around best substrate.

:I really appreciate the help here, I'll go home and figure out what to do know. Take care.
:Kjetil

No problem, I hope everything goes well with you and your snakes!
Good luck and happy herping
Brian Baker

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