How to Heat Snake Cages

Pet snakes need heat.

Snakes cannot produce their own body heat, yet they must warm up to accomplish a number of vital physiological processes, such as digestion, growth and disease prevention. Consequently, snakes rely on external heat sources as part of their daily lives. In the wild, snakes often have a broad range of temperature choices, from basking in the full sun to coiling in the shade or retreating underground where it is often significantly cooler. As a pet owner, one of your most important jobs is to ensure that your pet snake has a broad range of biologically appropriate temperatures available in captivity.

Things You'll Need

• Heat lamp
• Light bulb
• Heat-tape
• Thermometer
• Heating pad

Instructions

1. Determine your snake's temperature requirements. Snake species differ significantly in their thermal requirements, so it is important that you research the temperature needs of your snake. In addition to the species of your snake, consider your snake's gender, size, reproductive status and geographical origin, as these can all influence a snake's temperature needs.

2. Use a heat lamp. The easiest, least expensive and most natural way to heat a snake's cage is to use a heat lamp placed on one side of the terrarium. Choose a suitable light fixture, such as a clamp light fixture equipped with an aluminum reflector, which is available at your local hardware store. To create heat, use a standard incandescent light bulb, a ceramic heat bulb or any other variety of specially designed reptile heat bulbs. Check the ground and air temperatures on both sides of the cage to ensure you have created a suitable thermal gradient for your snake (choosing a bulb of an appropriate wattage is often an iterative process).

3. Try electric heat tape. Flexwatt heat tape is a thin, flexible commercial product designed to heat the underside of terrariums and aquaria. The number of watts produced by a sheet of heat tape is controlled using a rheostat or dimmer switch, which allows precise control of the heat output. You can create a precise thermal gradient by using multiple strips of heat tape, each with a different heat output, on a single aquarium.

4. Employ a heating pad. Like heat tape, heating pads can be used to heat the underside of a snake's cage. However, with only two or three temperature settings (i.e., high, medium or low) heating pads offer less control of temperature output, compared to heat tape.

5. Avoid commercial "hot rocks." Hot rocks are rock-shaped objects that produce heat. Although designed specifically for reptiles, hot rocks are not recommended by most veterinarians and professional reptile keepers because they often lead to burn injuries in reptiles.

Tips & Warnings

• Place the snake's water bowl on the cool end of the cage, away from the heat source, to avoid increasing the humidity in the cage and minimize the number of times you have to refill the water bowl.

• Read all warning labels and follow the manufacturers' directions on heating products to avoid injury and the chance of fire.

References

• Hot Rocks and Reptiles: What the experts say; how reptiles thermoregulate; and comments