Flexwatt width for Sterilite bins

[forkedtongue]

Hey guys, I recently made the switch to a rack system finally, which was the most space liberating thing in the world....

But I've been wondering if I need to change the width of the flexwatt for these bins. I'm using 41qt and I believe 31qt bins.

I'm heating with under belly and haven't had any trouble getting the back of the racks to the desired temps, which leaves the rest of the area about 10 degrees cooler throughout the container from what I've probed both inside and outside of substrate.

But the area I'm concerned on is that the little buddies seem to 9/10 want to sit on the heat strip area, which as I said is only 3inches wide across the back of the container.

Should I get a wider (6 or 11inch) strip system and replace what I have in right now? (It IS winter here in Michigan but still room temp never goes below 70-75 in the snake room)

[Mikoh4792]

What are the dimensions of the tubs? I only use racks for young snakes and I'm using 4 inch heat tape for bins that are about 2 feet long.

Also racks may be space liberating but that only benefits the owner. Since racks save space, that means space is taken away from the animals. You could always stack enclosures that give snakes more room but also save space compared to tanks lying around side by side.

[forkedtongue]

The dimensions are somewhere around 30Lx20Wx6H

[Mikoh4792]

I'd use a 6 inch heat tape for that kind of tub(where I live since it gets cold in the winter)

Do you have a lot of ventilation holes in the bins? Using less holes is better for heat and humidity retention.

[millertime89]

Open sided rack go 6, enclosed go 4. 41qts are fairly sizeable, perfect Imo for terrestrial snakes under 5ft and depending on species even a bit bigger.

[forkedtongue]

Thanks, I feel like 6 is probably sensible, the 3 inch IS holding the desired temps I just feel like I want to give them a bigger comfort area if they want hot side.

Ya I don't want to get into a size/comfort discussion on housing on here or anywhere else, but ty for the concern

[Mikoh4792]

Well you did bring it up by saying how space liberating racks were... other people are free to give their input on a public forum thread.

[forkedtongue]

Well since you want to be all entitled about your right to preach housing size in a thread about heating, I'll bite...

How many breeders do you know using rack systems versus enclosure stacking? Explain to me exactly how you know that a snake is more happy having a giant over priced enclosure to waste space on versus a large container to waste space on?

There was no point in this thread that I the OP or anyone else asked "are tubs better than enclosures?" But I appreciate you needlessly bringing your personal preferences into a subject that had nothing to do with them.

Also racks may be space liberating but that only benefits the owner. Since racks save space, that means space is taken away from the animals.

Enclosures may be space liberating, but that only benefits the owner. I feel that to be fair to the animals, if you have an entire room to yourself why shouldn't the animals that you love? I personally converted my entire extra bedroom into a terrarium with full substrate flooring, sprinkler systems for humidity, multiple boulder formations for different hides....It's only fair to the animal to simulate their natural environment with maximum comfort.

[Mikoh4792]

First of all, calm down. This is a public forum and as your questions get answered a thread doesn't need to stay on topic.

The breeders I know of like Nick Mutton, Vin Russo(basically the biggest breeders in their category) house their animals in cages that are 3x2,4x2,6x2..respective to the size of the animals being housed.

That's not to say that racks are bad, I never said that. I was only responding to your point about racks being space liberating. I also never said that snakes are more "happy", don't put words in my mouth.

Also no cages are giant. Snakes are not supposed to live in cages...they are supposed to be free range so having a cage is not wasting space. Keeping them in tubs limits their room to move even more.

Again the smaller you go, it only benefits you so when you post about how refreshing it is to "save space" I'm just going to point this out.

[forkedtongue]

Oh ok, well since we are able to change topics within a post now that the question has been answered....

That's strange because a couple of my snakes are from one of the breeders you listed....ironically the tubs I have them in with the rack system is a good deal larger than the housing they were in.....but hey, Forums are like Wikipedia, if you need facts to back up your internet preaching, make em up!

I don't care if it's a "public forum" that doesn't mean you need to run around preaching your preferences on setups in a nonrelated manner, if I asked about them then please by all means. You must be new to this hobby to not know that everyone has there own preferences and it's usually a topic like Politics or Religion, unless someone is asking you about it, keep it to yourself.

I guess for someone who has posts ALL OVER this thread yelling at people for "double posting" on topics, it would adhere to your logic that one thread should be re-used for multiple topics so changing it up at your own will makes sense.

[Mikoh4792]

Enclosures may be space liberating, but that only benefits the owner.

You don't make any sense here. Enclosures are not space liberating as you've said mentioned they are giant and a waste of space.

I feel that to be fair to the animals, if you have an entire room to yourself why shouldn't the animals that you love? I personally converted my entire extra bedroom into a terrarium with full substrate flooring, sprinkler systems for humidity, multiple boulder formations for different hides....It's only fair to the animal to simulate their natural environment with maximum comfort.

If you are being serious then kudos to you. what animal are you housing in this room sized enclosure?

[Mikoh4792]

Oh ok, well since we are able to change topics within a post now that the question has been answered....

That's strange because a couple of my snakes are from one of the breeders you listed....ironically the tubs I have them in with the rack system is a good deal larger than the housing they were in.....but hey, Forums are like Wikipedia, if you need facts to back up your internet preaching, make em up!

Why is it strange? Did I misrepresent a breeder by saying they keep their snakes in cages? I'm not talking about baby snakes that are being temporarily housed before they are sold. I'm talking about snakes that are going to be kept for a long time(ie. their breeders).

And what facts do you want? I don't think I made any extraordinary claims.

I don't care if it's a "public forum" that doesn't mean you need to run around preaching your preferences on setups in a nonrelated manner, if I asked about them then please by all means. You must be new to this hobby to not know that everyone has there own preferences and it's usually a topic like Politics or Religion, unless someone is asking you about it, keep it to yourself.

I'm not preaching anything, just giving my input which I am allowed to. I am pretty new to this hobby but so are you...if you have to ask about the correct flexx wat size for a rack.

I guess for someone who has posts ALL OVER this thread yelling at people for "double posting" on topics, it would adhere to your logic that one thread should be re-used for multiple topics so changing it up at your own will makes sense.

I'd say you are the one yelling. I'm just here for casual conversation yet you are one getting offended and taking this to another level with ad-hominem attacks.

[forkedtongue]

Go back to your freshman college courses, you sound like every other person who just had a intro to ethics class and has just learned about fallacies and feels like using that in every argument is a iwin button...

So how long into an animals life does it go from "it's temp I'm selling you" to "well we better get you some leg room to keep the hippies version of enough space happy"? Because I didn't get babies from this breeder stud.

Frankly you are an idiot, you can preach your unrelated topic opinions all you want I'm done reading anything you type, you literally just spew anti-iq

[Mikoh4792]

Go back to your freshman college courses, you sound like every other person who just had a intro to ethics class and has just learned about fallacies and feels like using that in every argument is a iwin button...

Frankly you are an idiot, you can preach your unrelated topic opinions all you want I'm done reading anything you type, you literally just spew anti-iq

It doesn't matter if I sound like every other person....etc if what I am saying is true. It is true that I'm just here to discuss matters which may involve my opinions...while you are getting heated for trivial reasons and resorting to personal attacks such as "you must be new","you're an idiot"...etc.

So how long into an animals life does it go from "it's temp I'm selling you" to "well we better get you some leg room to keep the hippies version of enough space happy"? Because I didn't get babies from this breeder stud.

Well when your snake is young, small tubs are not "bad"...since the snakes themselves are small anyways. So I don't see anything wrong with keeping a clutch of snakes in a rack system before they are sold.

[smy_749]

Heat tape to cover 1/3 of the enclosure. Take your measurements on length and divide by three. If its a bit bigger or smaller, but not much, then I would say no big deal.

[forkedtongue]

Again....Not babies, again not true, again your fallacy crap doesn't apply if it's relevant to what I said, which is your disregard for forum topic and my only guess as to your logic in trolling all the posts I came across last night acting like a mod yelling about people making more than one thread which I have a feeling if I went back and looked were probably in different subforums, but since you seem to spew your veteran knowledge on every subforum, I guess it's double posting because you read it more than once.

I don't care about your opinion, I never asked for it, and I put zero value in it. I am done posting here I just want to point out that you need to ask your instructor to re explain how to use fallacies on the interest and that again your comment about breeders pertaining to the ones you listed were inaccurate.

[forkedtongue]

Heat tape to cover 1/3 of the enclosure. Take your measurements on length and divide by three. If its a bit bigger or smaller, but not much, then I would say no big deal.

Thanks, I'll give it a glance over when I get back home. If nothing else I'll strip the larger snake racks and reuse the 3 inch for baby racks and put 6 inch on the big guys

[Mikoh4792]

Again....Not babies, again not true, again your fallacy crap doesn't apply if it's relevant to what I said, which is your disregard for forum topic and my only guess as to your logic in trolling all the posts I came across last night acting like a mod yelling about people making more than one thread which I have a feeling if I went back and looked were probably in different subforums, but since you seem to spew your veteran knowledge on every subforum, I guess it's double posting because you read it more than once.

What are you going off about? What is this "fallacy crap" you speak of? I didn't make a post yesterday about double posting. You are making assumptions about my posts on other forums without any proof to back it up. Hypocritical considering you asked me for proof before.

I don't care about your opinion, I never asked for it, and I put zero value in it. I am done posting here I just want to point out that you need to ask your instructor to re explain how to use fallacies on the interest and that again your comment about breeders pertaining to the ones you listed were inaccurate.

I don't care that you don't care, but I'll still give my input because I'm allowed to. If you don't like it you'll need to deal with it because I will continue to do what I do.

I don't know what your obsession with fallacies are.

[Terranaut]

Well well....nice thread.
The original on topic response was a great answer.
It was mentioned how that tub was ok for smaller snakes at first and not condemned to being to small for larger snakes. So why di you take it there then freak out at the responses? On a public forum many threads drift but still have valuable discussion. This is not the case here. I also agree bigger is better for enclosures. Just my opinion and my snakes seem to react positively when in larger cages.
Please try not to over react next time. The advice given was in good faith and meant for discussion not argument.

[Mikoh4792]

Please try not to over react next time. The advice given was in good faith and meant for discussion not argument.

This is what I am getting at. I'm just trying to have discussions. We can agree or disagree, but we can still have civil conversation.

[revent]

I have a 41 qt bin rack with 3 inch flexwatt set up as bottom heat. But since it snakes through the rack in sorta an s shape its kinda top heat also. I keep hides in the back and the whole inside of the his gets nice and toasty and outside of the hides the heat gradually reduces to about 10 degrees lower at the end of the bins.

[millertime89]

I do 1/4 of the enclosure for coverage with flexwatt. I heat my snake room to 78 so I only have to use it as a supplemental hotspot so I can get away running a little less than someone that keeps the room with their snakes cooler.