Mandarin rat snake

[reptiledude987]

I'm considering adding one of these guys to my collection but am getting conflicting info on care sheets and wondering if anyone here with expierence with them could clairify.

Some care sheets were saying no heat source is required and average household temps of 70-75 is fine due to their locality. However others were saying to have a warm and cool side with similar temps to most colubrids. Anyone know the ideal conditions for these guys or is it a variable based on their regional locality?

Also any other husbandry tips for them would be great.

Thanks in advance :freakedout:

[Charis]

We keep ours similar to most other colubrids with a humid hide and they seem to do well that way. However, if you check out the conditions for their natural habitat, their range is huge, you will see temps and avarege humidity vary widely! That's probably why the difference in the care sheets, the people writing them probably had the best success with one method or another depending on where the first imports they got came from.

So my advice is to find an established breeder to buy from and set up how the breeder has theirs.

[jjhill001]

I do know when they first started keeping these they had a high mortality rate (similar to other Asian rat snakes) they can be kept similar to American rats but they aren't as tolerant of the high 80's low 90's temps some people keep their American Rats at. I'd say it's probably best to just ask a breeder what they do. It's probable that they just lowered their overall colubrid collection's temps in order to keep them.

[IW17]

I keep just about all Asian colubrids low 80's warm side, room temp cool side. You might get away with no supplemental heat if you room stays in the mid 70's, but I know all of mine like the heat after eating.

[reptiledude987]

Ok cool thanks for the tips guys