AnimalPlastics A20 Cage

[riddick07]

I was looking into getting this cage for my one chinese beauty. The cage is 48wx24dx36h. I'm looking at the options and it has internal heat shroud as one. I've never had a cage with so much height so I'm not sure if the under does the job by itself. Would I need the shroud or do these cages keep okay temps with just the belly heat?

[IW17]

It might be OK. Most beauty snakes are perfectly fine living with ambient temps in the 70's. As long as your room doesn't get colder than this and you have belly heat in the low 80's for digestion I wouldn't see a reason why this wouldn't be perfect. I'm actually looking at this same enclosure for my Taiwan beauty. Humidity is much more detrimental to beauty snakes than heat in my opinion. If I had a room that stayed in the upper 70's I would even experiment with no supplemental heating. Just make sure your humidity stays over 60% and your perfect.

[riddick07]

The house is always around 74 because two out of three are complete wimps when it comes to the cold. My room is around 78 right now so I would be one of those wimps.

I will be buying one of these then without the shroud. What substrate do you use for your beauty? My adults humidity isn't working with what I have so I ordered coco husk to try. The little one does fine since she has such a small enclosure it is easy to get the higher humidity.

[IW17]

I use cypress mulch/topsoil blend. Just make sure it's organic. Both are fine on their own as well. That being said it's almost impossible to get belly heat through this substrate. A radiant heat panel would be a better option. But with your room already being 78 I would give it a basking platform and use that for your hot spot. Trying to create a hot spot on the ground in a three foot tall enclosure would almost certainly raise your ambient temps too high using any overhead heating options. That being said heat panels are great. I've got two and I'm saving up to use them in all my enclosures.

[riddick07]

Just looked up the radiant heat panels and I'm liking them as an option too. My temps only tend to get that high in the winter and tend to stay close to low 70s in the summer. So I'm guessing I might need the cage to have two options to switch back and forth as the seasons change and I change the temps in the room.

[reptiledude987]

I personally really like the heat panels. with them on a tstat and timer theyre great to regulate temp and make any changes when breeding season comes around. I use them for my carpet pythons.