ok this heat thing...?

[akane]

I thought this part was simple. I keep seeing temps mentioned and I put in my UTH but decided it might not be enough so I left a 50w bulb pointed at a brick on the edge of the UTH to expand the heated area while still trying to get the heat underneath her and then used the behavior of my snake as a guide. I got a thermometer/hygrometer and stuck it on the lower back center like it seemed to be designed for. I was planning to get another thermometer so can do both ends. Local supplies are limited and overpriced so I've been 2 day shipping from amazon and making do. Anyway the reading of the glass is apparently 50F when the room is 68F and it was reading 60s before I put it in.

So how are all these temps measured that I see and how do you get an accurate reading if I put in a thermostat? The ambient temp is not going to make 75-90F with ventilation. Are all thermostats and thermometers on the floor of the tank? Someone said they just stick theirs directly in the sand. Right now it's flat newspaper but I'm moving her to bedding with the next change.

[Andy_G]

Get a temp gun to measure the temps instantly. Also use digital thermometers to observe ongoing temps because those stick on thermometers are garbage and very inaccurate. You want to measure where the snake is, not on the side of the tank, so it would be more correct to put the thermometer right on/in the substrate.

[akane]

From previous hedgehog raising I've got some weather digital thermometers meant to be used to keep track of multiple rooms and outdoors and they connect to a station that will wirelessly read all of them. Now if only I knew where they were because that was 2 moves ago. Even replacing them is a whole lot cheaper than the ones in the reptile section. $30 thermometers that were nothing fancy.

[Andy_G]

As soon as a snake or lizard is on the packaging the price goes up!

FYI, you can get some pretty awesome temp guns for $30.00 or less from a hardware store, too.