Enclosure Size

[DDW]

So I'm looking into doing my own rack system and trying to determine the size of the tubs I'm going to use. I'll be housing multiple species in this so I can't specify which other than that these are terrestrial species.

I remember seeing that the snakes overall length should be no larger than the enclosure's perimeter. Is this correct?

If that is not a good reference, what would be a good indication on how large the enclosure should be on the base?

That's all. Thanks.

[Pythonguy1]

Enclosure length should be half the size of the snake.
As a general rule of the floor space is you go one square foot for every foot of snake.
Example: an 8 foot black headed python gets an enclosure 2x4 foot. And a 5 foot spotted python gets an enclosure 2x2.5 foot.

[DDW]

Enclosure length should be half the size of the snake.
As a general rule of the floor space is you go one square foot for every foot of snake.
Example: an 8 foot black headed python gets an enclosure 2x4 foot. And a 5 foot spotted python gets an enclosure 2x2.5 foot.

Thank you so much! This will definitely help me out.

[DDW]

I just had an interesting thought. I'm having problems finding the size of tubs I need for my design but... if I house say, ball pythons or speckled kings in these, could I put together multi-level tubs and count it to the floor space? Like have a warm level on the bottom and a cool level on the top like a little condo thing. Would that be... okay?

[Pythonguy1]

As long as the length of the tub isn't too far from half the length of the snake and only half of the floor is heated then it should OK to have two levels.
I don't know a ton about ball pythons and kings, but they don't get too big and will spend time climbing here and there so two levels should work.

Good luck mate!

[DDW]

Thank you! I have some crafting to do :D

[Pythonguy1]

Cheers mate!

[toddnbecka]

I built a rack from plastic shelving units. The back is a sheet of plywood, with 2 very wide strips of heat tape running down to the bottom. It will hold either 2 Sterilite sweater box tubs or one of the larger (double the size of the sweater box tubs) on each shelf. I simply went with the locally available tubs and spaced the shelves to fit those. Actually didn't plan on using the larger tubs initially, was pleasantly surprised to find that they fit so well. When my Dominican red mountain boas drop their litters I house the neonates in shoe box tub racks, then move them into the sweater box tubs when they reach a year old. After 2 years they are moved into the double wide tubs.

[DDW]

Thanks for the info!