Ball pythons in rubbermaids?!

[Emily-Fisher]

Okay well Pixie brought me to this amazing petstore and showed me the ball pythons there and now I am even more obsessed!! However, I would like to keep the snake in a large rubbermaid storage box for the first one or two years of his life but <b>What do I do to heat the rubbermaid?!</b> Do I stick the heatpad dirrectly onto the rubbermaid container or would it melt the plastic? So basically my question is how do I give a baby BP the proper heating in a rubbermaid conainer? Thanks in advance! -Emily

[tHeGiNo]

Yes, you will want to use a heat pad. However, this will require a rheostat to control temperatures; its pretty easy to make one.

[BallPython13]

im doing the same

[Big Mike]

This questions seems to come up quite a bit.

First, you don't need to stick the UTH to the Rubbermaid. Just put the UTH on the shelf (table, desk etc) and put the Rubbermaid on top.

The UTH will need to be controlled, as always.

The temps required for ball pythons (most snakes for that matter) is less than 90. I don't know what temp will melt plastic but I sure that it's a lot higher than that. If a rubbermaid did melt then the snake inside would probably be long since dead.

Definately go with the Rubbermaid, they make great homes for balls because they hold humidity very well.

Good Luck

[Colonel SB]

I do the smae as Big Mike, I have a shelf system where the heat tape is on the bottom of the shelf and the cages are placed on top.

[BallPython13]

heat it with heat tape,lay a few pieces of it under the rm.