My Jungle Boas Terrarium Setup

[Mikoh4792]

Originally Posted by smy_749

If you cover the whole top with a custom fit glass top that doesn't allow moisture to escape....? Not advising that tanks are the best way to keep an animal, but covering the top sufficiently and sides for security....

Adding onto this, I know light bulbs dry the air out, but wouldn't using an UTH with the screen top covered be okay?

[B_Aller]

Originally Posted by smy_749

If you cover the whole top with a custom fit glass top that doesn't allow moisture to escape....? Not advising that tanks are the best way to keep an animal, but covering the top sufficiently and sides for security....

Sorry, not sold. Tanks can be used as a stop gap solution but need to be phased out completely as they are not designed to house reptiles.
WE always stress that lights need to be INSIDE of the enclosure to allow for maximum use of heat and to limit loss of both heat and humidity.
Also most top opening enclosures let all accumulated heat and humidity out when opened. Plus the vents on the hood of the lights speed up convection around the lights, accelerating humidity loss. Yes, you lose heat and humidity opening from the front but not nearly as much.
Most cover the top with plexi or tin foil and leave a round opening just bigger than the light, so where you need it the most you are losing heat, again, taking humidity with it.
Generally when you build an enclosure you will have ventilation around doors, windows, gaps here and there etc. So you do have air exchange and some limited ventilation, but not total loss of humidity.
My whole point of being here is to try and bring up these realities and get some conversation going. All the evidence is out there, we need to push NOW for progress and change or we are all going to lose our right to keep these animals. Things need to change, the status quo for keeping reptiles is torture. There is a better way and people are doing it, just not most people, so we need to take every opportunity to get the party started.
Most reptiles are housed in a manner where they are physically unable to breed! Imagine if you kept a dog or cat in conditions that didn't even allow them to breed, you'd go to jail.

This is not intended to reflect on any one person or the o.p, just trying to shake it up a bit.
Thanks.

[B_Aller]

Originally Posted by Mikoh4792

Adding onto this, I know light bulbs dry the air out, but wouldn't using an UTH with the screen top covered be okay?

Yes, there are lots of ways to achieve the proper husbandry parameters, but again, even a covered screen top will let all the heat out when opened. Not to mention the way that top opening enclosures affect behavior. Most reptiles are preyed upon by birds in the wild, so coming in from above can and does(in my opinion) affect behavior.
I've notice a huge change in behavior in my animals when allowed to perch above MY head height. Both snakes and monitors.
Best.

[smy_749]

Fair points

[bigsnakegirl785]

Originally Posted by B_Aller

Absolutely terrible advice.
Screen tops allow all of the necessary humidity to attach to heat and rise out of the enclosure. A "reptile cage" with a screen top is actually the exact same design as a meat dehydrator. Imagine living in a meat dehydrator and what it would do to your internal organs.
Your boas may have been fine short term but this type of antiquated husbandry is PROVEN to cause gout and long term problems.
We need to move this hobby past the 1970's style of keeping. Fish tanks are for fish. Screen tops are a slow death sentence.
What we try to tech people is that holding humidity in an enclosure is just like holding water in a bucket, if you have even a small section of the bottom of your bucket made of screen will it hold water?
Not to mention the waste of money, why pay to heat your enclosure when it all just escapes out of the top?
Thanks.

You said yourself it's ok short-term. OP said it wouldn't stay in there. I said to cover it to keep humidity in. I never once said they should be kept permanently in this set-up. "Most" is not the whole top. Leaving some uncovered will allow for some airflow. Seeing as OP said "for awhile," they may be planning to upgrade to a better enclosure. For now, surely, this set-up will work?

[B_Aller]

Originally Posted by bigsnakegirl785

You said yourself it's ok short-term. OP said it wouldn't stay in there. I said to cover it to keep humidity in. I never once said they should be kept permanently in this set-up. "Most" is not the whole top. Leaving some uncovered will allow for some airflow. Seeing as OP said "for awhile," they may be planning to upgrade to a better enclosure. For now, surely, this set-up will work?

I think you may not have understood my posts.
I said it is O.K to use a tank for a "stop gap" solution not a temporary home.

The whole top of the enclosure should be sealed.
The lights should be INSIDE of the enclosure.
Covering "most" or some" of the top is worthless, see my response to Sam above for the details.
"airflow" is your enemy.
To me this set up is unacceptable because of the screen top.
Thanks.

[LiL Zap]

Great enclosure! I'm a huge fan of the natural look!