Quote:
Originally Posted by chairman
That all said, providing a gradient with a cool side, warm side, and hot spot is considerably more "idiot proof" than aiming to maintain one temperature. The gradient allows the animal to do all the work, induce fevers, etc. Using a single temperature approach is probably something that should only be done by experienced keepers for established animals. If I used a single temp approach I certainly wouldn't use it in quarantine, let those new animals that I don't know yet combat whatever they need to.
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Really interesting stuff with the tortoises.
I have to agree pretty heartily with this last paragraph. I probably should have put a disclaimer in the beginning of my post that the theory in general is not something that a beginner should be going off of, especially if they don't have a lot of knowledge of how snakes act. I don't necessarily think it's a horrible thing for a beginner keeper to tighten up the temps in the various "zones" of the terrarium.
People on this forum haven't heard much about how I actually keep my snakes except for a few people that have actually PM'd me for advice on specific issues. I know one keeper on this forum keeps all of his snakes with ceramic heat emitters and I believe UVB lights as well, I'm not gonna mention any usernames because stuff like this has become controversial and quite frankly if he wants dragged into the discussion he'll show up lol.
There really is something to be said of experience. When I was a new keeper I thought I knew everything because I had read so much and done so much research, I never thought that in practice the rules sometimes go out the window (anyone remember back when people said mealworms would eat a lizard from the inside?) lol. I would give advice on random animals even though I only really kept frogs at the time. I think a lot of new keepers who do research on tons of animals prior to picking a specific one can end up doing this especially back when I was young and the internet was just so new lol.
Nowadays I try to the best of my ability to avoid talking with any sort of authority on something I haven't had experience with. My snake experience has been limited to colubrids, corns, rats, kings, gophers, garters, and a water snake for a week or two when I was a kid before my mom found out I had it (I told her my leopard frog would eat the feeder fish I bought). I worked at a pet store as a teen, but I've found that they don't let a kid take much of an active part in the actual care of the animals apart from cleaning up poop and scrubbing algae off of fish tanks. The only time I'll offer up information on something is if there aren't any replies and I feel as if my experience with other reptiles would help, mostly common sense, or "here's what I'd try" type stuff.
I'll tell you right now that if I'm ever going to consider buying a ball python the first person I'm PMing is Aaron_S. The link is right in the signature to see they are keeping some BEAUTIFUL animals. What's he doing, why? what are his conditions like where he's living, my situation is this what would you do if yours was similar etc. If I'm asking for advice on larger enclosures I'm asking dannybgoode.
Beginners who may have read this far, I can say that having resources like the ones mentioned above and others, finding people who you can trust and bother even taking the time is what makes this community so special. You don't see the mega breeders on here helping people out, just other keepers and maybe some smaller breeders who take the time out of their day to help others, discuss the animals we love so much and quite frankly give a crap about some random pet that might be 1000's of miles away.
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