How often do you clean?

Lefitte · 09-24-15, 10:13 PM

Hey, pretty straight forward here. I'm trying to get a feel of how often everyone does a full large cleaning on their tanks. I dont mean a spot cleaning for poop or cleaning the water dishes and hides and such but a full clean that includes all that and replacing the substrate. I have both a desert species with aspen chips and a tropical species with moss. Both of my snakes are young and small in large cages so it's a bit hard to find their poops. There hasnt been any mold.

So do you do it on a strict schedule? Every month, two months, six months?
Or do you do it by sight, feel, smell depending on when you feel the need to do it? Before this, I used newspaper so it was very easy to throw away full dirty sections and switch out. There is so mucb substrate now that it seems like a waste to dump it all out until I'm sure I need to.

Georgia · 09-24-15, 11:36 PM

I use bioactive setup...so I clean about every 3 years.

serpentgirl123 · 09-24-15, 11:37 PM

Since I use paper towels and unprinted newspaper, it isn't costly for me to throw away the substrate. I do a full cleaning usually once every 1-3 months depending on the size of the enclosure/tub and how "smelly/dirty" it is.

With the rack tubs, I have 2-5 extra tubs per rack system, so I take the dirty one out, wash and disinfect it, replace with a clean and dry one, and let the newly cleaned one dry out. I found this method a lot easier and cost effective than wasting paper towels and 10-30minutes trying to dry the just cleaned tub. The large enclosures, I can't do that with, so they are on a 2-3monthly cleaning.

trailblazer295 · 09-25-15, 02:52 AM

I do mine every 4-6 weeks. Not a set to the day schedule but feel better doing a full cleaning. Spot cleaning is good but doesn't mean won't have bacteria spread beyond what you scoop. So I'll disinfect decor and change substrate.

Jim Smith · 09-25-15, 06:06 AM

I use SaniChips which do a good job of "clumping" urates and feces, therefor I do a complete cleaning including washing with bleach/water solution about every 3-4 months.

MDT · 09-25-15, 06:18 AM

I use these: Disposable Cage Liners Inc. ,

I clean (change liner) whenever they take a big 'ol poo. If it's small or not a sig amt of liquid associated w it, I'll remove waste and leave liner in place until the "revenge bomb" occurs.

Usually about every 7-10 days.

Sylphie · 09-25-15, 07:14 AM

Hmm recently it's every time I'm moving my snakes to the new vivs, as they are all growing and need bigger setups. Or when we decide to make a new project... I'm going partly bio-active (soil, live plants, plant pot bugs... I always forget how they are called, but I don't put there any other bugs, so it's not fully bio-active like some) so I'm just spot cleaning when I don't mess with the design.

Wingbeats · 09-25-15, 10:17 AM

I full-clean whenever my cypress mulch substrate starts looking too "mushy" - which is about once a month. Due to the super high humidity of a rainbow boa enclosure, it gets swampy in there if I leave it to long!

(I hunt for snake poos once a day, since mold grows immediately on those haha)

reptiledude987 · 09-25-15, 10:22 AM

I do daily spot cleanings then a full sanitizatization every 4-6 weeks.

prairiepanda · 09-25-15, 11:16 AM

It depends on how messy the individual is. None of the species I keep requires high humidity, so they can usually go quite a while without a full cleaning. I'm using shredded newspaper as bedding, and when the depth of the bedding gets too low from spot cleaning(I often have to remove large handfulls of paper along with poop etc.) I just add more. In most cases I do a full cleaning every 2 to 3 months. The water dish poopers can sometimes go longer because no poop gets on the plastic or paper. But there are also some who need a full cleaning every month or sometimes even more because they smear poop everywhere.

A full cleaning is easy, though. It might get more difficult when I start moving my snakes into nice display enclosures, but they're all in bins right now. I have a couple spare bins, so when it comes time to clean someone's enclosure I prepare a fresh bin with everything and put the snake straight into that bin so that it won't have to wait somewhere for me to clean. I then empty, clean, and sterilize the old bin so that it has time to air out and can be used for the next time I clean a bin. Whole process takes around 15 minutes each time.

trailblazer295 · 09-25-15, 11:30 AM

I'll add when I'm doing a full cleaning my snake is in a rubbermaid with a towel substrate and a hide. It doesn't take that long to do a full cleaning on a PVC cage. If you had a massive cage then maybe but 4x2 isn't that hard to scoop the cypress out and spray down and wipe everything.

reptiledude987 · 09-25-15, 02:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by trailblazer295

I'll add when I'm doing a full cleaning my snake is in a rubbermaid with a towel substrate and a hide. It doesn't take that long to do a full cleaning on a PVC cage. If you had a massive cage then maybe but 4x2 isn't that hard to scoop the cypress out and spray down and wipe everything.

This is more of a task with 21 enclosures and substrate gets expensive lol

Albert Clark · 09-25-15, 03:28 PM

I do am and pm spot cleanings of all my tubs. Weekly disinfection also of my garter tubs, water bowls. Unprinted newspaper gets changed prn. My ball python tubs get am and pm spot cleanings with weekly disinfection of tubs and water bowls. Pythons are on unprinted newspaper also with a small lining of carefresh. Every animal is in a rack. Separate racks for pythons.

trailblazer295 · 09-25-15, 04:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reptiledude987

This is more of a task with 21 enclosures and substrate gets expensive lol

Very true but I'm such a baller I can easily handle two. I'm just a high roller like that.

**EL Ziggy** · 09-25-15, 04:59 PM

I spot clean as needed and do a full cage cleaning every 6-8 weeks.