Green Tree Python Heat & Humidity Information

So unless you live in a tropical jungle you are going to need to provide supplemental heat and humidity for your GTP. The thing to remember is that both of these things have two basic factors - power and control. Power refers to how much differential you can expect a unit to produce, so an under tank heater that can only increase the internal cage temperature by 8-10 degrees would be said to be low power and a 150 watt ceramic heat emitter which can increase the cage temps by 50-60 degrees is a high power unit. Control refers to the ability to keep environmental factors within a certain range - this is impacted not just by the quality of your vents and thermostats but the inherent properties of your cage. The reptile cage is a dynamic environment where conditions are always changing - we have found that working with nature and trying to enhance the natural way weather swings is a much more effective strategy than trying to stop external factors - work with mother nature, don't fight her.

Heat Sources

There are two basic heat types - baseline and hot spot. Baseline heat is best thought of as a background heat that is steady and almost always on, while hot spot heat is that one super warm spot.

Electrical Resistance

The most basic heating elements are flexwatt and under tank heaters, which are really the same thing. Simple solid state design these units offer a good low power source of background heat. They all basically work the same way an electric blanket does, electricity is converted to heat through resistance. They come in a wide array of sizes (watts) and there are lots of manufacturers. When using one of these you need to think about how you'll apply it to your cage and how well it will work based on other choices....so a thick glass fish tank in which you were planning to have a thick layer of substrate would not be the best in terms of heat transmission. There are some heat mats designed to go inside a cage but they aren't cheap and are best at providing "belly heat" which doesn't really apply since GTP's are almost always perched.

Incandescent Bulbs

The good old basic light bulb is cheap, simple, and comes in a variety of wattages. "Black" (purple) bulbs can be used for heating with an incandescent bulb at night. There are a wide array of reptile specific bulbs but those are all designed to produce specific colors and light "temperatures" (not the same as heat temperature at all) - and basically they are a waste of money for GTP's. You need to put an incandescent bulb in a fixture which must be physically separated from the animal (typically placed on top of the cage). You also need to make sure the fixture you are using is properly rated for the wattage of bulb you want to use - don't screw around on this point, you can cause a fire.

The problem with incandescent bulbs is that they become part of the day/night cycle - so you end up needing two fixtures (one day and one night) to fix the issue.

Ceramic Heat Emitters

Light bulbs that emit no light - these screw into a regular light socket but they are not bulbs, they are ceramic elements that create heat using electrical resistance. They are super efficient and can generate huge amounts of heat - they cost ten times more than an incandescent bulb but they last 20 times as long. Ceramic heat emitters provide a very "penetrating" type heat which is good for animal health. There are several manufacturers and we haven't found that any one of them is that much better than the other. The thing with ceramic heat emitters is that they can generate a tremendous amount of heat, so the fixture you use must be able to handle it. Generally speaking that means a porcelain socket and a nice aluminum reflector. Just like incandescent lights these need to be placed outside of the cage so the animal is protected from being burned.

Radiant Heat Panels

Radiant heat panels are similar to ceramic heat emitters in the way that they work but they are thin squares that are self contained units. The nice thing about radiant heat panels is that they can actually serve as the only heat source in your cage because they can provide both a hot spot and background heat with just the one heater. We're big fans of this type of heater because they are definitely the least expensive way to heat your cage, they can be mounted inside the cage as they won't burn an animal (safe to the touch) which helps with humidity issues, and they are the longest lasting of any heat system with units typically giving 25+ years of service life. In addition they provide a penetrating heat which is best for animal health.

Heat Controllers

There are some "heat controllers" on the market which are actually just dimmers or rheostats. These units just restrict the electricity that is flowing to your heater, the same way you dim a bulb in your living room. They do not sense temperature in any way - while a bit better than just plugging a heat source in with no control at all we do not not consider dimmers or rheostats to be heat controllers, don't use them.

A thermostat on the other hand always has a probe, which is where the temperature is measured. These units turn your heat source on and off in response to the actual temperature in the cage which is what you want to control the environment. Thermostats come in two basic flavors - digital and analog.

Analog thermostats are pretty simple and work well, we have used a bunch of these and they have served us well - $33.

We mostly use digital Ranco controllers and have been quite pleased with them – they run about $100. They are used in all sorts of applications and are are also the controller of choice for saltwater fish tanks. If you get your cage from Boaphile Plastics or Freedom Breeder you'll get a Ranco controller.

While the Ranco unit is a good proportional thermostat if you want to breed you'll want different temperatures in the daytime and the night time. We manually turn our cage temps up each morning and down each night, which also gives us a good opportunity to check on the creatures but you may want to automate this - and if you do you'll need a controller that supports a "night time drop". Helix is the old standby in this category and they do make a nice unit - it used to be that they really had a superior product but lots of folks make units that are as good as a Helix these days. The Herp Power is the least expensive unit we know of that supports night drop, it is analog but a really nice piece of gear for $120.

No matter how good your controls are never trust them - always use gauges and check your temps regularly. Thermostats can fail open (heat always on, cooked reptile) or off (frozen critter) - every brand and type of controller can and does fail. You also want to make sure that the thermostat you are using has sufficient capacity - 500 watts of heaters plugged into a 300W max thermostat will fritz.

Generally speaking we like a hot spot in the 88-90 range during the daytime and nighttime temp of about 85 for babies. Adults get the same sort of hot spot and night time temps that are a few degrees lower than the young ones. Despite what you may read chondros really never need to be above 90 unless they are ill.

Breeding is another matter but a chondro kept at eighty five degrees all the time is going to be happy. One thing to be aware of is that GTP's don't thermoregulate the same way other reptiles do - given a choice between a comfy perch and temps that are too low a Green Tree Python will choose to stay cold every time.

Lights and Light Cycle

Let's start with the biggest misconception about lights - there is no evidence that snakes require full spectrum lighting the way lizards do. Lots of folks - including Spruce Nubble Farm - use full spectrum lights but all they do is make the snakes look better.

Generally speaking you want the "lights" to be on for 12 hours and off for 12. This is easily done with a timer which is a simple and inexpensive item you can get at any hardware or big box store for less than $10. All you need is a basic florescent strip light, an 18" fixture with bulb is usually about $15 at that same hardware or big box store.

Light cycle is important for all animals - without a clear day night cycle animals become sleep deprived which can lead to all sorts of nasty problems. For a nocturnal animal like a GTP the day/night cycle is even more important - try to avoid "shocking" your GTP by turning on room lights at night time when the cage is dark. Remember that if you want to do so you can adjust the timer so that your GTP's "night" beings well after you are done watching TV for the evening.

Light cycle is one of the things we adjust to prepare Green Tree Pythons to breed but generally speaking a 12 hours on 12 hours off cycle is fine to use all of the time.

Gauges

We've heard it all: My cage is about mid 80's or so , seems warm in there to me, I'm sure everything is fine - DON'T GUESS ABOUT TEMPERTURES OR HUMIDITY LEVELS, YOU MUST USE GAUGES.

Analog is acceptable and almost never breaks or goes dead. Fancy digital (get the dual probe so the unit itself can be outside the cage) is what lots of folks like to use. Deluxe is a Non Contact Temp Gun, best price is usually on ebay (but you still need gauges) and you want a RayTek - they start from like $75. Never depend on the controller to be accurate - always use a secondary gauge. I have many electronic thermostats set to 90 degrees or 78 degrees to achieve 85 in the middle of the cage.

The big difference with GTP's is that you shouldn't really believe them - most snakes thermoregulate aggressively and if they are always under the heat lamp it is too cold or always in the cold end it is too hot - not as true with these guys. You want some gradient but not a heck of a lot - keep everything steady and stable around 85 degrees with a hot spot of only a few degrees warmer.

Humidity, Misting, and Water

If you've ever been to a tropical jungle you know how it works - round about three or four in the afternoon the sky opens up and it pours rain for about 5 minutes and then it is suddenly sunny again.

This "flood and dry" is exactly what we want to have happen in the GTP cage - as in condensation on the glass daily (90-100%) and then over the next day drying out to about 50%. The glass should be foggy within a half hour of misting and should be dry when you go to mist the next time. Adjustable cage vents should help you control this. A low tech "adjustable cage vent" is a piece of aluminum foil or hard plastic on top of the screen.

We have a bunch of these and like them. Any basic empty spray bottle from a big box store will work just fine. We spray our young ones every 2-3 days but our tubs are pretty well sealed, so humidity is maintained. We spray adults daily. Spray the animal until it is wet and then spray the enclosure walls/substrate.

A word about automated systems - they do work well and are nice as they support the go on vacation vibe of a snake not the feed every day vibe of a dog BUT they have a great tendency to cause people to not observe their animals which is why we don't use them. The daily spraying is our chance to take a good look at each creature and observe carefully. That being said there are plenty of people with auto systems that observe daily I have just found I'm not one of them. A good single cage system can be found here.

Don't forget your house humidity will change dramatically over the year - typical forced hot air heat house in February is very dry but the same house in summer can be wet unless AC is used which sucks water out of the air like mad, so keep your eye on those gauges!

Better to be a bit too wet with the little guys than too dry. Too dry problems - shedding issues, off feed/not as aggressive - serious problem health wise fast and a bad shed left with no help usually kills a youngster. Too wet problems - mold, skin fungus/rot type problems, loose looking stools - usually easily fixable and rarely a fatal error.