cage ideas

[redtails]

Well...my rock pythons are growing and soon will be too big for their rubbermaid tubs. I'm thinking of a couple ideas for housing them.

First is an idea I've had since I was a kid, make a bunk bed/cage! I can put a queen/king matress on top of 2 cages of same size, maybe even divided(4 total) and if necessary, a plexi/lexan sofa with clear plastic cushions and of course the snake in there. That saves a bunch of space and also make a neat entertainment piece for the room.



The second would be a normal stack of 8'x2.5'x1.5' plywood cages, 4 in total. This would be a nice wall sized feature with ease of cleaning compared to the bed idea, but not as attractive.

What do you think I should do? No hurry, my biggest still fits in a sweaterbox for like 6 months more.

[bpkid]

If you make the bunkbed, aren't you afraid of falling through or damaging the roof of the snakes? Maybe you should just build the cages.

[DaemoNox]

I've seen cages like that for sale before; personally I'd just stick with cages. Like said the weight thing would be the biggest issue with the bed.

[redtails]

Good point. It'll have 2x4's or 2x6's as a frame including reinforcing the top. Plus I'm only 140.

[-okapi-]

Bed idea is great! Ive actually got a similar idea for my bed: its a super twin (36in wide by 72in long). I would have it with a 55 gallon for the head and the foot of the bed, one side open for me to get in, and the other side be a 10 inch wide shelf with cubby holes to keep books, a cup of water, and an alarm clock. Then under the bed would be a one tub tall rack with a few tubs for mealworm cultures. It will be cool!

[redtails]

Sounds cool okapi. Good luck with that.

My bed right now is 71" wide by 72" long. It's going to be a pain to clean, but with big snakes you can't exactly put them in tubs all their lives. AZ Reptile Center has a 14', 150lb burm in a cage about that size(about 2 feet longer) and it looks like plenty of space, even if they end up close to 20' and 200lbs.

[fhayden]

My opinion from experience is the bunkbed sounds cool but in the end you'll end up using a cage anyway. Atleast you'll have fun for a shory will. Large snakes grow fast. Simply put a bunkbed type cage isn't practical. Why? For one, are you going to want to get on your knees and clean the cage when needed. Second, big snakes make big ****. It isn't going to be cool to sleep above a big snake when it takes a **** at 3 am when your sleeping. You won't be having sweet dreams for long. Besides that temps rise and keeping that big snake warm is going to be difficult. Snakes require correct temps to digest. I wonder how you'll feel when in the middle of the night you hear your snake deficate diahrea from a not properly digested jumbo rat or rabbit. I've kept giant snakes before and it's like keeping an elephant as a pet. You'll know what I mean soon enough. Anyone that's kept large snakes know exactly what I mean..lol.

Oh yeah, I hope you like sleeping with creepy crawlers because every long term herper has experienced mites. If your snake ever gets mites you'll have them crawling all over your bed and YOU.

Frank

[redtails]

Some good thoughts. I'm going for the regular cages as of late anyways. The big concern I didn't think about was the temps. I do live in Arizona, so I'm used to hot weather, but I just can't sleep above a hot cage without tossing and turning all night, which would eventually lead to a collapse nomatter how reinforced it is. And the mite problem, I used to have a florida integrade king that came with mites and even across the room I would wake up with rashes all over from those darn things. Took like 3 months to get rid of them.

I do however still need a little help. I don't know whether to do 2.5' wide or 3' wide cages. I don't have space in a 1-bedroom to put 4' cages all over. I origionally thought 2.5' would be perfect leaving 1.5' pieces for height as the boards are usually 4x8. I did however read and partially agree with a post somewhere that 2.5' might be a little small especially for large females as they can't coil comfortably. I had a 7' burm in a 6x2.5 cage and she seemed like she could double in size comfortably and still have a perfect bun, but not triple, which is about the size I hope my females to get. My local reptile store(2nd closest actually) has a huge burm in a 10x4 or 5' cage and that thing never coils, she mostly does a triple fold and lays like that, like she was used to a skinny cage even though she's been in that thing since she was under 10'. I might just do the 2.5's and when they get over 14' or too big for them, build some more that are also taller and keep those for transitionals sectioned into double units as I will be breeding them soon.