Thursday 28 November 2013

Rack city.

Hi, thought I would share an update here on the blog.  This update is going to show the racking system that I use to house my royal pythons as well as my corn snakes.  Snake racks are ideal in my opinion for housing larger quantities of snakes in a relatively small area, without compromising on their husbandry, or quality of life.  I decided to go down the hand built option of racking opposed to the professionally made version.  The reason for this is primarily the fact that when I was looking to buy a rack I was a university student, so funds were tight to say the least.  In total I would estimate the total cost to be around £240, which is not too excessive for a 9 bay rack.  Also the furniture in my bedroom (more like a snake room with a bed in) is white, so I didn't want to alter the feng shui of my room.  I enjoyed building my rack and I am happy with the result, pretty nifty looking if I must say so myself.

Each level is heated with a heat mat covering 1/3 of the shelf in order to provide a thermal gradient for the snake to thermo regulate. Underneath each mat is reflective aluminium tape to increase the transmission of heat from the mat to the tub.  I have the mats connected to a pulse proportional thermostat to control temperatures.  I find that a pulse stat keeps the temperature in the tubs within 0.5c of one another.  All the materials used to build the frame of the rack are from Ikea.  I used the Ikea Pax wardrobe frame, as well as Pax shelves for the skeleton of the rack.  The tubs used for the snakes enclosures are the largest size Komplent tubs.  Simply because it gave them the largest amount of floor space.  In all honesty I am happy with how the rack turned out, the tubs slide in and out with no drag or excess resistance, the airflow through the tubs is decent, and there is a large surface area for the animals to use.  I have had no health issues, e.g. R.I, mites etc. or problem feeders since using this rack, and I have had multiple locks between snakes, implying that they are all healthy and doing well since being moved in to their new homes.  Here is a peek inside one of the tubs to show how I decorate them. It also shows that when using a racking system the tubs don't have to just be a water bowl and a couple of hides.  This enclosure is for Dot, my female corn snake. 












Finally, you can find a link to a guide showing how I went about building my snake rack, as well as little tips I used in order to help me along the way.   Click here for the guide, not bad for a guy who struggles with DIY.

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