new boa ned advice please.

[macaltime]

Hello eveyone here is my first post.

After much thought and research I finally decided to get a RTB. He was very active and playful when I bought him and still is when I handle him. I have a few concerns though.

He is enclosed in a 20 gallon tank for the time being, I'll upgrade the tank in a few months. I decided to go with bark substrate(cedar free). I put on a small UTH (Under Tank Heater). After 2 days I noticed the temp in the tank was stable at only 80 during the day and 75 at night. In an effort to bring this up I bought a clamp lamp that I placed over the screen top, and inserted a 100W heat bulb. It is on the same side as the UTH.

Now my question. The daytime heat temp on the hot side is averaging 95-100 is that far too hot?

I also read the care guides, very helpful, the CHE whould that be that much better than the light I have now as far as controlling the temp?

And finally, If I were to go with the CHE, how do I install that and lights? Is there enough room on top of the fixture? In the care guides Clay emphasized how important it was to provide 12 hours of light and 12 hours of dark. I am missing something here?

Any help that anyone can offer will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance guys!

Brian

[SLAponte]

Re: new boa ned advice please.

Hi and welcome.

First a disclaimer : any time what I say and the care sheets differ, the care sheets are RIGHT and I am full of it.

I keep my Boas in 20L tanks the first 8 to 10 months, they seems ok. Like you, I have an UTH on one side, and then a fixture (on top) with two sockets. On one socket I place a CHE, usually 60W. On the other I have a light, 40W or 60W max. This gets hooked up to a timer (the light side). UTH and CHE are always on, light switches on and off and raises temps some more when on.

Temp wise, I don't get much over 90, or below 80 much. Daytime hot side is about 87, nighttime right about 78 to 80. I think anything above 95 is too hot for the Boa.

Now the people that actually know about all this might want to chime in.

[Blueeheeler]

Re: new boa ned advice please.

Bump!

My husbandry is 86-89 warm 76-80 cool side during the day.

Overnight temps are 80 warm 74 cool.

I have heat tape 11x11 and 1 clamp lamp with a 75 watt black light. For day light cycles I use a flourencet 40 watt fixture.

Hope this helps a little.

[BlackLX306]

Re: new boa ned advice please.

I have two baby boas in a 75..during the day it may peak @ 100 and the cool end is at 85ish. Night time its 82-85.

[Doug]

Re: new boa ned advice please.

HI,
I had smilar problems with some glass tanks,( problems with a forty critter tank) I am planning to take them down in the next month and replace them.
 here's some problems i had and some of the fixes.
 [ftp]http://www.redtailboas.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=board7&action=display&num=10 38532033[/ftp]
  Be sure you have enough humidty, this helps prevent dehydration and bad shed.
  doug