new rtb owner

[shannonmcfarland]

hi everyone! i just got my very first rtb this week. its living at my bf's apt since my mom told me that she couldn't sleep if there was a snake in the house. he's a veteran snake owner who used to work at a pet store so i hope he's (she's?) in good hands. i'll post some pics when i get a chance. any new snake owner advice that anyone can offer is definately appriciated. thanks.

[Stormyva]

Welcome to the site!
Cant wait to see the pics

[Ed_r]

Hopfully your going to be on good long term relationship with the b/f. Probably would have been better off the check with mom before you bought the snake. But the damage is done. Hopefully he IS a good experience keeper, and all goes well.

Welcome to the site!!!

Oh yeah definately pics please.

[reptigirl04]

Welcome to the site!
It'd be great to hear about the setup and any lighting/heating you have for the snake...Of course, that could be done with a pic too.

[Shuba]

In order to make it easier for my self, Im going to give you a link to a thread I talked about earlier. I am explaining to someone how to manage an RTB setup and I go over heating,lighting and all that. I also have a link to ANOTHER thread which shows pictures of an enclosure I made out of a rubbermaid container. Check it out

http://www.redtailboa.net/index.php?...wtopic&t=17299

[toker]

Welcome to the site!!

Congrats on your new baby... please do post pictures when you get a chance

[shannonmcfarland]

thanks shuba for the thread...very informative. as for setup, right now he's in a 30gal aquarium with a mesh top (and i found out the hard way that i have to keep something heavy on top of the lid if i don't want him roaming the apt). there's a heating pad underneath it and a 75watt halogen lamp on top. he has a water dish and papertowels covering the floor. right now he doesn't have any hiding place. i noticed from several posts that people say that a hiding place is important. should i get him one? also, i saw on the thread link something bout misting. should i do this? and how?

ps-still working on the pics

[Shuba]

right now he doesn't have any hiding place

You should try making/buying him a hiding place. Especialy that he is new he will want a place to feel secure. W/o a proper retreat your snake might become stressed and the uncommon in redtails might happen -- they wont eat!..You can make a homeade hide out of anytype of small container box with a little whole cut in so he can enter.

i saw on the thread link something bout misting. should i do this? and how?

Misting helps provide the humidty in the cage so that the snake feels more like in its natural habitat. For a RTB you can provide a humidty level at 50-70%.. You can maintain these levels with a humidty gage which you can buy at any petstore which will tell you the amount of humidity in your enclosure. Since you are using a mesh top it will be hard to maintain humidity w/o it escaping. Place cloth towels on half of the enclosure so the humidty stays inside the cage.

there's a heating pad underneath

Since you are using paper towels, I reccomend switchin to repti carpet/lizard liner/astro turf -- some type of durable substrate. From my own expirence I have noticed snakes like to crawl under the paper towels, and since they have no neurological feeling they wont feel a burn. Direct contact with a heating pad can be pretty bad. Another option is that you can go to home depot and buy a huge bag of cypress mulch for about $2.00 - $3.00 and layer it over the paper towels. A heating pad under the cypress mulch will make the mulch nice and warm for perfect belly heat (which is important because w/o proper belly heat your snake risks regurgitation)