Will a regular light bulb provide sufficient heat to a red tailed boa ?
I recently bought a baby red taield boa (18 inches long) and all i have is a regular lightbulb. Will that provide enough heat for him? If not please help me its my first snake.
Regular light bulbs do not provide a suitable temperature gradient or warmth for a red tail. Really any snake for that matter. Add on to that the risk of your boa coming into contact with the bulb and burning itself. Regular incandescent lighting also can be a fire hazard if it's wired up improperly. A much, much better alternative are under the tank heaters (UTHs). You can use radiant heat panels as well. In either case, they are very easy to wire up. If you go the UTH route, then there's a product called Flexwatt. It was originally intended for heating floors, but got co opted by various reptile enthusiasts. It comes in 3 inch, four inch and eleven inch wide by one foot pieces. Owing to the fact that you have a red tail, get two or three eleven foot pieces, plus the wiring kit. All this would cost you around 20 bucks. Then just hook up the clips to one piece for your baby boa, and you can add on more pieces as the boa grows older and larger. However, if you go this route you will need a thermostat/rheostat. Flexwatt if simply plugged into the wall can get up to 120 degrees so you'll need some means to control the temps. I went with a Ranco ETC 111000 prewired thermostat. I like it because it has multiple outlets so I can keep multiple boas all on one thermostat. It is programmable so you can just set and forget.
Here's some helpful links if you do decide to get flexwatt:
http://www.reptilebasics.com/Flexwatt-Heat-Tape-p-1-c-297.html
http://www.reptilebasics.com/Thermostats-p-1-c-250.html
http://www.herpo.com/cages/wiring.html
http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56085
Radiant heat panels are another good option. You can mount these on the side of the cages wall and set them to your desired temp. Best of all you can put these directly in the cages, because the snakes cannot burn themselves if they come into contact. The only downside is that they can be pricey.
Here's a link to a radiant heat panel for information:
http://www.reptilebasics.com/RBI-Radiant-Heat-Panels-p-1-c-283.html
Good luck.
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