Strange cage ideas....

Let me know what you guys n gals think of this idea. My theory behind this is that I have moved to a house that was kind of last minute, we were living in an apartment that was too small, my gma passed away and the family wanted us to buy her house, I was raised there so it meant a lot for me to move there. The only problem though, the house is heated with a wood stove, which is great heat but not consistent, so the room my snakes are in I am having to use a radiator heater to heat the room to the needed temps. In doing this the humdity is going below 20 percent, which is WAY too low. I have a humidifier in the room, its only raising the humidity to an average high of about 40 percent, which I need a little more than that for my BCI's. So I am thinking, if I can heat the fresh air coming into the cage, it will give me more even heating in each cage, better circulation and wouldn't require me to use a radiator heater. See, the room stays at about 70 degrees without the heater, I need the room at about 82 degrees, but can only get it up to 78. Once I get my snake room built, this will not be needed, but I need something for temporary. If anyone has better ideas than this, please let me know. here is a pic of my idea.

Cage sizes will be 14'' tall, 60'' wide by 24'' deep. The tops, sides, front and back will be made out of 1/2'' shelving board, which will be stained and sealed. The bottom of the enclosure will be made out of 1/4'' plywood, with 2 11'' strip of flex on my hot side, wired to a thermostat. The bottom of the cage will be lined with some type of either lenolium or water vinyl. Under each cage I want to have a "tunnel" about 1/2'' tall, running completely under each cage, with flexwatt inside the tunnel. I am wanting to wire up a small computer fan to "force" the air over the flex into each cage, then there will be an outlet on each cage so warm air is constantly being fed into each enclosure. My original diagram or picture, will change I am sure, but this is the basic idea. I know this sounds crazy, but it seems like if it works it will be awesome. Right now I have my humidity and temps correct in the cages my BCI's are in now, but it can only be temporary. A friend of mine has lots of herps, his herp room is about 78-80 degrees all the time, but he has some lizards that require hotter temps and he uses a similar method on them.

Another idea I have, which may be simpler is to use more flex. Before I moved, I had a snake room that was 82 degrees, then my flex gave me my hot spot about 93 degrees on one side. Now, the room is at 70 without the room heater, with it, it gets up to 78, but no higher, but still drops my humidity. What if, instead of just 2 11'' pieces of flex, I use 4-6 pieces? Would that give me my 82 on one side and 93 on another? The cage is 3/4 thick.

I have also thought about having a gap under the cage, if you can imagine (cage is 60''X24''x14''), there would be about a 1/2'' gap UNDER the cage, that would be sealed from the outside, it would have flexwatt in the gap, the only place for air to escape would be through a vent that would come up through the bottom of the cage, maybe 3 or 4'' up the wall of the cage. Doing it this way would give me a constant supply of warm air coming up from the flooring, AND the heated gap under the cage would help keep the whole cage a bit warmer.

I know it sounds like I am trying to complicate things, but if this works it would be really cool and it may be a really efficient way to keep ambient temps up NO MATTER what the room temp is.

Kinda like this maybe.....

I have thought about that. I am needing to build a new cage anyways, so I thought I might try to incorporate something into it to help with this problem. Am I fighting a loosing battle?

[F]Your imagination is your only limitation. Try your ideas and if they don't immediately work, modify!

I would pursue other options for the humidity in your home, though. My father had a massive nasal hemorrhage one year because the air was too dry. Have decorative water fountains in key rooms, keep a nice "teapot" on the stove, have lots of real plants and water and mist them frequently. Lots of work, but you'll all be more comfortable.

Your caging ideas are intriguing. I'll think more about them. It does seem too complicated, but I may be missing something.

Btw, my home is kept at 72 degrees in the winter with no problems keeping the snakes and tarantulas warm using UTHs. Do you keep something that requires even higher temps?[/FONT]

If the snakes are in a room that is not really large, like an average bedroom, then you might consider keeping an aquarium. Submersible heater set to 80'...nothing says humidity like warm water. For that matter, put a 5 gallon bucket next to the cages where the air is drawn in, and drop in a submersible heater into that, along with either a powerhead or airstone with pump for circulating the water.

...Just a thought. But then I have a room full of terrariums that gets misted every day and the temps are in the mid 80's, so humidity is more of a problem than a need.

I am mainly just keeping BCI's or standard columbian morphs. Normal temps I need at about 82 on cool side and 93 on hot side, humidity at 50-60%. I have 2 gravid females right now, so my hot sides need to be around 95 or so for them.

Right now each cage has 2 strips of 11'' flexwatt, I thought about just adding 2 more strips on the "cool" side, with a seperate thermostat to keep it at or around 80-82. I am going to brainstorm for awhile. I just figured if I created a way for me to more easily be able to control the temps on BOTH sides inside the enclosure, I wouldn't have to worry so much about actual room temps then.