• Responding to email notices you receive.
    **************************************************
    In short, DON'T! Email notices are to ONLY alert you of a reply to your private message or your ad on this site. Replying to the email just wastes your time as it goes NOWHERE, and probably pisses off the person you thought you replied to when they think you just ignored them. So instead of complaining to me about your messages not being replied to from this site via email, please READ that email notice that plainly states what you need to do in order to reply to who you are trying to converse with.

  • IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ!! About the Google Adsense ads being displayed

    =====================
    Posted 08/15/2025
    =====================


    Yeah, I know. They are a pain in the butt. But they pay the bills to keep my server running. Just a fact of life, I am afraid.

    Want to get rid of them? Simple. Just become a Contributor level member or above and they will be gone. -> Please click HERE."

    Is that too much for me to ask of you to keep this site running? Well, sorry about that. I too wish I could get everything for free. But alas.....

    =====================
    Addendum: 01/10/2026
    =====================


    Google Adsense ad revenue for December, 2025 was just $30 over the cost of the lease for the server running this site. So, in effect, the money providing the incentive for me to continue running this site is coming SOLELY from the paid memberships and sponsorships here. Which honestly ain't much....

Dropping a ton of money on new cages, need opinions!!!!

Yaz23

Yaz23

Member
Joined
May 21, 2007
Messages
721
Reaction score
15
Points
18
Location
Florida
I have searched through many old threads about caging and the 'best' caging etc. However, I need some new opinions and pros/cons on which brand you like the best and why.

I am looking to buy new cages for basically my whole snake room. I plan on dropping around $5,000 so this isnt a couple cage question. Considering most of you know my general collection consists of Carpets, most of these cages will be 3ft x 2 ft x 18 in and 4ft x 2ft x 18 in. I am also going to need some boa cages as well which will be 4 ft x 2 ft x 1 ft.

Question as well, do you think a 1 ft ceiling on a boa is too short? Right now all my custom cages are 18 in high including the cages my boas are in. Cutting them done to 1 ft sounds claustrophobic. Opinion on that matter?

Back to the main question, what brand do you believe is best and why? Holding temp and humidity is A MUST. I also DO NOT want to be assembling these cages. They need to come fully assembled with everything installed. If I'm dropping this kind of money, I do not want to spend my time putting them together.

Thanks in advance to anyone who responds. Your opinions/comments are appreciated! :thumbsup:
 
I have used 3 manufacures. I have a cage from AP, and two cages that came as kits from Rich Beasley. The last cage was from boaphile, the only one that came assembled was boaphile, but I spent alot more on that one than the other 3.

the boaphile cage is 12" tall, the ap is 15" and the other 2 are 18". I personaly dont like the 12" ones. the 18" tall ones are good for a deeper cage, personaly, for a 3-4x2 cage I like the 15in tall, not to short, not to tall.
 
Well, it depends on what type of door you want. Do want a drop down style, swing open style, or sliding glass. Each builder seems to offer a limited choice of door styles. So between that and you wanting them already assembled, you will most likely have it narrowed down to 1-2 cage builders.
 
Thank you both for the posts. My current custom enclosures have sliding glass doors. Drop downs are fine and sliding doors are fine (as long as bedding will not get stuck in the tracks). I cant stand that. The one type I dont want is swing out doors. That will just get annoying.

I have had my eye on a company but I dont want to mention it so my thread will stay unbiased. I am all ears to anything.
 
I also want to mention that I have owned cages by a couple companies out there but I just want to know everyones opinion on certain companies and why they like the cages / why dont they like the cages.
 
Yaz, if you want prebuilt (especially with Boas) I would think that Boaphile would be the way to go. I, too, do not want to waste time assembling. If I wanted to assemble, I would build my own. I personally do not like the 1 ft'ers either. I would go with something in between 1ft and 1.5 ft.

The next stack I am wanting to try out though is Constrictors Northwest. I want a display in the living room and I think they make a really nice cage, if you get the lighted white base and the backgrounds that they offer. Either way though, I wish you well with whomever you choose.
 
Just a personal opinion on the 12" cages for boas.
I know the Boaphile uses this height cage and offers them for boas, and they may be more acceptable when having to house a very large number of them.
But for me though a 12" high cage just isn't a consideration for my boas. With the overall cage height being 12", that brings the door opening down to about 8".
My boas are good sized, I don't have many but they're all 8 feet. I just wouldn't want to pull them out and especially get them back in through an eight inch wide opening. They are about 4 inches thick from belly to backbone. That's just not enough room for me to work in personally.
 
Thanks for the responses everyone! Boaphile only has 2 heights (11.5" and 17.5") or am I wrong? I have been looking at their " cage stack packs". I'm wondering why they dont have a 15" high or something. Maybe I'm missing them?

C. NW cages are nice, my custom enclosures that I have now are cabinet display cages that would look GREAT in a living room but they are in the snake room and my wife would kill me if I decided to move cages in the living room!

I use to have an amazing HUGE arboreal cage by Cages By Design (it was 6ft high, 4ft wide, 4 ft long). Very :censored: expensive lmao. I sold it along time ago though. You guys may have seen my ad like 2 years ago or something lol.

Dean, what size cages do you have for your boas?
Clay, the opening is only 8" when its an 11.5" tall cage?
Anyways, keep posting guys!
 
It's 8" or maybe 8.5". Someone who has one on hand can measure and correct me if I'm wrong.
But if you look at the picture of an 11.5" cage you can see there's 1.5-2" above and below the door opening. This is required to provide a substrate dam at the bottom and make the top rigid enough that it won't sag. The drawback is with that overall height the door opening has to be shorter than what I want to use.
 
Clay, I guess I can see why it cuts the hand room down to 8" or so. Thats unfortunate. :ack2: I guess I could make it work but my poor boas wont be able to lift there head more than a few inches :eek: Errrr!!

Dean, were did you get yours custom made? What material are they? All my enclosures are custom made with 3/4" MDF (yes expensive and heavy wood lol), and 1/4" glass (yes thick glass, I wanted to make sure when I take the glass out to clean it, it wouldnt break/crack/chip on me like all the damn Vision cages glass does lmao).

Overall I love the cages I have, but I want all my cages to match not some custom, some brand name, some racks, etc. I am very picky and like things all the same and matching, so this is bugging me like all hell! I have even seen used Boaphiles but if I buy them and then buy new ones they wont match :angry: Call me crazy but thats who I am! :D

Wanted to correct myself from my last post. My Cages By Design cage was (6ft H x 4ft L x 3ft Deep). Awesome cage I have to say :thumbsup: but will put a hole in your wallet!
 
Yaz, I got mine custom made by a family friend. He owns an auto body shop but is very close to my family (dads best friend). He is a retired carpenter that does all of our woodwork, when he has the time. Lets just say if I ever had a need for a car, auto work, or custom wood, I have a line of credit with him that I dont think I could ever reach. Thanks to Clay's rat rack design, he is in the process of making me 5 of those for 125.00 ea, including labor.
 
Dean, I TOTALLY didnt see you posted that last post! Sorry didnt want to seem like I ignored it!

Your lucky! I wish I had someone to do things like that for me!
 
Way to ignore Dean. lol

I personally like Animal Plastics. I like the fact that if I wanted to I can break the cage down for easy transport. Plus the the customer service and cages are awesome. Next January I plan on getting the T13.
 
I build my own cages out wood flooring. They came out pretty nice. I made two 4x2x2 stack able enclosure with a one sheet slide out door. I made vents on both sides and perfect when it comes to substrate not getting stuck in the rails. The best thing is their super light. Am willing to make some for you unless you want pro cages.
 
Thanks for the offer but I already have custom wood enclosures, I'm looking to get plastic ones so I can avoid having heat bulbs.

If I did though the shipping would be insanely expensive to get them to me, I plan on buying a large amount of cages. Thanks though!
 
Tom, I wouldnt mind getting some freedom breeders but the issue is that I have mostly Carpets in my collection so freedom breeders in my opinion wont satisfy them. They like to climb and if I stick them in freedom breeders that will disable them from doing that. Freedom breeders are good for boas, balls and really any snake; however, Morelia in those just dont seem to be adequate. Your opinion on that?
 
Back
Top