Substrate Types - Which one is best
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- Опубліковано 17 січ 2020
- This video runs through the pros and cons of a few substrate types to help you choose which one is best for you!
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At 0:47 I was using Aspirin bedding for a while but it gets expensive. I switched to generic Advil and my snakes are thriving
Lmao.
😂
Yea I prefer unbranded ibuprofen
Lol. PM is used for more arid area reptiles
Hahahaha
Love your tact and how articulate you are. Appreciate how you focus on the hobby... no gimmicks. Great videos man!
Thank you!
Asprin wow that's gotta be expensive. Yes I know it was a slip up but it's funny
😂😂😂😂
Haha
Another great video, Jason!! Thanks again!
Thanks Jason! Great video, great topic! Keep them coming!
Thanks man!
Great video. I definitely think it is all about the animals needs and what works for each individual keeper.
Absolutely and I agree
Great video again. Always very informative. And I'm the same way I've changed substrates 3 times the last year. I went from eco earth coco husk, to cypress mulch to now I've combined the two. I think it gives it a nice look and holds the humidity great for my boas
I've done that in the past as well and I agree. It is pretty nice. Just gets dusty when it gets dry.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles Yes that is true but easy to keep up on them since I only have my 2 boas and they are breeding so in same enclosure. Except while feeding. So as my collection grows I might have to change things up
Hey Jason! Love the regular videos! I personally use coconut husk bedding, but I only have a few animals. I can definitely see if you had a big collection or if you are a breeder then it would get pretty expensive.
I like Coco husk for sure, but it just becomes a pain when I have so many snakes.
Great info bro!!
I had wondered about potentially using aspen with some of my boas but I've always been worried about the humidity. I use reptichip right now and its pretty good for an overall bedding but it's not a very clean one (ie lots of fiber and dust). I've wanted to try cypress but I have had trouble finding pure cypress mulch in my area without going to the pet store and like you said that's a rediculous price tag. Thanks for another great video Jason, stay awesome man!
Thanks man! Depending on where you live, you may be able to find a farm feed store somewhere if you go out a little bit. You can usually buy big bags of Cypress like you would use in the garden for about 8 to $10. The best part about this is there's typically no chance of mites because there are no reptiles in these stores
Great video Jason
Thank you!
Another great video, Jason. Right now I've got my boas on a paper or cardboard base, with a bunch of moss thrown in for burrowing & humidity control.
Thank you!
I've got a similar system going, hes on paper but I've got wet hides for him and a big dish and do a spritzing daily
I'm using repti chip of course I have 1 working on getting another snake but nothing like you and I use it dry my hog nose loves it I just bought some aspen it's still 8n bag doi. Research to decide about using because I 9nly have 1 and am gett8ng 1 more I want to try to do the best for them I can love your info lots of diff bias opinions so just getting as much knowledge from guys like you with lots experience just wanna spoil I will be breeding them 1 or 2 times nothing like you just wanna see some babies I can come up with I have past experiences breeding been long time and lots have changed live your videos and knowledge and appreciate it but for the small amount of reptiles I have I really like the repti chip and so does my boy but ism open to try diff things want the best for them keep making videos please your knowledge helps more then you know thank you
I'm kind of new to the hobby but I'm really starting to love a coco fiber / cypress mulch mix. Live in Colorado where it's super dry. This mix is absorbent with the coco fiber and the cypress mulch for humidity. Love your channel man as i'm new into reptiles and boas. Tons of great info. So far my favorite vids have been a combination of seeing the growth vids and locale vids. Anyway, thanks man.
Thank you!! I really appreciate that. I'm also a big fan of mixing substrate. I swap substrates all the time.
Another fantastic topic brotha. I see your becoming a full time youtuber
Thanks man! I wouldn't say full-time, but trying to get at least a little more regular
This was SO helpful! My daughter has her 1st ball python and we're using aspen bedding. The snake's first shed was great from the head to about half his body but we had to bathe him to get the stuck shed off. So we've added a humidifier to the room, very small room, and waiting to see how his next shed goes. But now I'm gonna be extra diligent in checking for mold. My daughter is 20 BTW, just got a bug up her butt to get a snake and after she got me into researching I'm dying to get my own. 😂 they're wonderful and although newbies, channels like yours have been so very educational. Really appreciate you going over basics and species, etc... Just awesome. I have come to realize that snakes are like tattoos, you can't have just one! But we're getting our hands on experience with our 1st before delving into more. Anyway... Sorry to ramble, thanks again!!
Thank you so much for watching in for the nice feedback! And that would agree with you on the snake verse tattoo haha
Hey I recommend trying a Hubert box just put wet spagna moss in a Tupperware container and cut a hole in the stop and put it on the warm side of enclosure! Reply how the next shed goes !
great video thanks :)
Thank you!
For everyone who says Aspen bedding sucks I disagree and agree. If you are handling a reptile that requires lots of humidity then its terrible bedding but if your reptile does good in just 30-40 percent humidity which is about how much is in a normal house then aspen is great.
I use the coco chip and it lasts a long time. Just spot clean and go on to the next tub. Mold resistant and great with odors.
I love when you've got a hypo out, my little guy is a hypo about 7 months and seeing him get more and more orange/pink is awesome, it's cool to see adult hypos and guess my boa's future look.
Really helpful video as I'm going through different substrates right now experimenting for the best one
I'm still changing things up. Good to keep things different.
Great video. I had my wife watch this video to help her learn how the substrate affects the humidity. I use news paper for new snakes then switch to cypress. I have so much respect for what you do strictly for the love of the animals while working as a regular dude. Keep it up. Just some fyi, Bob Clarke just listed a few Peruvians, I'm not sure if they are Iquitos or Pucallpa though.
Thank you for watching. Glad it was helpful. And I'll have to check the out! I'm assuming wc/farmed iquitos.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles that's what I was thinking. There appears to be a few farmed ones popping up lately. The farmed stuff makes me a little weary especially since the price points vary so much for the same locality. Is there a large difference between Iquitos and Pucallpa or is it like the Suriname and Guyana debate, in your opinion.
What kind of morph was that snake? Beautiful looking snake!
Thanks for all your videos! Awesome information and ideas in each one!
Great video, gotta throw out my weekly idea - caring and housing newborn boas.
I use a mix of bedding. The coco core and I think reptibark
I use paper kitchen towell for another 2months, and the switch to reptiblock(It's coconut block that have a big size that they can 't ingest) or aspen. And my humidity is like 45-55% now. I live in Belgium.
I love Asprin bedding absorbs and gets rid of the pain of cleaning.
I tend to buy topsoil and cypress mulch and bake them for 30 minutes at 350F. Throw it in the enclosure and mix with water! I love it and it’s cheap.
Beautiful Boa!! I prefer the Cypress mulch but am researching building bigger enclosures and Bioactive?
I'm going to try to do a video on bioactive.
I was using the powder cocohusk mix that you add water to, and it worked great for me except that I had the feeding issue you mention with my ATB - I got her off a sketchy dude and shes always had off behavior and seemed a bit loose in the head, and one day I see her shoving her mouse and face through the dirt and she just fills up with it - I managed to save her but I'm never using the stuff again.
I had a snake miss a feeder, back when live was about the only option, and his mouth got packed with the coconut husk, got it out but changed it out to newspaper, then switched to cyprus bark
Hardwood mulch my dude. That shit is amazing! The kind I get is ground up better than Cypress mulch. The no float Cypress blend at home depot, is all hardwoods, no pine or cedar.
I use Repti-Chip. I think it looks the best, doesn’t mold, holds humidity. And a block of that lasts me an eternity with my 3 snakes. It really expands a lot once you break it up and hydrate it! It’s 72qts, way more than any of the other reptile specific bedding I’ve seen readily available. I find it very cost effective. I really like it. Pretty sure my boa likes it too, she burrows down and cuddles up in it sometimes. :)
I've never personally tried it because the cost but I hear great things.
Jason's Exotic Reptiles It’s also worth it to me for aesthetics, which I guess as a breeder/with tubs or a rack system that’s not as much of a factor.
Jason's Exotic Reptiles Ooh! Question as well! Do you have snakes that you keep as personal pets in terrariums or racks only?
Jason I am looking at the freedom breeder rack system and i was wondering about the size I need to get for BBC red tail bowa and I have 3 of them type of bowa and one bci red tail bowa male and female and I have two blood phthon matrix both male and female and I have 8 Ball python and two Bull snake male and female and a ground bowa and sand bowa and a garder snake so what do you reckaned for me to get as far as the bins for them and the rack system and i plan on getting more snakes too so I can breed them so it makes it easier for me to take care of them and be able to breed them I have a home made one now but I want to upgrade to the freedom breeder rack system and i need to know what size I need to do this and thank you for your help and time I really appreciate you and doing this for people like me out here
You will likely need the 4 foot or 6 foot racks. I don’t know the numbers off the top of my head. I believe the 44-6 or the 66-6
I personally use aspen as well except quarantining, I havent been bringing any new animals in for a while but I always keep them on newspaper for quarantine.
I know this is off topic of the video, but I was wondering what your thoughts on non-rodent feeders, IE chicks/chicken, Guinea pigs, rabbits and such. Not switching off rodents permanently but offering a variety in the diet. I recently seen a breeding group of red jungle fowl for sale in my area, they are raised for meat for human consumption. They are basically a small chicken, the big adults don't get bigger then 2 pounds and the chicks are about half the size of a normal chicken chick. The hens much like chickens if you keep taking there eggs and putting them in an incubator they will continue to lay an egg every one to two days for most of the year. I currently only feed rodents and my 2 biggest snakes get a rabbit every once an a while. But I like the idea of every 3rd or 4th feeding being something other then the normal rat.
I think it can be a great addition 2 cycle feeders. I have noticed that you have to be careful with birds as they can become hooked on them and never want to eat anything else. That's happened to a few snakes that I have acquired from others and it's very common with species like Burmese pythons. I would say as long as it's just the occasional every third or fourth feeding like you mentioned it could be a great addition
Hay Jason what’s the correct humidity you need for boas I keep getting different answers...
If you check my page and look back two or three videos I made a whole video on basic boa care that has all this info in it.
Hi,
What do you recommend for an adult burmese? She is now 7ft and I am looking to move her j to her new viv and was wondering what substrate would benefit her?
Thanks,
I personally like Coco substrate. I’m using a brand called gaps at the moment and really like it
Cocoblox. You have to say it like Jessy from Freedom Breeder says it: Co-Co-Blawks. You might want to hit Jessy up on prices: one block is kind of pricey but at the scale you're using it at you can probably get a pretty steep discount per-block when you order many at a time.
I've been using Cocoblox mostly because of the smell. I'm not a fan of the pet store/small animal aspen smell. Personal preference.
Good topic. I use Forest Floor Cypress Mulch for the majority. But I also have some boas that I keep on repti bark because one time I found a small sliver stuck in my boa's nose and I had to pull it out. I think it's good to alternate beddings, some snakes do better than others. In my case, my boa would bury himself under the Cypress Mulch and that's how he got some stuck in his nose.
Forest floor stuff is so expensive. Try going to a local farm feed store. Your will get the exact stuff but three times the amount and a quarter of the price.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles I will check that out! We have a bunch of farm, feed and hardware stores here.
What about shredded newspaper for a dumeril boa for him to burrow? Think it will be fine? Not amped to add aspen, the dust isn't fun.
That can work. It might be a little bit dry but it should work.
I have used Aspen and I am now using Coco Block. I have only seven snakes and the Coco hold humidity longer.
Coco block is good stuff. I don't have the patience of breaking down the bricks
I like
Cocanut husk reptichip and cypress mulch and aspen i use the puppy pad just under the water bowls in case water gets spilled
Thanks not a bad idea at all
I have a question regarding Cypress mulch. I can get Cypress mulch, in very large bags from Home Depot or Lowe’s in my area and that would save me a hell of a lot of money, but what I’m concerned about is, what are the chances of finding mites or other infestations in that cypress, mulch material? Also, in reference to you saying that when you thaw out mice or rats or whatever, and they’re wet that the material in the substrate would stick to it, and the snake would ingest it, I have a solution for that, what I do is take the frozen mouse, or the frozen rat put it in a watertight sandwich bag glad bag and then submerge that in hot water With something holding it down underneath the water and then when the mouse or the rat is fully thawed out, you pull it out of the waterproof baggie and they’re not wet they’re warm which is nice but they’re not wet. This works really well for me.
I’d rather get it from Home Depot than the pet store.
How do you feel about the repti carpets for snakes. I’ve had snakes in the past and the aspen bedding got under the scales causing a bad infection.
I don't like them unless you plan to throw away every week or two rather than spot clean.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles I spot clean with my dragons I don’t mind
so do you humidify the whole room to keep humidity levels up?
I do. My humidity ranges between 50-75 on average in my room. If I need higher humidity I'll spray my floor to bring the whole room up.
All depends on the animal I think, e.g. atm I've got the big boa and burm on paper and things like the hognoses and fwc on aspen :) I'll use cardboard boxes for hides to, they don't look the best but they do the job and it's always good to recycle 🤘
Agreed!
Aspen is best...can see waste immediately...smell reduction...looks cleans...just be neat...use 😷 when laying out
Hey Jason was curious what your thought was on mixing substrates aspen and coco husk? Or if you have every tried it! Enjoying all your videos. Thanks
The aspen would likely mold and then you have to just throw them both away. It wouldn’t really make sense to mix a dry and humid substrate in my opinion
@@JasonsExoticReptiles Thanks! Keep up the awesome videos! Looking to buy my first boa because of your videos!
What about pure cardboard that has been through a micro shredder?
Probably not a bad idea
Jason what do you think about “loose coconut” substrate? Also when is it appropriate to quarantine your snake? I plan on getting my first no this Wednesday from a guy On Craigslist, visually I’m the photos he looks healthy but after watching your videos I’m thinking maybe I should quarantine the snake on paper towel substrate until I can verify it doesn’t have mites
I made a video on cocoblox and that's all I use at the moment. I like it so much I buy by the pallet and resell. Definitely quarantine anything new especially from Craigslist.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles thanks Jason I appreciate this
And now you’re sponsored by FB! 🤘🏼Using the CocoBlox.
So far I like it. We will see if it goes the distance.
I had good luck with rabbit pellets (rabbit food).
good evening Jason,
Today is Wednesday, are you working on anything new. Hopefully all is well..
Hi alex! I'm actually cutting back to 1 video a week again on saturdays. I have the content to do two videos a week but wasnt sure how sustainable that would be making 100 videos per years. So now I'm back to Saturday mornings. The video stats are also so important to youtube so wednesday videos would get less videos and actually pull the whole channel growth down.
What about reptile carpet?
I've never been a fan of that. I feel like once it gets dirty you just have to throw it away. It becomes pretty expensive if you really want to keep the cages clean. Spot cleaning only goes so far with that.
Good video. I stick with paper towel for new or sick animals, and coco fiber for everything else. Just dry rodents off before feeding and I never have any problem with bedding sticking to it. It's a pain but I check all rodents thoroughly to see if they are warm enough anyways so it's just an extra second to take them to a towel.
Absolutly. Everyone has different setups so it's impossible for me to say which one is best for each person. Drying a few hundred rodents every feeding could get pretty time consuming Haha.
@@JasonsExoticReptiles Yeah for sure! Use up a whole lot of towels too haha. For the bigger guys I can see the plain papers or mulch working the best as you've said you use. All the options in the video are great
Hello, I'm new in this world of reptiles y want to use coco fiber because is not expensive, I think they use it for plants, do you recommend that substrate?
👌
I just looked this up bc I have over 50 pounds of newspaper and need something to use it for such as snake and rat bedding🤣
Cypress mulch all the way! I have enclosures and like the aesthetic to it all. Paper just looks cheap and lazy. Granted I get it if you’re a breeder and have rack systems.
You know the pee pee pads because you’re too lazy to take your dog outside lmao perfect 👌🏼
🤘🏻
Aspirin 🤣 he said fuck it lol leave it there, it generates comments, right lol
Hahah
With the coco products, you forgot “coco” pebbles... lol Seriously though, my favorite of the mix is definitely cypress mulch. I am currently trying the cypress/coco mix solution right now and like it too. Just seems to dry out quicker to me...
I've never used them. I'll have to check it out. Any specific brand or line of them?
Jason's Exotic Reptiles - I’ll go ahead and tell you they get soggy pretty fast. Lol Post and Kellogg’s makes the best ones to me. ;)
Lmfao when he says aspirin instead of aspen hahaha 0:47
Love your vids!!
Haha, thank you!
Bro, Walmart has aspen for about $4 a bag as opposed to the same size or slightly smaller bags being sold for $12 to $15 a bag.
Not sure what Walmart your shopping at but they are one of the more expensive places for Aspen around me. They only have the 2cf bags
I'm in New York, mid Hudson valley. Sucks that your Walmart is expensive! We have a petco, a petsmart and a local fish and animal feed store. I get my rats at the feed store and aspen at our Walmart.
Big Pharma has to love you!
What I've found is very convenient is for my 4x2x2 enclosures, I find large short tubs that fill "most" of the bottom or at least half of it. I then fill that tub with a substrate with a hide in it that is very easy to keep humid on the humid side. For the rest of the bottom I use brown packing paper I have a huge roll of. That way when the substrate needs to get changed, I just pull out the bin, sterilize it and go from there. It keeps things cleaner, and god forbid there is every a pest issue, much easier to get it down to bare bones and work.
paper products double as a hide
Sometimes I'll throw newspaper on top of Aspen or Cypress so that they can borrow and really get some good coverage.
Freedom breeder its cocoblox
You are paying too much for Aspen you can get 8 cu ft bags for $15.
Where are you getting that!! Cheapest I've been able to find it is about 13-15 for a 4cf bag
Jason's Exotic Reptiles not sure about where you are, but there is a local distributor of Nepco brand kiln-dried aspen for $15 for 8cuft. He is often at the Daytona show and I stock up there. I think you can order wholesale from Nepco if you have a biz and wholesale license and it is even cheaper. Also Nepco is better than the Kaytee stuff, it is softer and less dusty.
You disappeared......
Haha I kept getting notifications when people posted stories and couldn't figure out how to turn them off so I deleted the app lol. Phone was buzzing every few minutes and was driving me crazy.
Jason's Exotic Reptiles well now I can’t talk to you! :(
Do you have any dwarf or super dwarfs for sale???