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A question for all you folks in the southwest...

Sisuitl

Sisuitl

I dig'em!
I'm very likely moving to Tucson in a couple of months. Now, I realize the climate is drastically different from the Pacific Northwest. Around here I just crank up the heat in the reptile room and leave them on shelves, then toss in a closet for brumation with never a worry about humidity.

How do people in the southwest deal with the super hotness where reptiles are concerned? Do you keep them in an air conditioned room? That's all I can come up with. If anyone can take the time to answer my question I would appreciate it immensely, since I am a little worried about high temps and my critters. Thanks for your time!
 
No worries. We all have central air conditioning here. Actually, in Tucson it's so dry (because no one waters the crap out of their lawns) that a "swamp" cooler works beautifully for most of the summer. Basically, it's a fan behind a water-soaked pad. It humidifies the air and the evaporation of the moisture cools your house down nicely. Some houses in Tucson have only evap., but most also have AC or only AC. And you usually cool your whole house--not just one room. If you were to want to let your house get up to 85F, I guess your corns might just use their water dishes as swimming pools. You're going to love the herping in Tucson. I did. I was once hiking on Mt. Lemmon and caught 12 different newly hatched horned lizards the size of a silver dollar. It was a hike with quite a lot of elevation change, and every one I found looked completely different from the previous. And in the winter, it gets plenty cold. Tucson usually gets frost a couple times each winter. Even here in Phoenix, we tried to be strong and not heat the house warmer than 64F. You can brumate WITH the snakes if you really want to!
 
Awesome! The house I would be living in uses a swamp cooler, so that will be good. I am so looking forward to the herping. All we have here for herps are the beautiful garters, rubber boas, and alligator lizards. That's it pretty much. My fiance is from Tucson and owns a house there...so we're leaning pretty heavily towards moving there when we get married. :)
 
I caught 3 rattlers when I lived there (they needed not to be where they were so I just moved them, but not too far). Watch out for the colorado river toads in the summer because they're deadly to dogs if they mouth them. I once saw a red racer chase my dog and bite her on the nose. It was hilarious. Boy was that dog surprised! And there are banded geckos in Tucson. Here, we just have the non-native Mediterranean ones. I'm not too good at catching big lizards, but there are plenty to see if you go on hikes in the desert. And in the winter, if you're transplanting plants, you often accidentally dig them up. THEN I can catch them! lol.

Have fun!
 
You do realize that rattlesnakes are highly territorial and will return to the area of their den year after year unless they are moved quite far away. Most likely you'll be seeing them again.
 
You will love Tucson, I know I do! I have lived with both swamp cooler and AC. I like my place pretty cool so I still have a UTH that I control with a Rheostat to make sure it stays warm enough. I have never had a problem with humidity either. What kind of substrate do you use??? I use ReptiBark which tends to hold humidity a bit better than some others. Well, good luck with the move and if you need any references, I have lived here my whole life so I know where to go and where NOT to go!!
 
MegF. said:
You do realize that rattlesnakes are highly territorial and will return to the area of their den year after year unless they are moved quite far away. Most likely you'll be seeing them again.
Click to expand...

Yeah, but according to the Arizona-Sonora desert museum, they also have a tendency to die if they are moved too far. So they recommend moving rattlers no more than a mile away, which is what we did. I don't live there anymore, but I would rather see them again then be responsible for their deaths. :shrugs: Anyway, it's not as if you can actually get rid your place of rattlesnakes when you live in the desert. But you can't leave them under your washing machine, either! And once they've been there for days, you can't keep hoping they'll leave on their own!
 
It's official! We're moving to Tucson in early June! I'm really excited about it. He's a really supportive guy. I told him that I was planning on getting a candycane male from Carol, and he was really happy because it will complete out that trio. He says it doesn't really matter to him how many snakes I get, because at this point "it's kind of like collecting antique furniture, and you can't have missing pieces in a collection!" I think this will definitely work out! :cheers:

There are a lot of things that seem really good about moving there. Robert says it's pretty close to the zoo. The house is in the historic district. It would be awesome to get in touch with other herpers down there though. He said it was pretty much drilled into them not to go lifting up rocks, and that rattle = bad. :rolleyes:
 
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