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brumation

jbaygirl0

New member
My snakes are about 4 months old and doing well, i have the vivs upstairs in my lounge. East facing always warm. I spoke to local "snake Guy" and he says it's not neccessary to put them into brumation as they will naturally slow down. Then i get told by pet shop that i should move vivs to a cold spot and just leave them for a couple of months.

I live in South Africa, winter here day temp about 21-24C (70 -75F)
night time down to 12C(53F)

What should I do, as most of the info i can get relates to US or UK.

TIA for advice
 
I'm not 100% sure but I don't think you need to be brumationing them until they are past the one year mark and even then you don't have to. It's mostly for the breeders and at 4 months they are to young to be breeding so you don't need to worry about it.
 
If you can't keep the temps under 60 F it's better not to brumate, as temps higher than this can cause the snake to still be active and they can lose weight if you are not feeding them.
I also only brumate adults that I am planning to breed, not the babies or juveniles.
 
I wish they had told me that, guys at pet shop are asking why snakes are not chilling out yet -they too young, hugs to you both, you put my mind at ease:)
 
lol. No problem. Unless you have breeding plans you don't need to worry about it. Also you should only do it if the snake has enough weight on them to make it through the "winter".
 
Even when breeding, brumation isn't strictly necessary.

I never brumate and I currently have 3 fertile clutches in the incubators, with 2 more due in the next couple of weeks. I've had maybe half a dozen slugs in total this year - not really a huge disaster.
 
anytime you get advice like that always go with the local snake guy ...breeder.. keeper.... there gonna tell you what you NEED TO KNOW to keep the snake happy and healthy... the pet shop will almost always tell you what you WANT TO HEAR to keep you happy. and 7 times out of 10 its not the right answer
 
i am beginning to realise this, that's why i have been buying books and i joined the forum, loads of good advice here:)
 
Also did you say that they asked why they are not cooling yet? As in they should be now if so even if brumating it is early in the year to start.
 
sorry, incorrect use of the word on my part, pet shop wanted to know if the snakes were slowing down:) definitely not, they out and about right now
 
Also did you say that they asked why they are not cooling yet? As in they should be now if so even if brumating it is early in the year to start.

jbaygirl0 lives in South Africa, so their seasons are opposite to ours, they are in fall/autumn over there I think, or may even be into winter already :)
 
it is winter, but we are on the coast in a bay so we are quite fortunate, loads of bad weather goes past, so it's not too cold, the days are prettywarm, but it's 5 in the morning now and it's flippping cold:) lol
 
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