Corn Snake Heat Mat

The vivarium setup for my young corn snake.

Corn snake heat mat.

I used to have a mat under a wooden viv with the thermostat probe inside the viv directly above where the mat was and easily maintained the right hot spot for a corn snake. Corn snakes are cold blooded creatures and need all the heat they can get that s why ultraviolet heat lamps and top of the range heat mats are perfect for your pet corn snake corn snakes are generally seen late in the evening. You can also heat the habitat from the ground up using a heat mat tape or pad. There are other ways to go about it these are just the most common strategies.

This heat pad is ideal for corn snakes offering a twenty four hour primary or secondary heat source with optimal mounting on the base or side of the terrarium. How you heat the cage is not nearly as important as achieving the proper temperatures. To make sure that the heat mat remains the correct temperature it is controlled by a simple on off thermostat set to 80 o f. Heat mats are the still the most widely used method of maintaining correct temperatures for corn snakes although i believe that they are an inferior heat source compared to heat lamps.

At night the heat lamp can be turned off while the heat mat remains on to prevent the cage getting too cold. It s not actually true that the heat from a heat mat gets blocked by the base of a wooden vivarium it penetrates just fine. A heat lamp to create a suitable basking spot and a heat mat to produce a gentle background temperature. But for a heat mat any mat stat will be sufficient.

While she was still in her exo terra plastic box as a young corn snake i used the following setup. Corn snakes enjoy temperatures in the range 70 88 f 21 31 c. I used a lucky reptile mat on the underside of the box for her hot basking area. Heat mats produce warmth without light and are only good for heating the bottom of an enclosure not the air.

Heat lamps dry out the air inside the enclosure so they work better for snakes with low humidity requirements such as hognose snakes and corn snakes. The mat is highly likely to be fowled on at some point making cleaning more difficult. Heat mats are preferred because they provide no light meaning that they can keep your snake warm 24 hours a day. Generally speaking the best corn snake heating is likely to consist of two parts.

The heat mat will warm objects around it providing a warm patch of ground for the corn snake to rest on. If your enclosure doesn t have a lifted base the rubber feet included will be useful to create airflow between the heat mat and ground surface.