I’m not allergic to it 
Cocoblox use to be the only coconut substrate that I could handle being around, but it started becoming SUPER dusty and every time I would change out substrate for cleaning or just making a new tub I would be coughing from the dust and breaking out with hives since I’m allergic to coconut. My last time I tried it I had such a bad reaction that we almost went to the ER.
What I like about repti-zorb liners is that I can tell when my snake has gone to the bathroom. Poop or pee - you can see. It also, in my opinion, makes the tub look cleaner and nicer. No dust to worry about, no poop hiding somewhere. If it’s dirty you just pull it out and replace. I’ve had a lot of people ask me about humidity and what I do for that when they shed. I spray my snakes like normal; day 1 and day 3. Haven’t had an issue with stuck shed or any crappy sheds. Humidity stays pretty well with the liners.
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Top soil. Straight dirt with a bit of compost and orchid bark with sphagnum moss. Recently I did change my mix from the peat moss tourbe I was trying to use up and jeez is it great! I only spend 6 bucks on the orchid bark which lasts me a good amount of enclosures and I spend 3 bucks per bag of top soil. This way it won’t cultivate salt like coco dirt was and doesn’t cause cut up bellies like repti chip and repti bark does, and is pretty sustainable compared to peat tourbe, and personally I just don’t use aspen since it doesn’t hold moisture like I want it to and can’t be used for bioactive (along with a good amount of coco products since it kills the plant with the salt in it, I learned the hard way. Some of this is product to product though and it’s a good option it just can’t be used with live plants for a plethora of reasons so don’t kill 200$+ plants like I did) and I have a terrible aspen allergy, hives and all. Otherwise paper is ok but it provides little to no “sponginess” to it which can be a bit uncomfortable for the snake, same for paper towels but I tend to layer them in my temporary enclosures to make up for that, there’s also just the fact that it can get smelly and sopping wet fast so I opt to not use it besides for like mentioned, temporary setups but also hatchlings or generally young snakes. No substrate is all a no-go in my book altogether since it just lets humidity condensate and trickle into the edges of the cage causing puddles and everything slides around inside the cage, including the snake and overall it just doesn’t look good almost ever. Obviously I’m a pretty big advocate for larger cages and bioactive and I’m lucky enough to have access to the materials I do for my enclosures, including enclosures themselves (got an emptied out PC tower for free I installed and waterproofed a shelf in with leftover OSB and valspar paint, along with buying some package deal and clearance plants. The only thing I actually bought for it was the orchid bark, the spray foam, and the hardware for the door)
Basically I would say opt for a bioactive mix, coco husk or coir, or bottom line layered paper towels. Just seeing this post now since it got some recent attention but I thought I’d chip in with my reasoning. And also as far as the humidity I like to keep things at since I tend to mention humidity a lot but never elaborate (whoops) is around 70 or 80%, that may seem pretty high and it definitely is, but with the proper substrate which is what matters so much to me, I’ve managed to never have any issues with scale rot. I’ve had issues with RI’s but that’s generally from heating going out while I’m away or it was a poisoning situation or other that I wasn’t responsible for (in the grand scheme of things I was and I should protect my animals from other people essentially mistreating them. But I had no awareness or control of the situations and I take full responsibility for those isolated situations) plus keeping humidity so high it means I never have to raise it for shedding and my plants love it. It also imitates their natural habitat more which I enjoy and I think my snakes enjoy as well
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Here in Florida it is always humid, so I can just used paper towels. I like coconut bedding also, and like Reptichip, but its a bit dusty for my liking. I tried the “Zoo Med” coconut bedding, and it was SOOO dusty.
Billy from Mutation Creation did a comparison a few months ago between Freedom Breeders “Cocoblox,” and a coconut bedding called “Go-4-Coco,” which I believe his friend makes in Europe?
The Go-4-Coco had less dust, and had different sized chunks of coconut husk, and some seemed softer and would absorb water better. Whereas the “Cocoblox” was more dusty (and FB sells a “substrate cleaner” table to make it less dusty?) and mostly all large chunks of coconut. So Billy uses Go-4-Coco and says its the best coconut substrate he’s used.
It wasn’t widely available at the time, but I just checked and a lot of people are vending it. It comes in 2 different sizes of substrate. One has smaller pieces- for hatchings, and one with larger pieces for adults.
It’s the exact same price as Cocoblox and Reptichip, so i’m going to give that a try.
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