What is the worst bit of advice you have been given/seen being given about how to care for a specific reptile?
Has anyone recommend you put your retic in a chameleon terrarium or told you your 6 kingsnakes are fine being housed together?
What utter rubbish have you read on the internet that you couldn’t believe what you were reading?
I was told by the previous owner of some cal kings to just sit them outside to brumate. He put them under a bush behind his house. This is in Tennessee so we get some snow and get pretty cold. Upon my own research (since that just didn’t sit right with me one bit) I read not to let them get much below 45-50. Oh! Also said not to give them water during that time since it’d make them freeze from the inside and kill them. Needless to say, I didn’t believe anything he told me after that.
Worst advice I have seen given for certain reptiles
Leopard geckos: use sand substrate, you must provide a heat bulb, Male and females can be kept together year round, males can be kept together
Ball pythons: aspin can be used as substrate, they only get as big as the cage they are provided
All the stuff listed is BS that I have heard people and mostly pet stores tell customers. New customers usually buy into whatever they say especially about a certain peice of equipment if it means the pet store will make an extra buck
Someone tried to tell me that brumating my western hognoses at 50-55°F would kill them, according to their “friends who know and have done brumation before”
I think the person was just upset that I decided to use a functioning mini fridge for my brumation setup. The door is cracked open, which sets it at just the right temperature. Plus that helps keeps air circulating so they won’t suffocate or anything in there!
They’ve been down for at least a month now and still seem to be doing fine. They’re pretty inactive but I do see them sitting in different positions every day. At least the female anyways, the male just hides under the paper towel so I have no idea what he’s up to lol
ive had many crazy things said to me when it comes to snakes (of course i knew better than to listen to it, i even took the time to educate them) stuff like “you should never feed inside the enclosure, that causes aggression”, “they dont need water”, “they dont need heat during the day”, “snakes love baths, you should bathe them”, “they need heat lights so they arent always in the dark”, “belly heat causes them to digest too fast which makes them hungry faster”, “you should always offer food because if it eats then its hungry”, and the one im sure many have heard “that snake is going to size you up and eat you in your sleep”
This is my favourite of them all… 
It reminded me of one of the greatest questions my wife has ever asked (this was way before ever owning one). “Do snakes drink from water bottles like rabbits?”
After imagining it, I was kind of upset they didn’t
Man, would it be nice if snakes drank from a bottle. That would solve so many of my problems.
I’ve heard people say “When a snake regurgitates, feed it a series of small meals right afterwards to get its strength up.” “You don’t need a vet for a respiratory infection, just turn the heat up.” “When a snake bites, tap it on the nose to punish it.”
I like that one aswel “you wanna bite me?.. Well here’s a scary finger straight at your bitey part”
feed your baby boa a feeder that is 2 to 3 times the size of the girth
Haha, wait was that really advice someone recommended? Lol.
“Don’t feed a snake anything bigger than its head.”
@westridge @nathan_e
that is so backwards.
“If your snake bites you, you should stick it under water intill it lets go”
I was told this by a breeder if the snake won’t let go. He was mainly talking about very big snakes who absolutely wouldn’t release, and using really hot water because it will shock them. (full on physical shock that could kill them if you did it too long) he’d only done it once with a retic that had got him when in food mode and wouldn’t let go