I jsut recently adopted a california kingsnake and want to add live plants to his terarrium. He ranges from pretty much all of california, west nevada south utah, arizona etc. I was thinking about putting in a spindle palm or jade plant. i would like some sugestions for what to put in there. His humidity cant go ovr 50% mabey 60%. Of course, no spines or poisonous plants but please anu suggestions would be helpful Peace
What are the dimensions of your terrarium/enclosure? Native plants of the American southwest would be desirable, would they not? What kind of light, natural or artificial, would the enclosure be exposed to? Soil mix?
the tank will be a 33 gallon ( about 3 feet long by a foot or so hight and a foot or so deep). I was thinking of using native plants, but th eonly one I can think of is the spinless yucca. Washingtona palms would work for sure but they grow too fast. As for the light he will have 1 exoterra 100w heat glow lamp ( infared bulb for radiative heat), a exoterra 75w sun glow ( white light for daytime), and 2 10.0 reptiglo uv light ( both uva and uvb ) to simulate the desert climate. The tank will be at 80-85degrees ambient temp while the hot side will be at around 90 and the cool side will be about 75-80degrees. Humidity once again will be around 25-50%, anything higer may give him respitory problems.
I am assuming you are going to have a top on this aquarium, as a King snake would easily escape from such an enclosure, otherwise. So, what you would be looking for would be something tolerant of warm, arid conditions, low-growing, non-poisonous, without spines, and will not quickly out grow it's container. I have a list of plants in mind. I will get back with you on another post with a list. Perhaps there will be something that you will like. Mark 1. Gasteria: Several species. 2. Haworthia: Several species. 3. Sansevieria: Several of the small, low-growing species. 4. Calibanis hookeri I understand that the Canadian plant trade is a bit more strict, so often plants that we can obtain easily in the U.S. are rare in Canada. That said, many of these plants are common in wholesale nurseries, so I would hope you would have access to these. Just do a web image search on these plants and see what you think.
Spindle palms need a relatively moist soil. You were concerned about excess humidity with the snake. Spindle palms are a large plant, by nature, and tend to grow quickly. So, the answer to your question will be that you will likely have to keep the plant in it's own container and perhaps only keep relatively small, seedling plants. Mark
