Morelia spilota — Fact Sheet

Morelia spilota · Morelia spilota

Full care guide and sources

📋 At a glance

🏠 Enclosure

• Adult enclosure: 180 × 90 × 120 cm (length × width × height).

Planning example for one known smaller adult no longer than 180 cm. Use the expected individual’s length, not the species name alone: enclosure length should at least match the snake, with width around half its length and usable climbing height. For a 250 cm coastal-type adult, an example is 250 × 125 × 120 cm or larger. Ask about parental size and increase the plan when that information is uncertain. Furnish the height with securely fixed branches and elevated retreats; empty volume cannot replace usable floor area.

• Substrate planning depth: 10 cm
• Housing: One animal per enclosure

🪨 Substrate and furnishings

The enclosure should include a warm hide, cool hide, water bowl, rough but safe shedding surfaces, and enough cover for the animal to move without feeling exposed. Arboreal species need secure branches and elevated perches; heavy terrestrial species need floor space and furnishings that cannot collapse.

Juvenile enclosures should be simple enough to inspect but not bare. Adult enclosures must be built for strength: locks, cable ports, sliding doors, and ventilation panels are common escape points.

💡 Lighting

Use a 10-12 hour daylight cycle with optional moderate UVB over one climbing zone. Carpet pythons should be able to leave light and heat easily, and nights should stay dark.

🌡️ Temperature

• Basking spot: 31-33 °C

• Daytime air: 28-30 °C

• Cool zone: 24-26 °C

• Night: 22-24 °C

• Clear gradient required; the animal must be able to move between warm, cool, and hidden zones

• Measure basking surfaces with an infrared thermometer and ambient zones with digital probes

• Avoid heat rocks and unguarded heat sources

💧 Humidity and water

Air humidity: 40–60%. Practical air-humidity range, not a physiological limit. Measure at animal height, away from wet surfaces and direct heat.

Provide fresh water at all times. Target humidity: 40–60%, with a humid hide during shed. Use substrate choice, water-bowl placement, partial ventilation control, and a humid hide to manage shedding. Chronic wet bedding causes scale and respiratory problems; chronic dryness causes retained shed and dehydration.

🪳 Feeding

Feed appropriately sized frozen-thawed prey whenever possible. Prey should generally match the snake’s widest body diameter, adjusted for species build and age. Babies usually feed every 5-7 days, juveniles every 7-10 days, and adults every 10-21 days depending on species, temperature, season, and body condition.

Avoid routine live feeding, oversized prey, and handling for at least 48 hours after meals. Refusal to feed is often caused by wrong temperatures, exposure, shedding, breeding season, stress, or prey presentation.

Adjust feeding by body condition, not by appetite alone. A snake that always eats can still become obese, while a seasonal refusal may be normal if weight is stable and the enclosure is correct.

🩺 Health — warning signs

Common problems include retained shed, respiratory infection, mites, burns, mouth inflammation, obesity, dehydration, regurgitation, and injuries from escapes or unstable decor. Warning signs include wheezing, bubbles at the nostrils, open-mouth breathing, repeated soaking, patchy shed, refusal to feed with weight loss, swelling, twisting posture, or repeated regurgitation.

Consult a reptile- or exotic-animal veterinarian for severe weakness, injury, breathing signs, swelling, repeated regurgitation, or prolonged refusal to eat.

If a problem appears, first verify the basics with instruments: warm surface, cool end, night temperature, humidity, hide fit, and prey size. Guessing at treatment before correcting the environment often wastes the most important recovery window.