Well, let's see. I've had around 25 black rat snake types in all in the past 8 years, and I'm including in that group Yellow rats, Everglades rats, Texas rats, Grey rats, and all the other ones from the P. obsoletus group. To me, their differences are geographically/environmentally created; they are not a separate species of snake. I've have had both wild caught and captive bred in my collection.

First, I'm no expert. I'll leave that up to those who've been keeping black rats longer than I have. In my opinion, however, blacks and greys are the best personality-wise. Texas rats seem to be overly skittish to the point of aggression. These, I think, are polar opposites on the calmness scale from one to ten. After that, you just have to pick up the individual snake to see where on that scale they fit. None want to be held. It a degree of okay-ness with being held. Some are okay with it for a while and some don't want it at all, but may settle down eventually.

They are great pets!

If I had to choose between a snake and a beardie I would probably choose the snake

WESOME SNAKES!

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I use flexwatt on the inside, and lay linoleum tile over it, and seal that with silicone as well

yeah man, like aquarium silicone

yep, the trick is to seal up the edges before you put it together. you can put it together wet still, but silicone those edges or it's just like using wood.

for plastic cages? comes in sheets. I like the melamine myself, though it's heavy

yeah man, get rid of the coconut, try paper towel. get a temp gun, check that UTH, if it gets 90 degrees, and the rest of the tank is 75 including the air, it's perfect. I dunno about the foil, may not work as well. I know I sound biased here, but try those things and watch what happens to your humidity. Also, put that water dish on the hot side ;)

well, it's not the glass that sucks the humidity out, it's the screen top and the heat light instead of belly heat. and wood or carpet bedding if you're using that, that stuff sucks up humidity too. cover that screen with some saran wrap, lower the wattage on your light bulb, use paper bedding. ;) as far as instructions, you gotta kinda wing it, I posted a few pics of a few builds I've done on monsters.

I build and sell custom enclosures, most full grown retics never need anything more than a 6' x 3' x 18" enclosure. The trick is to not use wood! lol, melamine is what I use, plastic works well too. Anything else sucks the humidity out of the air, and retics need some pretty high humidity