When I first saw an East African sand boa the first word that came to mind was sausage. Then I handled one. I was surprised by the docile nature of the snake. Not to mention the beauty. With a pattern of dark brown to black spots over a yellow, red, or orange background they are truly stunning creatures.
They are small snakes, and their size is sexually dimorphic, with females being much larger than the males. Females can reach up to 30 inches. When I acquired my first pair they were about the same size, with the male being larger by half an inch. I fed them at the same time, and fed them the same quantity, but the female, several years later, is over twenty inches and weighs about 180 grams or so, while the male is much smaller at a mere fourteen inches and about 55 grams.
Both of these snakes were extremely docile from the moment I got them. I kind of lucked out in this aspect, because I have gotten others that needed a good deal of gentle handling before they stopped being nippy. I have found that these snakes calm down a great deal as they grow older, and housing them with other sand boas also helps to calm them down. All of my adult snakes are very calm and gentle. Overall I'd say that this is a very good species for someone who is new to keeping snakes and would be turned off by something extremely aggressive.
I housed the new snakes separately in plastic shoe boxes, although I have since housed up to 3 pairs together with no ill effects. These boxes have around 40 to 50 square inches of floor space. I keep the adult snakes in larger sweater boxes. I've kept a full grown pair on about 100 square inches of floor space successfully.
I've housed my East African sand boas on a variety of media, including paper towels, walnut shells, and aspen. Of all these I've found that walnut shells are the most efficient. These snakes get nervous unless they are capable of burrowing into a medium that has a sufficient weight. On paper towels this isn't possible, as no reasonable amount of crumpled paper will work. With aspen it takes up to six inches, which can be a little pricey. On crushed walnut shells it only takes about three to four inches. The snakes seem to prefer the walnut shells, as it allows them to create an ambush pit. They lay very still under the shells with their heads poking up through the sand, waiting for something to slide down into their waiting mouths. It is also very efficient because it clumps around waste, just like kitty litter, so it can simply be sifted until clean. I have never had any problems with impaction from this media, and that's with feeding most of my adults in their cages.
As far as water is concerned, East African sand boas seem to be able to go longer without than most. But it has been my experience that unless you keep water in the cage with the animal at all times, shedding problems can occur. The most frequent of these being a fragmented shed, in which the skin flakes off instead of peeling off smoothly. I have never had any problems with the cages being too humid, just so long as water droplets do not form on the walls of the cage.
My East African sand boas all have had an aggressive feeding response. When young they feed readily on frozen and thawed pinky mice. I feed my adults hopper mice. I've found that the snakes prefer to have numerous smaller meals rather than one really large one. Once full grown the snakes do not eat more than twice a month, and have gone a couple months without food with no apparent weight loss. They are crepuscular snakes, and I have seen nothing to contradict this. My animals are active only in the evening, for the most part. I try to feed them around this time as well. To prevent problems if animals are housed together I separate them for feeding. Sometimes young animals do not readily eat thawed pre-killed pinkies. There are several ways to overcome this difficulty. The most successful way that I've used is pretty simple. I merely shredded a couple of paper towels and placed them over top of the young snake and its meal. This seemed to supply the security necessary to get these youngsters feeding. Well, this is a compilation of my experiences keeping these wonderful, gentle little beauties. Good luck!