First Natural setup - Journal

First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Mon Jan 07, 2013 9:51 pm

Hallo everyone

Been browsing and drooling on the site for years now! Finally have the courage and the finance and most importantly the right animal for a natural viv.

So here is a pic of the cage.

Image

Sorry for the crappy quality, was taken with my phone.

The cage is 90cm high. So nice and deep, Ideal for cresteds, which coincidentally is what i am planning on keeping in there.

First thing I did was start with the background, which meant paiting it with silicone. For this I used Den Braven Black Marine silicone. This was the only one readily available locally.

Image

Image

Now for my first question, how thick should the silicone be, cause light still comes through some spots, but it is all covered in silicone, will this be ok for GS background? Here is a photo to demonstrate what i mean.

Image

Thats it for now, have to bake the wood. Also need to play around with my method of attaching the peat moss to the GS. I was thinking of using a mixture of Silicon and white spirits/mineral spirits/mineral turpentine.

Also, here is a picture of the one crested current setup and the crested that will go in the setup.

Image

Image

Image

Image
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby kfc223 » Mon Jan 07, 2013 10:11 pm

Looks quite good!

Is it correct for me to assume you are from cape town?
User avatar
kfc223
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 833
Joined: Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:30 pm
Location: Cape Town, Western Cape

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby coral snake » Mon Jan 07, 2013 10:22 pm

Nice setup!! Is that a coconut shaving bedding??
Brown House snake 0.2
Corn snake normal 3.1
Corn snake Albino 0.1
Leopard Gecko 0.0.1
Western Hognose 1.0
White lipped Tree viper 1.1
Yellow anaconda 1.0
Bahai scarlet birdeater 0.1
Fire Red birdeater 0.1
Curly hair 0.1
Chilean rose 0.1

-Alex Parsons
User avatar
coral snake
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 133
Joined: Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:30 pm
Location: Benoni,JHB

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Mon Jan 07, 2013 11:06 pm

Yes I am Capetonian. And if I may ask what gave it away? Accent?

And Yes that is coco bedding. I think i used to little, very thin layer, but it is a very nice bedding, so far. Well it looks nice, don't know how it works
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby coral snake » Mon Jan 07, 2013 11:25 pm

In my experience it helps A LOT with humidity! And is very rewarding, just keep it clean :)
Brown House snake 0.2
Corn snake normal 3.1
Corn snake Albino 0.1
Leopard Gecko 0.0.1
Western Hognose 1.0
White lipped Tree viper 1.1
Yellow anaconda 1.0
Bahai scarlet birdeater 0.1
Fire Red birdeater 0.1
Curly hair 0.1
Chilean rose 0.1

-Alex Parsons
User avatar
coral snake
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 133
Joined: Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:30 pm
Location: Benoni,JHB

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby coral snake » Mon Jan 07, 2013 11:32 pm

The layer depth isn't a problem since your gecko is arboreal and not terrestriel . In my experience its better to keep the substrate level (in especially your type of tank) just below the hinge door(about 1cm-1.5cm).
Brown House snake 0.2
Corn snake normal 3.1
Corn snake Albino 0.1
Leopard Gecko 0.0.1
Western Hognose 1.0
White lipped Tree viper 1.1
Yellow anaconda 1.0
Bahai scarlet birdeater 0.1
Fire Red birdeater 0.1
Curly hair 0.1
Chilean rose 0.1

-Alex Parsons
User avatar
coral snake
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 133
Joined: Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:30 pm
Location: Benoni,JHB

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Tue Jan 08, 2013 7:32 am

In that case i still need to a little bit! LoL
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby kfc223 » Sat Jan 26, 2013 9:28 pm

Any update on your little guy?
User avatar
kfc223
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 833
Joined: Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:30 pm
Location: Cape Town, Western Cape

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Thu Jan 31, 2013 6:44 pm

Small update, will soon upload
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Wed Feb 06, 2013 8:41 pm

Some new pics.

So the silicone is finished, it is there so that the GS background has something to stick to, GS is great stuff for those who dont know and is a form of expanding foam, I on the other hand is using denbraven expanding foam. worked so far.

First here is a picture of the wood and more or less where i want it.

Image

The PVC pipe is a my "trunking", this will be used to run my wires through as well as some tubing to remove excess water from the bottom of the tank.

Image

And here is a pic of the cage with the first can of expanding foam, only had one can, bought some more today, will take pics when the whole background is done. O and also the wood will be kept in place by the foam.

Image

The next thing I did( Actually the first ) was start with the vines. First attempt was a fail, tried mixing silicone with peatmoss and then tried attaching that to rope. did not work. then went to brights to get some Xylene, which is a paint thinner and it is quite potent. I also got some clear silicone and some rope.

So here is what I started with.

Image

And please, for the following, use cloves and something other than your hands to mix with.

So you get an old container, add 1-2 parts xylene to 1 part silicone. then mix very well. once you have mixed it it should be quite runny, and sort of look like this.

Image

Now take a piece of rope and drag it through the silicone to cover the entire rope, use cloves and really rub the rope in silicone. then through the rope in a heap of peatmoss( dry or wet from my expierence)

Image

Image

The end result looks something like this

Image

I also used air tubing, bit difficult to cover in peatmoss, but after three layers it looks good, my plan is to put some wire in the airtubing to make it more rigid. Will post pictures of this later.

The same method of doing the vines will be used to cover the background in peatmoss.

But that is it for now.
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby kfc223 » Wed Feb 06, 2013 8:49 pm

Great stuff man!

Awesome when guys go through so much effort for their reptiles.
User avatar
kfc223
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 833
Joined: Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:30 pm
Location: Cape Town, Western Cape

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Wed Feb 06, 2013 8:54 pm

Thanks, Still got a way to go but the trip is fun so far
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby Fishy » Mon May 06, 2013 8:40 pm

So, as promised, a update. Sorry that there is no in between pics but it is not recommended to handle a camera with silicone hands :biggrin: So here is the completed cage

Image

Think it came out came nicely. Like the coconut hides. There is also a coconut feeding bowl. Just a question, how do you prepare these? I just baked them...:shock:

And here is a teazer for the plant selection

Image

Image

Image

Image

Also the cage might now be used for Giant Day Geckos
Fishy
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2012 11:21 pm

Re: First Natural setup - Journal

Postby RJG » Mon May 27, 2013 12:36 pm

This is a awesome post. Any updates? I really like it when people explain what they used and how. Ive been wanting to do a natural viv for my white lips but never knew product names etc... Thanks.
...
RJG
SA Reptiles Member
 
Posts: 156
Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2011 1:17 pm
Location: Pretoria


Return to Enclosure building

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 0 guests

cron