29G Tall Tank: Build Log with Pics.

[froggsong]

BTW, thread title has been reformatted.

[TimrekWTF]

I wanted to note that with my hood, I used my daylight bulb on one side, the heat bulb on the opposite side and nightlight in the middle. Here's why: I think by putting the heat on one side of the tank, being that mine is roughly 24" wide as well, will create a zone in the tank that is a few degrees warmer than the opposite side thereby enabling the frog to move from one temp gradient to another and regulate its temperature. I seem to have good light saturation with the single daylight bulb and did not want to pummel the guys with too much UV light as they don't really need it. They are used to the forest floor if I'm not mistaken. Secondly, I didn't want the daylight bulb directly over my water simply help control rampant alge growth. I wont mind some slow growing green, I think it will benifit the tank but I don't want to be cleaning the majority of it out on a weekly basis. Thirdly, I wanted to utalize the middle socket for a nightlight as I am going to be housing a nocturnal species and would like to be able to see him without throwing on the floodlights. I may need to go to a redlight as the blacklight seems to light up all the scraps of paper in my den but doesnt provide much visable light to the tank floor, and the middle socket on my hood can operate independently from the outside. There is a link on the first set of posts to the exact hood. Now your application my differ greatly but this was my reasoning, hope this helps answer any questions you have. I am by no way an expert, quite the contrary, and there is the distinct possibility that I am completely off the mark lol.

[froggsong]

Tim, you have it perfectly right! You know, I don't know why I didn't think of that when I posted my last response, lol... I have my lights set up that way for my CWD. I think I was assuming it would be for a frog, and didn't think about a thermal gradient for them.

If you do go with a red light, the party lights from wal-mart work well, they are only 25 watts and don't seem to bother the frogs at all. However, if you can find one that is actually red glass, rather than painted red, I'd go with that, even if it is more expensive. With constant use, the painted bulbs begin to peel, then they have spots that are white light. If you do find one that is red glass, please do share where you get it from and what brand it is. I use a red bulb in my snake tank, because of the low wattage, and I am tired of them peeling on me.

[frasertheking]

looks great man.
have you looked at any of the aquarium substrates? they come in loads of colours, the amazon red types would look amazing on your water feature.
keep up the good work
Fraser

[marilu]

TimrekWTF, I really enjoyed reading your log and loved the pictures. It turned out so beautiful! Good luck on whatever frog ends up iin there!

[heartagramtc]

that is an amazing build! im sure when it grows in it will look 10x better!

[Shana's_mom]

I don't recommend putting a sticky under-tank heater on the glass behind the GS foam BG. I did this, thinking it would be OK since it wouldn't come in contact with water. Not only did the heat not get through the BG but it ended up cracking my glass. (It happened in less than a week.) I guess the BG acted like an insulator and kept the heat on the glass. It was an Exo Terra glass tank.

By the way, I am using the Exo Terra Compact Top Canopy. (My new tank is 45 x 45 x 60 cm) I have 2 of them and they each hold two bulbs. I have one fitted with two Sun Glo incandescent bulbs and the other fitted with two Moon Glo incandescent bulbs. I leave the Moon Glo on 24 hours. My tank gets to 30C in the day and 20C at night. It is home to my daughter's two adorable White's Green Tree Frogs.

Love your set-up and write-up. Your frogs should be very happy.

[froggsong]

That's very good info to share! Whether the heat mats could go on the glass behind GS is something we have been discussing for a while.

[Nicte1983]

This is an amazing thread, awesome job! I only just joined these forums and am on my first (re?)build of a standard 29G for a WTF that I haven't purchased yet.. I wanted to get the space ready, that was four months ago. I think your lessons are well related, I will try to go in about the same order with my comments/additions/questions.

I did the great stuff method and in researching & working on my 1.0 build over the last few months, I never realized that the wood was attached before the foam so no built in wood for me. (I'd love to have a branch mounted in somehow, if any one knows how after the fact..) I couldn't find the plastic crate type pots I have seen others use as forms for potted plants so I used peat pots, super cheap and you can cut the back off to make it flatter. Plus it doesn't look like foam when you look in without any extra work (just in case that soil line is lower than you thought)!

I also didn't realize the expansion keeps going for 24 hours! I also had the same thought about sculpting the non-cured foam and touching it just made it "gloppy" and dense, it was prettier before I mucked with it so I'll not do that again! (Not to mention that the more small crevices created the harder covering with eco-earth is.) I also didn't know about the black Handi-foam, which should hide better than the white/yellow great stuff (lots of my little "high" points are peeking through, any suggestions?). I will use it next time, for sure.

My first thought for my bottom has failed. I used a cat litter pan upside down, glued with aquarium sealant to the bottom of my tank (surrounded by gravel) to take up space, then mesh, then substrate with plants in it (I was hoping for lighter weight without spending a fortune in hydroballs). Even though my water level never went as high as the soil, the soil became waterlogged and now I'm going to take it apart and use the egg crate method (and before your post I didn't really understand it and thought it couldn't be hidden except by painting/covering the outside of the tank). Another plus is that the egg crate method has move inherent water, mine had only about a gallon so I had to add more nearly everyday!

Also a problem with my soil mix is that it was probably too much soil, I've read since that bulky mixes like orchid substrate are better because they don't compact quite so much. Does anyone know what the risk of impaction to my future frog would be with a higher bark mixture? Your tillandsias are gorgeous. I wasn't going to have any and now I will make space for one... or two.

In many of the egg crate methods I never saw the zip tie strategy, most just say be careful when you put it in. I like it. Also, I had toyed with the idea of drilling holes in the PVC for water drainage, but the slot method looks more functional. Which dremel bits worked best for you? (I have my safety goggles for shrapnel deflection). Thank you for the mention of where the egg crate is at the store, I didn't even know it was for lights, it's not exactly an intuitive name.

Is there any particular reason you put egg crate on the bottom of your pond area? Couldn't you just leave it bare?

Rather than use a pump and tubing method I went with the Reptofilter because I liked that it worked in shallow water. I got the plain green one optimistically thinking I could make it prettier than the decorative version- my artistic ability evidently doesn't go that far. I ended up gluing polished gravel to it. It doesn't look natural, but it isn't quite the sore thumb that it was. I would buy the decorative one if I could go back in time.

My light box (made by ESU) has two switches, two fixtures on the right and one on the left. It came with lights. Each fixture is rated for a 100w incandescent, but during the day I was hitting the upper 90s (probably because 3 sides of my tank are covered in insulation, duh!) so I switched one of the daylights to a normal CFL and that helped tremendously. Unfortunately the blue moonglow light doesn't put out enough heat so I'm thinking of using a submersible heater. I have read on many forums that the under tank heaters are generally disappointing regardless of great stuff issues so I'm going to avoid that. I will have about 4 gallons of water in my tank, so I'm planning on getting a Hydor Mini Heater (7.5w) to keep the water warm in winter when my room temp is in the low 60s I figure warm water will go a long way to temperature regulation, but I might end up needing another CFL daylight..

I'm thinking of using cork background to hide the egg crate "retaining walls" of my pond area - does anyone know if this breaks down/discolors water? (I would leave space at the bottom for water flow, maybe some large rocks there..)

Also, I'm in need of good branches/driftwood and suffering from sticker shock. Any crafty ideas?

[TimrekWTF]

Thank you for the kind words! To answer one of the questions in the last post, White's are poor swimmers and i wanted a shallow pond but still wanted the over-all water level to be high enough for the pump and so i wouldn't have to add water every couple of days. I found that stacking 2 pieces of egg crate together flat gave me about the right depth and added a bit of stability to the whole structure. As I was using gravel all around the sides and its a bit heavy as it is, I thought a couple of inces of gravel was worth another pound or two saved. The dremel bit was the flat sanding/cutting disc turned on its side.

And thank you to Shana's mom for pointing out the undertank heater issue. This makes up my mind to try a small submersable aquarium heater to get a few more degrees.