New grow out tank, humidity too low - HELP!

[Roy Anthony]

Hi All!

Long time reader, first time poster. I have 20g tank that I converted to a vertical vivarium. I would consider this my first real tank where I was actually successful in growing moss and plants. Construction and planting officially finished in early April. The issue I've been having is that I can't seem to raise the humidity with my current setup. I'm maxing out at 50% most days. I believe it may be the lack of ventilation within my tank, which would also explain the heat! I figured I'd better get suggestions from some froggers with real experience, and maybe recommendations based on my setup!

Tank Specs:
12.25"W x 12.25"L x 30"H
- Front: Glass pane held in place with magnets

Ventilation:
(2) 1.75" holes on the top glass.

Lighting:
Jungle Hobbies LED Lighting System
- positioned 2.75" from above the tank

Misting:
MistKing system, 3 nozzles - 2 front corner, 1 back corner.
- Schedule: 5 times a day, 20 secs

Drainage:
False bottom
- Syphoning out the water

Plants:
Ficus pumila 'Minima'

Ficus exotica 'Oriental'

Southern Maidenhair Fern

Philodendron 'McColley's Finale'

Tradescantia fluminensis 'Wandering Jew Tricolor'

Peperomia trinervula 'Bibi'

Selaginella kraussiana 'Gold Tips'

Lysimachia sp. - Creeping Jenny

Ficus pumila 'Creeping Fig'

Neoregelia 'Chiquita Linda'


Background:
Ecoweb + Hygrolon + Moss spores

Here are some pictures of everything (start to now):
















I plan on putting a tree frog species in here (most likely P. Tomopterna) once I get the humidity and temp situated. Any recommendation would be great!!

Thanks,
Roy

[DigitalPunk]

Hey Roy! Welcome to the Frog Forum!

First off Great job on the tank. I looks amazing!

I have a couple questions to help isolate what might be causing your problems.

1. What are you using to heat the tank?

2. What sort of Drainage layer/false bottom are you using

3. How often do you mist that tank? --- NM just reread your post. 20 Sec isn't that long. May need to increase that, but we can look at it once the heat is sorted out.



First thing I want to look at is the heat issue. Heat and Humidity are inversely related to each other. When heat rises humidity naturally decrease. What this results to in Vivariums is the hotter you keep the tank the more often you will need to mist to maintain the desired humidity. When you add ventilation you are further reducing the amount of Humidity that is trapped in the tank as well. Most tree frogs require good ventilation so we don't want to eliminate those.

Let me know what you have heating the tank. Aquatic Heater, Ambient room temperature, sun from a window, Ceramic heat emitter, Heat cord... anything. Once we figure out your heating problem the humidity will be much easier to address.

Thanks

Paul

[Roy Anthony]

Thanks for the reply and warm welcome, Paul!

The crazy thing is, I'm not using anything to heat my tank and the temperature is still extremely high . I keep the tank in my garage for now, which stays about 77 ºF during the day, and drops to high 60's at night. The only window is positioned on the other side of the garage, so I don't think the sun hits it much or even at all.

For the false bottom, I have about a 2" egg crate structure being supported with PVC piping that have notches in them for the water to escape. I then use Hydroballs for filtration, followed by Peat moss + Ecoearth, and ABG mixture. Tropical moss and random spores took over the top layer.

Do you really think 20 secs, 5 times a day is a little too less? I've experimented with 30 secs a few weeks ago, couldn't tell much of a difference (although my reservoir was emptying a lot quicker!)

Thanks,
Roy

[DigitalPunk]

Hmmm Have you tried placing a glass thermometer in the tank to gut check your digital one? Maybe a false reading or has a error range of + or - 1 -10%....? Digital meters tend to be flakey in my experience. I have all but phased them out of my tanks in favor of old school lol. If they get wet they can read way way off... could that be happening here? Does it feel like 88F when you put your arm in it?

In your false bottom do you currently have any water? If not adding water to fill the False bottom by 1/2 will help with humidity some.

Looks like your probe for your digital hydrotherm is near the top. Try placing it about 1/2 down in the center of the tank for a bit. That will give us a better look at the average temp in the tank. Glass thermometers are cheap, I would get a couple and put them at varying heights and use those to help dial in what your digital is really telling you.


When your mister runs for 20Sec what does the humidity read at the end of the mist cycle? It is most definitely a balancing act between misting enough to keep the humidity up, but not so much to swamp out the tank... the drainage layer will help with that....

Will the tank live in the garage permanently or is this just a temp location? Have you tried moving the tank inside to see how the temps and humidity work their. Often in a enclosed space with poor ventilation 77 outside can feel like 90 inside (such as in a garage with the door closed). You could try something as simple as running a ran in the room to help move air around and see what changes that causes in the tank..

Sorry I am all over the place. I don't see/read anything wrong with the tank that would be causing this..... I am going to go get some sleep... I will check back in the morning.

[Roy Anthony]

Just bought a few glass thermometers on ebay . I'm terrible at "feeling" out temperatures, but it seems to be decently warm. This is my second digital hygro-therm reader. The first exo-terra I had read pretty well for awhile, then just started throwing out some far out numbers. I'll lower the probe on my Sunleaves farther down and see if I get some clearer read outs.

The false bottom usually has about an inch to 1.5" of water depending on how much is syphoned out (usually happens once every few weeks). Haven't paid attention to the readings when my mister is on, but i'll definitely take note tomorrow.

The tank will probably live in here for a least a few more months - until I can convince my gf otherwise . The garage door is always closed since we use it mostly for storage and "my cave". There's a few wall ventilations that are 5 feet away in both directions from the table the tank resides on. I can try placing a fan in the garage to get some air circulation going.

You don't think it has anything to do with the minimal ventilation that the tank actually has? I thought about drilling two more holes on the right hand side to a little more air flow, but pretty hesitant. 1. Because I don't want to possibly decrease the humidity even further. 2. Because I don't want to fool around and possibly crack the glass 3+ months in!

Thanks,
Roy

[Mentat]

Nice tank... GF does not like in house... time for new GF ! Joking aside; it is perplexing to me a tank in a 70-60F garage would hold 88F with LED lights and no heat sources. Is glass under them lights warmer than others to touch?) .

Drilling the side glass will present a challenge unless you can set tank on side because drill bit needs to remain wet.

I would move tank inside just for one night to see how it goes. As Paul stated, do ensure the humidity probes are not getting wet and giving false readings. Walmart has the glass aquarium thermometers for $2 in the pet section. Good luck !

[flybyferns]

Hi

You did a great job converting the enclosure.

I believe , as well, there is simply something wrong with the device you are using to measure the humidity.
Therefore, you have to be suspicious about he accuracy of the temp as well.
The humidity devices are notoriously inaccurate wrong - enough to pull your hair out

I have one mist head in 2 of my exo- terra ( drilled for drainage) 18x18x24H enclosure = and they are fine

A tank that size, with that many mist heads --- no way the humidity is 50% --- Just no way!
Just look at the moisture on the glass.

I see from your "location" you could be anywhere in the US?
It would help us if we could narrow down the location - a bit
Are you monitoring the garage/ ambient temperature. Is it heated?
Have you considered waiting -> through the winter to monitor things more closely;
unless you can move the tank easily if it gets too cold.

The interior of the enclosure will be cooler than the area .

Carlos and I use the little 2$ thermometers. The are very accurate and you can move them around!

[deranged chipmunk]

Now, I am just gauging my opinion from looking at your plants and ignoring everything else, but your humidity is definitely NOT 42%. I would say it's closer to 85-90%. Some of the plants you have in there would definitely dry up and start to die off at 42% humidity. I would defiantly question the hygrometer/thermometer combo.


Education is the most powerful weapon we can use to change the world ~ Nelson Mandela

[DigitalPunk]

Roy you will be fine now. You have attracted the "A" to help you out

I was thinking the exact same thing about his humidity, but wanted to nail down the temp thing before doing anything else


Roy you could remove the digital sensor from the tank for a week and let it dry out and then introduce it to the tank shortly after a misting and see what it reads from there. This will most likely fix the exo terr sensor that start showing way wrong numbers. That is what happens when the sensors get wet

I do not use any Hydrometers in my tanks anymore simply because I couldn't trust them. I now mist based off of how dry my plants and moss look and let that be my guide. I do have my old Exo Terra meters I put in from time to time to gut check myself, but am trying to learn to not depend on them.

Good luck and keep us in the loop!

[Roy Anthony]

@ Carlos - The glass is about the same temperature as the rests of the sides. And yes, I would have to unfortunately turn the tank on the side to drill, which is something I don't think I want to consider after all! I may try to see how the inside fairs if this doesn't get resolved soon. The probe is usually pretty soaked after mistings, so I'm assuming that's throwing readings off.

@ Lynn - Thank you, it was a nightmare removing the black aquarium trim, though . The only reason I had 3 mist heads installed was because the back panel of ecoweb + moss wasn't getting enough moisture, and thus drying up any moss growth. Crazy to think that those couldn't keep the humidity high enough! I live in California, within Silicon Valley. Around here it's normally a consistent 75 degrees outside, and around the same inside. The winters don't dip that low either, up until this last winter which had it's sporadic cold streaks. I keep all my other reptiles in here without any heat source with no issues. I ordered some cheap glass thermometers, so hopefully that gives me correct readings!

@ Bill - I guess I refused to believe that two of the digital readers were bad, and assumed it was just my tank. The glass always has condensation on it and the plants, even though a few have started to fade, seem to be flourishing. I just didn't want to take a chance and put any frog in there when the conditions could life threatening for them.

@ Paul - Yes, a lot of good suggestions from everybody! I'm going to let the digital reader sit out a few days and see if that helps any. I'm still thinking about at least raising the LED lighting higher, since some of the moss up top seem to be fading away.

I'm also going to try using some old computer fans to circulate the air a bit and see if that helps any. Fingers crossed at this point!

[DigitalPunk]

If anything the LED lights could be to bright but there is no way the produce enough heat to cause this. My money is on a faulty sensor from being wet.

Hope you get this figured out sooner rather than later. Keep us in the loop . It's never hopeless

[sorethumb]

You could just run a drip wall waterfall feature that would
Bring the humidity to the level your stabbing for . Good luck

[deranged chipmunk]

The light being close could cause issues growing moss up top because it prefers less light, but it wouldn't heat the tank to the point of losing humidity.



Education is the most powerful weapon we can use to change the world ~ Nelson Mandela