Progress of my first frog viv!

[Animalnstinct]

I think I have finally made it about half way through building my first frog vivarium and thought I would share what I've done thus far. I have made a couple smaller backgrounds for a few tarantula enclosures using silicon, great stuff, and kitter litter methods but this is my first true full vivarium build, which is for a few Bird Poop Frogs I plan to get soon.

Sorry about the horrible photos, especially the last one of the quikrete. I had better images ( and more of different steps ) and put them in a separate folder but lost it.

The first thing I did was I made the false bottom. I just used egg crate, zap straps, and screening. Basically the only thing different I did then just the typical flat egg crate bottom is I made a spot where I could drop a plant, still potted, in for easy access and to keep the roots from going crazy. I also have the egg crate corner wall so t I can slide in a pump for a waterfall.



The next thing I did was start spraying some great stuff down. I marked the areas I wanted the great stuff to be with a white board marker and then layer by layer built up the foam over about a weeks time.



Once I had enough great stuff filled into the size and area I desired I just started carving. This part took a bit and was a bit difficult due to being confined in the area of the terrarium.



After I carved the shape that I wanted I made 3 additional blobs of foam where I could carve in cup like shapes to create my actual waterfall.



Next, I wanted a river so I used even more great stuff and then carved the shape of the river I wanted.







After a few hours of cleaning out the foam pieces and giving it a light sanding I was ready to start putting cement on everything, which I did this evening. As you can see, I ended up not making a big enough batch to coat the whole thing so I decided to let what I have on there cure a bit and come back to it tomorrow.



Well that is what I have so far. I'm going to finishing covering the rest in the morning and then also give in another coat tomorrow night. After a 3rd coat and it's completely cured I will start painting it.

I will update this thread with some more progress images as I go.

[tjtreefrog]

That's awesome! I've never thought about using quikrete. I think I'll have to try that with a ball python viv I'm planning. Thanks for the idea, and the great pics. I can't wait to see how this turns out.

[TheBambooGoanna]

That looks great!! I can't wait to see what it looks like finished.

[Animalnstinct]

Thanks for comments everyone

I got the whole thing covered in quikrete today, except I did something a bit different. I was really upset with how grainy the mix was so this time I sifted out all the grain and pebbles and it went on way smoother. Though because it had to go over the grainy stuff it's not prefect but I'm hoping after another couple layers it will be a lot better.

What I have done.