My understanding is that if even you aren't going to have a water feature, you're still going to need to siphon out excess and/or stagnant water, so some sort of access to the water in the bottom is necessary. There's several options, but I'll let someone a little more knowledgeable go into better detail. I just have a little "pond" for the frogs to soak in. I siphon and change the water from there.