First attempt at building a fake background.

[thadmy]

After a night of drying its time to cover the walls.

[DonLisk]

Nice. If you have not began putting the silicone to it you can cut in some ledges and overhangs with a sharp knife. I cut in crevasses, ledges and such pretty dramatically since the silicone fills them in fast and they end up covered mostly if not exaggerated. I also like to cut out under some locations I made for plants on occasion.

Doing this gives more depth and less interior space taken up by all the GS.

[thadmy]

I did cut out some crevasses that I'm going to put some pond stones in to make it look like a cliff, but I was wondering what the best way and thing to use for a water dish and also should I use a feeding dish for my clowns or will they not use it.

[DonLisk]

I use the reptile water dishes that look like stones for my tree frogs. I have places to set them instead of permanently installed since they should be rinsed with every water change.

I use the glass bowl method for feeding and my Red Eyes do fine so I don't see why the Clowns wouldn't mind it.

[thadmy]

If I wanted to make a small pool for them and grow bamboo how could I do that seeing how the only space I have left that is empty in the tank is what would be the side panel which is only 19 inches

[DonLisk]

You can use some eggcrate to block off a section with screen around the eggcrate. The have your drainage layer over the whole bottom except the area you have sectioned off where the water will be exposed.

Here is a link to Mikes build which he does similar.
http://www.frogforum.net/vivarium-te...ium-build.html

[thadmy]

If I end up doing a small pool I thought about using a small piece of glass to section off a small space for a pool. But if I make a pool will the frogs drink from the pool or will I still need a water dish in there for them

[DonLisk]

They drink by absorbing water only. They absorb it from the misting you do along with either soaking in the pool or a water dish.

Just have to make sure the water level isn't deeper than what they can rest in.

[thadmy]

Yeah I plan on putting a shallow plastic bowl in the tank since I don't feel like cutting away some of the Great Stuff and silicon since I put that all the way to the floor. I just want to be able to plant my bamboo in it figured on only having the water depth be about 2 inches

[DonLisk]

You wouldn't have to cut any background away since the GS and silicone are waterproof. In one of my dart tanks I actually pulled back the hydroballs and substrate, laid a piece of screen material in and used large stones to create a water feature which is pretty much only the collected water from the misting system. This made an easy place for me to remove the collected water.

To do so with tree frogs, just use large enough stones so the frogs can't swallow them.
The frogs you are planning on are not the most aggressive eaters so large aquarium stones are not something they are going to swallow. Just don't use pea gravel or small aquarium stones.

To change the water, just simply use a siphon hose and replace the water with fresh every few days. Only takes minutes.

[thadmy]

I got a bowl from work that is 4 in deep by 5 inches wide by 12 long so I might use that. Not getting the frogs till Feb and only putting plants in next month so I still have time to decide. I think I'm going to set it up using my idea and your idea and let it run for a couple days and see what I like. Problem with your idea is if I plant my bamboo in it like I want it will be in the front since I don't want to slope it to the back then it just makes it hard to change the water.

Although I could try to figure out how to slope it to the side.

[DonLisk]

What about sticking the bamboo right into the back lower section of the GS background right at the bottom? They don't have to be in a pool of water and grow just about anywhere. If you angle the holes to get the overhanging effect with the bamboo, it will make places to climb and bamboo only needs a tiny bit of water to grow. In this case, the water source would be the water collected in your drainage layer.

I use to have bamboo in with my WTFs and I just set them into a pile of stones to support them standing upright. I eventually had to remove them though since they are now well over 3 feet high :-)

[thadmy]

That's actually a really good idea with the bamboo. Could you upload of pic of how you used the screen to make a pool. Did you just use the screen to separate the dirt from falling into the drainage layer.

[DonLisk]

I don't have a picture of it but you basically just hold the hydroballs back and place your stones in on top of the screen material. Have the stones come up high enough to meet your substrates top so it doesn't fall into the water area.

[thadmy]

So I hold push the hydroballs back then place the screen over that where I then place rocks over it and levels the rocks off with the land so it doesn't fall in

[DonLisk]

Sounds right. you can just make an area sectioned off by using eggcrate to create the frame of the pond area, then screen all of that so the hydroballs don't get into the pond. Place that on the bottom and design your ponds contours with stone coming up on the sides to stop substrates from mixing in.

[DonLisk]

Here are some images of members tanks to get some ideas for doing your pond area.










Hope these help.

[thadmy]

Yeah the second one is most likely what I'm going to make. I just need to get all the branches in to see how much space I have in the bottom of the tank to do it. I'll post pictures tomorrow after the silicon has completely dried. I end up using small stones and dried sphagnum moss to cover areas on the GS that weren't covered with dirt.

That way it gives it more of a naturalistic look rather than just a dirt wall

[thadmy]

Here is what I have so far. I had to scrape the big tree as I got it from a friend and there was a dead lizard that had crawled inside and died. It smelt bad so I figured it would be toxic for the frogs so I'm going to the reptile show on Sat to get another big central branch.

The bottom I plan on sloping to a small pool in the front by the door leading up to land and then planting the bamboo on a slant in the back corner like you said. I also plan on adding more moss and small rocks to the side walls as long as a few vines here and there to create climbing spaces.

I was thinking getting a small colony of Clowns (4) and maybe 2 Neon blue geckos.

[thadmy]

Only problem I seem to have is because the side was so large I had to use two pieces of styrofoam and now it is bowing out on the side. I tried using silicone to hold the styrofoam to the glass but that didn't work. I'm trying gorilla glue tonight and I'm going to let it cure for a day.

Any ideas what else I could try if that doesn't work