Putting water in a "Zilla Critter Keeper"

[ejh805]

Thank you ^_^

I'll be sure to post pictures when I finally get the whole setup together.

[ejh805]

I just got a bunch of my supplies in the mail today. Should the heating pad go above or below the substrate line?
oh, and the brown color would be the level of substrate

[deranged chipmunk]

Above. If you go below or partially below, your pixie could get burned if he burrows close to it.

[ejh805]

****...is there any safe way to take a stick on heater like this and reposition it?
I didn't think to ask this until I'd already stuck it on. I have it like the 3rd picture, and I don't want to make the substrate any shallow-er.

[deranged chipmunk]

easy......silicone a piece of glass to work as a thermal barrier, so to speak. have the glass cut a few inches higher than your substrate, then glue it in about an inch away from the back wall, running parallel with the back glass. it should run from the divider to the wall opposite the divider. otherwise, you can try a razor blade and work the uth off the glass slowly, but in all reality, that will probably wreck the heater. the glass will act as a barrier for the frog and i would slit a piece of tubing and glue that to the top of the new piece of glass so your frog doesn't hurt himself if he freaks out.

[deranged chipmunk]

i'll try to come up with a simple diagram for you if this doesn't make sense.

[ejh805]

Im pretty sure I understood what you said. I was able to pry it off with a razorblade. It came off pretty easily. How do I tell if it is messed up though?

Also, I'm conducting the water test now, and it seems like it's gonna hold up it holds just under 5 gallons. And I replaced the log hide with a bridge-type thing from the fish section of the pet store.



and those little balls under the log are hydroballs. still waiting to get mesh to separate it from the eco earth stuff.

[deranged chipmunk]

are you going to filter the water? or are you planning on just changing it weekly? and don't forget to leave yourself some way to siphon out the extra water from the hydroton. but it is looking great i love the ladder.
the only way to test it is to attach it and plug her in and see if it gets warm. if it came off easily, then it should be ok. and i like the hide o the land side. and i think your frog will too

[ejh805]

Mhmm, I'm going to be getting a Fluval U2 in the next couple of months, so it'll be that along with weekly partial water changes (depending on how messy Mr. Frog is), and probably fishing out big chunks of nasty.
I bought some plastic tubing so I can siphon the old fashioned way...suck on the tube and just hope I dont swallow any frog-water haha. Blech
Probably gonna be adding some fake grass to the water area. And I don't think I'll need the fogger I was planning on getting...the hygrometer stuck on the side of the tank has been reading a consistent 50-60% throughout the day. That should be high enough, right?

[deranged chipmunk]

put a long enough tube on it, then a valve at the end, and you'll only have to siphon once. i would recommend putting some water in before you add the substrate, then siphon a little bit off, close the valve and you'll be good to go. now, anytime you want to siphon water out, you just need to open the valve. put a small chunk of sponge on the end under the hydroton and you won't need to worry about clogs.

not sure about the humidity on the pixies. sorry hit the care sheet

[ejh805]

FINISHED! Now she can move into her tank I'll put the log in there when it isn't so gargantuan compared to her.

If anyone spots something that NEEDS to be changed, please let me know

[deranged chipmunk]

i wanna post this like a noobie (yes, i am a newbie too, but i mean a REAL noobie).....wow!! that looks awesome!! i can only hope mine looks like that some day!! i love that back ground. did you make it yourself? and if you did, can you write up a detailed step by step picture post on it? and oh, yeah, how did you get the lamp in there on the last pic? did you use glass to build a stand for the lamp because it looks like it is floating, that is so COOL!! what are you gonna put in that tank?

sorry, i just finished reading about 40 pages just like that on another forum. god, did we all post like that at one time?? LOL seriously, emily, that looks really good. your little one is gonna love that tank. plenty of water to soak in, a lot of area to burrow in. yeah, that's gonna be one happy frog. Well done!!

[ejh805]

Hahaha! Well, thank you Bill!
I'm pretty happy with it. It's too big for her to hunt in at this point, so I'm feeding her in the critter keeper I got her in and it seems to be working well. Right now she's actually trying to eat a nightcrawler that's easily as big as she is. I put a cut up one in there and a whole one, and she went big!