Madagascar Mantella Paludarium

[deranged chipmunk]

Bill, First thanks for such an amazing and detailed build. You have inspired me !!! You are very creative and resourceful, and yours are certainly amonst the best tanks I have seen. You knowledge and talent obvious, and your work subtle and detailed.. I have been working out a builld, and have a few questions. First Question or I guess Comment is about the Mushrooms..( I love the idea of using these and am going to as part of my build). Well being a huge fan of your Titbond 3 Method, Would'nt that work just as well as a clear coat on the rooms? I have hit mine with Clear Coat Krylon, but am thinking as an extra precaution to give a couple of coats of Titbond. What do you think? My next question has to do with your drip irrigation Rain system. I thought this was very clever by the way.. How large of a pump is needed to make it work?? I can go to the Hydroponics place and ask, but I want to hear from you after using it in this application. I do have more questions of course, but I'll start with these... Thanks again for a most creative and detailed build..

You could coat them with titebond as an extra precaution, but keep in mind, titebond dries yellow. I went with clear acrylic nail polish because they were so small and a dollar for a bottle of nail polish was cheaper than a can of spray paint for the same purpose. If you cover them with krylon fusion clear, you'll be fine. I coated a couple dried shrooms with it in my white's tank.

My rain system ran (I disassembled it) off of a pond pump. When choosing a pump, I would recommend going bigger than you would expect. The more outlets you have, the more pressure. Try to figure out how many nozzles you will have, then talk to your hydro rep, they will set you straight. Expect to pay close to $60 or so for a pump.

Hope that helps!

[Sirjohn]

I ended up hitting the fungus and mushrooms with marine epoxy clear. They look good, just wanted to be sure as I wanted to use real ones, and didn't want nasties leeching out.. Why did you Dis Assemble the Rain system (Just curious), seemed like a good idea. But then again, simple is better I guess.. Like I said Bill, you have inpired me. I will post my build, and thanks again for a wonderful post, very well explained and detailed direction for an over the top vivarium build. Pointing out the importance of water flow underneath, filtration, and access to parts for repairs.. All very important.

[Bombina Bob]

Awesome tank Bill, Vivarium master! is there a list of aquatics that can
be planted in Vivs and paludariums? All i know is java moss and anubias.