75 gallon Australia Paludarium/Vivarium

[daybr4ke]

Hi! I'll soon be acquiring a used 75 gallon tall tank with some WTFs I am rehousing for someone. It's going to need a little cleaning, but after that I want to put in an almost fully australian planted living vivarium. I love the idea of housing a frog with the plants they would encounter in nature. Larry Wardog's 55 gallon tropical Forest Paludarium is absolutely beautiful, and an Australian paludarium or vivarium was his idea initially. Here's a link to that thread:
http://www.frogforum.net/showthread....lon-Paludarium
I'm going to start with the plant list.
1. Ficus Benjamina-The weeping fig is an Australian native. Ficus microcarpa is an alternative, also australian.
2. Schefflera Arboricola-The Dwarf Umbrella tree may not be native to Australia, but it looks like a smaller version of a larger plant which is native to Australia. Not sure I have room for this.
3. Epipremnum Aureum- The humble pothos is naturalized across Australia(and New Guinea), and is a good option as a naturalized species.
4.Epipremnum Pinnatum- Cebu Blue Pothos is an Australian native, a relative of Golden etc pothos. I am searching like some sort of plant fiend for it.
5. Chlorophytum Comosum-Spider plant. While not a native of Australia, in the same genus is C. Laxum, AKA Bichetii Grass, which looks almost the same as normal spider grass. Spider grass should make a good stand in.
6. Austral Gem fern-Hybrid Australian fern. One of the species it is bred from is from an island off the coast of Australia and the other is native. Native enough for me.
7. Dendrobium Kingianum-An Orchid Native to Australia. Not sure I wanna use it yet. Havent worked with orchids.
8.Codiaeum variegatum-Gold Dust Croton. My gf wanted me to get it because she thought it was pretty. Looked it up and it's native to Australia.
In addition to these I want to add another australian fern. I'm still working out what will make it to the final version. Any experiences with these plants would be useful as would recommendations on the additional ferns(preferring hardier ferns. Austral Gem is pretty sturdy.)
Layout-wise I'm planning to have the ficus as a centerpiece in the middle to give it growing room, with the other plants distributed around it.

Thanks for reading!

[elly]

Ambitious! I would be excited to find Epipremnum Pinnatum myself. I've found orchids to be not too difficult but I don't know whether they need cold spells to bloom. I do know they need enough light.

[daybr4ke]

I think it is a bit ambitious, but I feel like I've learned quite a bit from my preliminary builds to help me construct this. Plus lots of reading lol.
If you ever find Pinnatum, I'd love to get a cutting sent over. They're in the Exotic Angels selection from Costa Farms, so I keep checking Wal-Mart's. I got a Pearls and Jade a few days ago, though. Not like checking doesn't still pay off. I made some posts on Gardenweb and Dave's Garden recently looking for the plant. No results yet.
As for the orchid, there are a few other possible orchids I could get as well. I'm glad to hear they aren't overly troublesome. I think one problem I remember reading about is they need additional nutrition to bloom, and tou can't spray them with nutrients in the frog's tank safely.
Even if it wont bloom and it just sits there, that's cool. I figured I'd plant it in a hollow cork log filled with orchid bark. I'm planning to read more about the care of the orchid before getting it, rather than just the national origin lol

[daybr4ke]

Alright, other things:
I am currently checking plant ranges since sometimes there's erroneous info on plant range on Wikipedia.
Plant placement is another beast entirely. Ferns need some shade, for this build specfically the Cadiaeum will need to be away from the Ficus Benjamina(which will require some bonsai type work). I don't want the ficus to be too tiny. I want it to give partial shade to a lot of the tank, with the ferns and pothos ground cover below. Dwarf Umbrella Tree was my alternate for this role. I dont think there is room for both, even in a 75 gallon tall tank. I think the codiaeum in to the left so it gets light with the ficus slightly on the right.
I have some questions: in a full scale vivarium/paludarium, how many plants are usually used?
Should I use 2 or 3 embedded plants on the back wall?
I could use 2 cultivars of epipremnum Aureum, like Golden and Manjula or something. I want one for Pinnatum. Maybe the spider plant should be in one.
Should I put a foam backing on the sides? I was thinking of putting foam on one or both sides in addition to the back. I want to make this a really nice tank, but I dont know if that's going overboard.
Thanks again everyone.

[elly]

I don't think foam on the sides is going overboard. It just depend on if you want to see the tank through those sides.

I wish I had given my plants more space than I thought they needed, though that's hard to do with Pothos because it will take everything available. I guess I just want to say, remember, some of them will grow like crazy.

[daybr4ke]

Thanks for the advice on the plant spacing and the foam on the sides. I think I'm going to put a background on one side, maybe with a ledge, possibly a planted ledge.
Also, I checked around and the following plants have conflicting origins from different websites:
Codiaeum Variegatum, Chlorophytum Laxum. Some sites dont mention Australia.
http://bie.ala.org.au/species/http:/...01574#overview
This one is for normal spider plant rather than bichetii grass. Spider plants seem to be naturalized in australia anyway. Wikipedia says Bichetii grass is from Australia in addition to other locations. I found bichetii grass online, but I don't wanna buy it if its not native to Australia.
The codiaeum is similarly listed as from Australia in Wikipedia, but not some other resources.

[Larry Wardog]

This setup is great! You went all out for plants I give you a lot of credit. I understand how hard it was to find some plants but you found tons. I am actually going to use some of these plants whenever I update mine this upcoming summer. This was well thought out and that's great that you have blue eye WTF because I think they are beautiful and I may get a male seeing as how I am in need of a male with the loss a year ago of my last male. For the plants yes the pothos you only need a few small pieces because it will spread. I have pothos and it started at the left side of the tank this summer and it is wrapping back around to the left side again. It spread out 4 feet and would keep going if given space. Make sure you keep up with it so it doesn't choke plants out. The plants are in your opinion. I think having many plants looks cool so that would be cool and more natural to have a wide variety. I think you should consider Rainbow Fish or Mosquito Fish because they are native and one is invasive but now local so they both would work and not attempt to harm the frogs. You can't go overboard with the fish because too many rainbow fish will kill them from the size they attain and enough mosquito fish and they will breed fast and out of control. You could if your fish breed feed them on occasion to the frogs or if you had any other animals. I am moving more to a hybrid setup with Asia and Australia as the two conjoined environments for my setup so you have the real Australian setup. If you need help message me. I got a new phone and downloaded the app finally!

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