10 tips for being GREEN and saving money

[Leefrogs]

We all want to be greener, and save gas and money. So being green, you use things others throw away, or things you already have. Ordering things through the mail is fine if you can't find what you want localy, ordering adds pollution. So here's my list of things you can do to go green and save money.

#1 raise your own crickets, saves allot of gas and money
#2 pick your own wood, you can get just the right piece
#3 use and old or cracked tank, you can easily hide flaws
#4 pick your own rock or buy in bulk from a landscaper
#5 grow lights from Walmart or Lowes 1/4 of the cost and the same thing
#6 buy your worms from Walmart, they're parasite free and not 5$ a doz like petco
#7 get your plants from a florist instead of online, cheeper
#8 use tubs or storage bins instead of cricket keepers
#9 use pots from around your house or votives for your plants
#10 don't buy those jacuzzi tubs, use an old ashtray, kids cup, or even make your own, make a pool, or seal up a coconut shell

I love the look of something in-organic in a naturalistic viv; I have a big chunk of marble that the frogs love to cool off on, and opal bathes in an antique marano glass ashtray. So be brave, do something unique, use what u have. Your frogs will love your new green aura!!!

[bshmerlie]

Here's a couple more.
1. Fruit flies- easiest of all bugs to culture...almost a free food source.
2. Plants...whenever you buy a new plant. When you take it out of the pot to wash off the soil and roots separate a section of the plant with some roots and put it back into the pot with the soil. The other larger half can go in your viv. The small section put on a window sill in your kitchen, water it and in 2-3 months you will have a whole new plant for your next viv. FREE.

[Leefrogs]

Can we use the word FREE?!? Lol!! oh there's more than 10, just thaught 10 made a better list so if you want more --
#11 make. Your own vines
#12 make a waterfall instead of buying one
#13 only use cricket drink for babies
#14 make your own crix food
#15 make your own viv from dicarded glass
# 16 make your background instead of buying it
#17 treat your water instead of buying it
#18 wash and bake your dirt and re-use it
Or atleast don't throw it in the trash, add it to a house plant
#19 use your grow lights for a year instead of 6 months

Anyone have questions on wood, use tres like oak, birch, ironwood, popple, maple and etc... No pine or cypress

[Kisa]

Wow Ginger thanks so much for this amazing thread, it can really help a lot of those frogger who were ignorant in their first try and did all of this stuff the wrong way.

I'm going to definitely be more green and try to save more money as time goes on and I build more vivs or get more frogs. This summer I'm cleaning out my closet so I can raise crickets. Hopefully it'll be escape-proof...don't want them running around in my clothes...>>

But anyway, thank you Ginger!

[Leefrogs]

thanks, but my modivation is based on how many times have we heard, "I don't have the money". Well, you can buy five real plants for the price of a fake one. And all those pennies you can save can go to the frog emergency fund (vet bills) or for your next project. I like the originality of this hobby not the "off the shelf" look. So real wood is everywhere, even those that live in the city can find some on a hike or on vacation, and it may be your favorite piece, because it fits right and frogs love to hang out on it.

Any questions on crickets, wood, making vines, are welcome. I have a few hundred crickets and will probably freeze them in a coffee can for when I have a clutch that doesn't come out. Otherwise I don't know what to do with them all.

Any new ideas welcome also!!!

[UncleChester]

#1 savings for me is reusing other peoples old junk they were going to throw away anyway. From glass to build viv's, window/door trim for frames, chunks of closed cell foam for backgrounds, old scratched aquariums, to metal grating material, if someone is throwing it away and I can think of a use for it...

#2 savings for me is to buy bulk, and usually not from pet stores. I could get 1kg of LECA from a pet store for ~$12, or ~20kg for $30 including tax from the hydroponics store. Same goes for many other supplies, cement for backgrounds, huge bale of peat moss, vinyl tubes for water lines, landscape fabric for covering the LECA is sold in garden sized quantities at Home Depot, etc. It may cost more at the start, but in the long run it is much cheaper. Share the bulk costs with friends if you prefer, or hoard it for future builds like I do.

[1beataway]

When you find wood, for how long and at what temperature do you bake it?

1) My first suggestion is to breed mealworms. They're not a staple food, obviously, but they're so incredibly easy to breed that it doesn't make sense not to! I went a few months with no carrots in the tote, and I still got a few generations of mealies during that time period.

2) Use pothos. I can buy a plant from Wal-Mart for $2.75, and they grow so easily and so well. You can always grow more from cuttings, and if it starts to get to big for the tank, you just cut!

[Leefrogs]

1 hour at 200 degrees. Or until it sets on fire-- LOL.
Or if it's too big for the oven, or from a saltwater beach
You have to soak it in a tub with bleach water for 24 hours
And clean water for 24 hours to get bleach out.
Dry thoroghly

I love photos, a tough plant.

[clownonfire]

Ginger, just wanted to stop by and tell you that this was a great thread.

[Eric Walker]

My favorite green act is going to my local hospital. They have a closet they fill with medical shipping boxes that they stock up until they can find something to do with them. Instead of buying them from a shipping company i get ones that would otherwise most likely be thrown away. You can reuse them over and over if they are in good shape and they are medical grade. Plus they are FREE.

I hate Styrofoam but i feel so much better knowing I am refusing instead of making more garbage


for all you shippers out there I highly recomend checking with your local hospital. They are normally more than happy to help. Plus i have educated and created interest in frogs with plenty of hospital employies by explaining why I am there

[Leefrogs]

that's so awsome, I have a box of strofoam I've been holding onto for a year. It's the one thing that cannot be recycled. I think that's great advice!! Can't we use this for some of a drainage layer for frogs? I've read that somewhere, I don't know if it was "highly" recomended. Let's face it, it will never break down.

[Eric Walker]

Iv Read that before as well but i would rather just use rock. Plus Im not sure if that is the Type of foam they were talking about

[Leefrogs]

I think I now have a use for all that foam. The plan I have the water won't flow through it anyway.

[Leefrogs]

I have a another, using a clamp light from Walmart(8$), or one you already have, for your moon bulb(blacklight)

[Leefrogs]

there's another I forgot, use a human heating pad (instead of a UTH) especially if you own one already.

[Leefrogs]

I'll doing a build in the next few days with this in practice.
I didn't buy anything exept the plants!!! And some silicone. I will have to buy a hood, the frogs will be agalychnis annae

[bshmerlie]

Please document your build we would love to see how you build it.

[Leefrogs]

ok, so the 10 gal done, I'm going to wait to put doors on till Monday. And I did break one of my own rules. I have a store baught palm leaf!! All the rocks from outside in my giant rock collection. When Picts actually get posted, the first picture of the tank on a split rock outside, that's not my background. Ok, someone else has to post fir me and they ,"want the frogs are here".

I asked my friends if they'd ever get sick of mushrooms in every viv I have. They said no!! And helped me through the whole project. We ended up with a mushroom pool and a planter. And one that looks like a flower.

But 2 inches of packing peanuts
2 " cocofiber
3 " plantation soil
Sphagam moss
10 rocks
Many mushrooms
Brom
Birds nest fern
Wild stick
Prayer plant
And one I forgot

[Leefrogs]

This green build is in my alblum. I used packing peanuts for drainage layer and tried to use all my own advise. I did buy a dome light and built my own conversion kit. Glass was 4$ and sceen was 8$ beacause of laybor.