DIY - Isolation/Hydration Station

Every once in a while, you're going to need to separate one of your animals from the others - whether it's a new arrival, an illness, an injury, aggression, etc. This can be done quickly and easily, for far less than the cost of setting up an entirely new tank. The DIY I'm showing here is designed for temporary use (generally for injury or hydration), since it's such a basic set-up, but it can be easily modified to suit your needs.

In this case, I'm showing you how to make a 'hydration station' for a Crested Gecko.

Since I'm working with smaller animals, I'm using a plastic shoe box that was given to me by a friend of mine - I've also used plastic tubs designed for storage, which can be used to accommodate larger animals.

As substrate, I've laid down a couple paper towels. Paper towels are an excellent substrate for hydration, as they hold quite a bit of moisture - they are also a great choice for juveniles of many species, as well as injured animals due to their cleanliness, ease of changing, and color (white, simple backgrounds are far easier to spot waste and other important to see items on).

I've misted heavily, and placed a food dish into the shoebox.



Using a paring knife, I poked several holes in the lid.
(Apologies for the angle, but it does show some of the holes better than a straight on view.)



Annnnnd... that's it.

Easy, huh? :)

Now, for a recovering animal, this is a pretty solid set up (add a water dish if they're going to be in there for more than a few hours, even with a heavy mist) - for an animal that just needs to be separated and is going to be in there for a prolonged period of time, use a larger space and add more decorations (paper towel and toilet paper tubes work well for a variety of species). Done and done. Quick, easy, and inexpensive.

DIY - Naturalistic Background, No 'Great Stuff' Needed!

I'd be amazed if no one had thought of this before, but I personally haven't seen any threads about it, so here you go! They're quick, easy, and don't require the curing time or mess that great stuff and silicon do.

You will need:
-Your tank
-A pen of sorts for marking (I had a sharpie lying around so I used that)
-Strong scissors/wire cutters
-Hot glue gun&extra glue sticks
-Fake plants (I got mine from Michael's Arts&Crafts - it is important when selecting your plants that you make sure there are no sharp edges or little pieces that they could pull off&hurt themselves.)
-Contact Paper Cork Board (You can find several different brands, available in different places - I don't remember where I got mine, it might have been Orchard Supply Hardware. Here's a link to some that they have on amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Tact-04F-C6421-06-18-Inch-4-Feet-Adhesive/dp/B000WEPD6U/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1301162045&sr=8-2
-Optional, Strongly Suggested: A good sense of humor

All the supplies, put together (oooh... ahhh... a visual aid...):



Pick the side that you want to decorate, and measure it out on the cork board. I'm working with scraps that I had left over, and managed to have just enough to cover that back wall of a 10 gal that I wanted to decorate. Draw your lines, then cut.

Personal recommendation: I like to cut the cork a little bit smaller than the dimensions of the side I'm putting it on, so that I know it will fit, and it gives me a little leeway with the plants and letting them stick over the edges. (For example, if the side was 18x24, I might cut the cork at 16x22)

Measure, draw, cut:



Plug in that hot glue gun, grab your fake plants, and start decorating!



A couple 'rule of thumbs' that I like to keep in mind:

-With my geckos, "If it's not nailed down, they're going to tear it up." My critters /love/ these backgrounds, and it shows.

-Fabric is easier to glue than plastic. I always make sure to anchor the plants down by the 'stem', and then additionally by gluing a couple of the leaves to the cork as well.

-When in doubt, add more glue. It doesn't always have to be to the cork board - sometimes I'll glue one leaf to another well anchored leaf.

I like to rotate it a little, make sure I get a different view as I'm gluing stuff down, and 'over fill' the background a little - that's my own personal preference.



When I think the background looks full enough, or I'm done burning my fingers on the glue gun (which, for a ten gallon, takes about an hour), it looks something like this:



Turn it over, peel off the paper...



And press it onto the inside of the tank. Make sure to be very thorough, so that it adheres fully - I like to start from the center and work out, which helps to eliminate any air bubbles that might have gotten caught between the paper and the backing.



They're quick, easy, and hold up well to both the geckos and the humidity.

Hope this is helpful! :D

A gratuitous shot of the 20 L I did about 4 months ago:

DIY - Naturalistic Crested Gecko Background/Hide Spots

Alright, while I've been waiting to get the animals moved in at my new place, I have admittedly been going a little stir crazy without them. One of the awesome things about reptiles, though, is the amount of awesome things you can do to decorate their tanks - something which, in my case, can be worked on without either the animals OR their enclosures (as long as you know the dimensions of the tank you're working with).

So, what better thing to do with my time than work on decorations?

About a year ago, I started on a custom backdrop for my Crested Gecko breeder tank. Crested Geckos are an arboreal species, which live in semi-humid, moderate temperature environments - meaning that when I'm creating a background for these guys, I need something they can climb and hide in, which will stand up to a somewhat moist environment. To make one yourself, you will need:

1) Great Stuff Expanding Foam Insulation (I bought 2 cans of it, since I hadn't used the material before, and I wasn't sure how much I was going to need.)
2) Something to act as the base for the background. I personally like to use flat sheets of cork board - it's reasonably inexpensive, lightweight, easy to manipulate so that I can get it the right size&position, and it seems to stand up well to my tanks&their inhabitants. Additionally, a lot of cork board packages come with some sort of self-adhesive Velcro pads, which you can use to mount the background to the tank if you deem it necessary (as with anything you put in your tank, be aware of the dangers of placing an adhesive in the enclosure - I prefer to make the background large enough that I can wedge it tightly against the back of the tank to prevent slippage, or small enough that I can use a suction cup based clip for easy removal.)
3) Wire Cutters or strong scissors
4) Hot glue gun (and extra sticks of hot glue)
5) Clear drying caulk
6) Dirt (I used loose coconut fiber that I had frozen for a week or two to 'sanitize' it, then defrosted)
7) Fake Plants (I got mine from Michael's Arts&Crafts - it is important when selecting your plants that you make sure there are no sharp edges or little pieces that they could pull off&hurt themselves.)
8) *OPTIONAL, STRONGLY SUGGESTED* Biodegradable planter cups

As I originally started this project nearly a year ago, I do not have photos of the first few steps - I know, I know - epic documenting fail. ;)

That's alright, you're intelligent people - I'm sure you can figure it out without the visual aids!

...Or, next time I make one of these, I'll photograph that as well.

The breeder tank that I use for the Crested Geckos is an 18"x18"x24" - I started by arranging the cork board into an appropriate sized back drop (taking several 12"x12" pieces and cutting&hot gluing as appropriate to create an approximately 17"x17" square - allowing space on the edges for the Great Stuff Expanding Foam to... well... expand, after I sprayed it on... more on that in a moment).

After I had hot glued the pieces of cork board into an appropriately sized&shaped base to start with, I took some of those biodegradable planters and arranged them on top of the base (to create pockets for hiding/sticking the fake plants in later) - I ended up cutting the biodegradable planters in half to create a more natural look, then hot glued them in place as well.

Next step... GREAT STUFF! This was actually the most unusual (and simultaneously most nerve-wracking) step for me, since I had never used this particular medium before (it was recommended to me by numerous people who have done their own Crestie enclosures). I took the Great Stuff Expanding Foam, and commenced to cover the entire thing - I actually ended up overdoing it a little, I think - it sort of started swallowing those plant pockets I had created with the biodegradable planters - but it all worked out well.

I let the Great Stuff dry COMPLETELY, then picked up the Clear-Drying-Caulk and my bag-o-dirt.

...This step was SO messy. I ended up covered in caulk and coconut fiber. I really wish someone had managed to get a photo of me; I looked like a swamp thing.

Basically, I smeared the entire thing with clear drying caulk, and then covered it with the dirt.

...I had SO. MUCH. FUN! :D

The end result (after letting it dry completely, and shaking off the majority of the extra dirt... both from the background and from myself) left me with something like this:



Lumpy, brown, and reasonably unimpressive, albeit a pretty good start if I do say so myself. (You can't see them, particularly from this perspective, but there are four plant pockets hidden in there - their 'invisibility' isn't necessarily a bad thing; I prefer the look of not being able to see where they are - it feels more 'natural looking' to me; however you do yours is up to you. Have fun! Get creative!)

I then proceeded to let this air out for... oh... about a year (literally, since I sort of forgot about it). You don't need to let it air for that long, but I'd give it about a week in a well ventilated place to finish out-gassing. If you're not sure if it's done, give it more time - you definitely don't want those chemical smells in with your critters.

After it's completely done drying and is no longer giving off that chemical concoction aroma, it's time to DECORATE! Grab those plants, people!



Plug in your hot glue gun, and start playing around with where you think you want your plants to be. Once you like the way they look, get going! Begin to hot glue them in place.



*NOTE* A good deal of fake plants have wires in them that will help hold shape to some extent (this is where the wire cutters come in - trimming pieces off larger plants, etc), and it's important to remember that your critters will actually be actively involved with this background. While the support of the wire is nice, there's nothing quite like spending a ton of time putting a tank together, only to walk in the next morning and find that your geckos (party animals that they are) destroyed it over night. I make sure to 'anchor' the plants with hot glue in several locations, to prevent slippage, offer more stable footing to the animals, and stop the animals from massacring the decorations that they're clambering over.

When you're done (or have had enough of burning yourself on the hot glue), let it set to dry, and VOILA! You should be left with something vaguely resembling a naturalistic environment, that you can attach/wedge in to the back of your tank.



Personally, I have a blast with this stuff. Don't be afraid to get creative, have fun, and don't be afraid to make mistakes a mess ;) - it's how we learn.

Go enjoy your animals.