Water Dragon Vivarium Project

[Brickster]

So this is my new project, the Lizard Lounge. This monstrous contraption is being built to house a pair of Chinese Water Dragons in comfort and style. Roughly speaking, it's 72"x18"x36" with the plywood extension. I'm still a long way off from being ready for lizards, but there's already enough life to make things interesting. It's about time to start cataloging progress too, so here we go!

It's hard to get good photographs with the lighting so roughed in. You can see the hardscape better in the early photos.









So the basics first:

The tank is a 125 with a big crack in the backside that was being used as a snake cage. The old silicone was cut out and replaced, and a pair of holes were drilled in the bottom before it was used here. I wouldn't trust it as a fish tank, but it's perfect for this. There is a 20L sump, fed by a Home Depot durso pipe. A Mag5 return pump feeds a waterfall feature in that big landscaping rock on the right. A closed loop in the display driven by a Mag9 makes for a pretty rough riverbank environment. There will be some interesting tricks to the ATO that maintain humidity and add a little fun.

The hardscape is about 300 pounds of stuff from Keller Materiels, another couple of hundred pounds in holey rock, and a whole tree's worth of dried cedar root. Now I need to grow a jungle on top of that. The big hood is being built around a pair of 250W metal halides. The greatest thing about using these for plants is that bulbs come from Home Depot and cost $26.99 While I was in the lighting department, I picked up a few other things for low lighting that I'll share as they get installed and tested. The reptiles will also require some sort of UVB lighting, though I haven't decided how I want to implement that yet.

The plywood section already built is part of the enclosure, with access being through the big screen doors (made from a dismantled 40B top). There will also be a cosmetic cover made once the equipment is built and in place topside. There's already some mosquito fish living and breeding in my little river, and a big crayfish poking around somewhere. I put a few test plants in the pool to see how they do, with many more to follow as I finish the hood and get things nice and humid in there.

Miles to go before it's done, will post updates.

[Brickster]

Some progress, top is sanded, puttied, and has paint inside.



These little guys are gimbal mounted MR16s for a nice shadowy low light phase.



I've just started to play with these, but they are going to work out really well. I have a couple of dimmer circuits to use, and a 6' LED rope light for night viewing. Due to the size of the enclosure, I will probably have to use T5 HO UV bulbs. Nothing else has sufficient throw.

Now THAT'S an airstone!



Four of these driven by a Coralife Luftpump have been placed along the back of the tank to get some humidity started. My RO is sitting under the sink ready to install. Once that is working I'll add some sprayers on timers, and try and figure out how to make it rain (!). The RO has a 3 gallon pressure tank, so I'm hoping I can tap straight off that. Not sure if it will be that simple, or if I'll have to add a booster pump. We'll see.

Not quite there, but *almost* ready to toss in one of these!

[Fenker]

Thats awesome! Ive had few vivs. Ive found out here in tx alot of viv plants grow wild or r very easily found at hd and lowes.