Chris and Char's vivs/terariums

[chris-uk]

At Marnie's request in another thread, here's some pics of our vivs. There's a 4th one that I'll be setting up on Sunday for Vlad, but we have 3 scattered around the house at the moment.

"The Girls Viv" - 60x45x45 ExoTerra, with heatmat on a Lucky Reptile thermocontrol II Pro, and LED lights from Ikea (controlled by the LR Pro II)
This is the one in the corner of our livingroom which houses the checkereds and blacknecks. Warm side is on the right. They like the plants and often there will be one watching you from the top on the left and right. In the close-up shot you can just make out a wire running from the top right corner to halfway across, it's the wire for the hygrometer - Esk and the blacknecks like to traverse it, hence we call it the tightrope. They seem to like the platform that I made for them (9mm dowel, string and lashings learnt in my Scouting days, no glue!).
There will eventually be another ExoTerra sitting on a shelf that will attach to the top of the chest of drawers, once my dad has made the shelf for me.






"Quarantine/Baby snake viv" - 40x30x35 Komodo, with heatmat on a Habistat dimming stat
One in the hallway next to the aquarium. It's intended for any new babies we get, but is temporarily housing Vlad.
Vlad hides and lives in the water, so we have the oversized water bowl in there at the moment.
It's a top-opening Komodo viv, and whilst it's fine for babies and quarantine I wouldn't buy another one unless I was keeping a couple of batches of babies.




"Lacrimosa's boudoir viv" - 60x45x45 ExoTerra, with heatmat on Habistat dimming stat, and daylight lamp on a timer
This one is in my office, in the space previously taken up by Char's PC screen (she uses her laptop all the time now). Laci hangs out either in the tubes, her bark hide, or the water bowl. She has an oversized water bowl too because the Cuitzeos love spending time in water. Plants are just decoration and ground cover, she never climbs them.




So that's the three vivs we have up and running at the moment, we've also got a 90x45x45 ExoTerra in the attic waiting for when we have enough room in the house to put snakes in it. I'll be setting up Vlad's ExoTerra on Sunday and temporarily putting it in our bedroom while I wait for my dad to build the custom shelf for the livingroom, then his viv will be moving to the shelf above the girls. That will mean we have an empty tank for some more snakes...

[guidofatherof5]

Great looking setups.

I don't think that platform is up to code.

[tress29]

I never thought to fold in the ends of the cardboard tube. I think my littlest guy could feel secure and maybe come out from under the water dish!

[badbunny42]

Where did you get the 60x45x45 ExoTerra from? I think lightning may grow out of hers sooner or later.

[EasternGirl]

Thanks for putting up the pics of those Chris! Great looking set-ups you have. I have been thinking about getting a timer for my lights but right now I have been using red lamps at night for added heat...I worry that the night temps get too cool even with the mats in the winter. What are your night temps again? In Hermes tank...my albino checkered..I only have a red bulb on...he seems to like it warm and I haven't turned his heat mat on yet because he keeps burrowing down on top of the glass above it and it worries me. So I keep his lamp on all the time. I don't know what I should do about that.

[chris-uk]

At night our house temperature doesn't drop below 19.5C, so I'm happy turning the mats off completely. During the day our temps are between 20 and 22.5C.
Where the mats are on stats I have the probe in the substrate touching the glass, so I measure the mat temp so I know it's not jot enough to burn our snakes.

@Ben - Seapets is good for ExoTerra vivs. Else the classifieds on RFUK for used ones. The 90cm was an ad I saw on Gumtree. I'm considering some wooden vivs when we move and I'm looking at more snakes as they stack far easier than ExoTerras.

[chris-uk]

I never thought to fold in the ends of the cardboard tube. I think my littlest guy could feel secure and maybe come out from under the water dish!

It works well for smaller guys, makes the entrance a lot smaller and more secure.