Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey everyone! This is my first post, and im hopeing someone can help me out a little bit. I'm looking to adopt a full sized female iguana soon, and I need to build a cage. I have a rough idea of what i want, but I'm in no way an expert at this stuff. A few years back i had a shop class at the local highschool build me a small enclosure.

Anyway! I'm looking to make a basic cage made of maybe plywood (or anything cheap) and I had a few questions:

1. What would be the cheapest way to line the inside so i can keep the moisture up without ruining the wood?

2. The top will be framed with wood, but I can't figure out how to mount lighting without it laying directly on the wood... does anyone had any suggestions about high heat screening that would also be save if the iggy happened to grab it somehow?

3. how big should this cage be if the iguana is 4-6' STL but will have free range of my room when im home... so about 5 hrs a day? I have a small room, and I have to live here too haha.

ANY other suggestions are very welcome and appreciated! Thanks!

I will let others help with the cage size.

The cheapest way to line the inside the cage and make it truely waterproof is to use Drylok, specifically their latex-based masonry waterproofer. Be warned that this is not the most attractive paint and it is also highly textured. But it can be coated with other paints and at $20 per gallon provides and impressive level of protection. People have used it to coat the insides of large plywood boxes that have been made into several hundred gallon aquaria.

Regarding heat sources, I have set aluminum shrowd fixtures directly onto 1/4" galvanized mesh and had high powered ceramic heat emmiters shine through for years with no problem. The screen itself probably does get a bit hot and I don't know if an Iguana would be likely to jump up and hang on the screen or not. At any rate, I just cut a circle out of the wooden top that was about 2" larger in diameter than the light fixture. I then used heavy duty staples to screen over that. Worked well.
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Current snakes:

0.0.1 Gonyosoma oxycephala - Java locale (green)

0.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - Malaysian locale (green)

1.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - Java local (green)

2.2 Gonyosoma janseni - Seleyar locale (all black)

1.2 Gonyosoma janseni - Celebes locale (Black & Tan)

thanks for your help! I was thinking of making the whole top screen, but that would make it hard to keep up the humidity and heat... the hole with screen idea is genius (why didn't i think of it?? haha) I'm getting a bunch of stuff together this weekend, and hopefully construction will start soon... so i might be back with more questions! Thanks again!
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AnonimousChicka
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