Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hey so i finally finished his cage (almost, still missing some aesthetics) but as soon as i put him in there he dug a burrow and hid. a little while (maybe an hour) later he felt secure enough to come out and explore. he took a swim in his pool and climbet up the branches to bask. im no longer really worried about him as he is showing a lot of interest in his environment, and although ive only seen him eat once, i think he continues to eat, just not so much in my presence. i do have a couple of questions though:
1. how big should the water area be? i initially thought that all he needed was water to drink and soak in, but i saw him swiming in there (and damn that was awsome!). right now the water is about 4-5 inches deep and 1 foot long by 7 inches wide. right now he is about 12-14 inches long (total length).
2. are live plants a good idea? i put a vine in there to cover the walls of the tank and make it look better and to add to his entertainment (climb and hide and stuff)
3. it is my understanding that they are arboreal (or enjoy climbing at the very least) so i foudn this really cool tree branch with a lot of smaller ones branching off it, so i am wondering how i should treat that for parasites, and how many branches i should put in there for climbing, i mean should i saturate the available spoace with branches?
4. does he need/should he have a uv light? i installed one in his cage and its on now, but i saw a ocuple posts down that they have to hide from the sun and i also remember seeing in a website that they dont make a difference... while up till now it has been my belief that all animals need uvb... so what do you guys do?
thats all for now, but i am gonna see if i can post pictures cuz i just remembered that the videocamera can take pictures, so as soon as i can upload the pics to my computer im gonna try to post some pictures. thanx a lot for all your help to get him started, and thanx in advance for this next round of questions.
P.S. the cage is 36 by 30 by 19, i forgot to mention that.

ok, here's the pictures... hope they work
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[img]Crogram FilesCanonZoomBrowser EXImage Library OneSamples101-0107_AUT.JPG[img]

[img]Crogram FilesCanonZoomBrowser EXImage Library OneSamples101-0108_AUT.JPG[img]

[img]Crogram FilesCanonZoomBrowser EXImage Library OneSamples101-0109_AUT.JPG[img]

[img]Crogram FilesCanonZoomBrowser EXImage Library OneSamples101-0110_AUT.JPG[img]
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-jake

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heres him climbing

here's a picture pf his cage:

isn't he a beauty?

you can see why i bought him (well maybe you can)

its about 80 degrees here

its about 100 here