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my jax cage has a rubbermaid bottom to it which i filled with dirt and pete moss/woodchip micture. i mixed it all together and planted my live plants in it. the problem is my rip system is causing a little flooding. i thought the plants would drink up the water but i guess it is too much. i was wondering if planting more plants or planting moss will help out. i would rather not drill holes in it becase it gets messy and a resivour fills up and spills over. will more plants drink up the water...if moss is good which is best for chameleons

hi - planting more plants will not help. Plants can take up just so much water and many have minimal requirements whereas other have more. Do you know thw individual requirements of your plants? What do you have?

With no drainage and constantly wet soil you will literally choke your plants to death. You are also asking for a fungus gnat problem (if you don't already have one) OK, that said....my suggestion would be to put your plants in individual pots and place them in the bin. You can then remove them individually for care and/or replacement as needed and easily clean the basin. Depending on how deep your basin is I would suggest raising the plants up off the bottom so they do not sit in standing water. You can use over turned pots, bricks, etc.

By doing this you can still leave a small amount (an inch or two)of your mix in the bin to help maintain humidity just don't let it get saturated for too long or you'll have other problems (mold, fungus gnats, etc.)

Do you always keep your dripper in the same place? Can you just put a container of some sort to catch most of the water? Then you can dump it daily.

So that's my input...I am sure others will have some different solutions as well.
>>my jax cage has a rubbermaid bottom to it which i filled with dirt and pete moss/woodchip micture. i mixed it all together and planted my live plants in it. the problem is my rip system is causing a little flooding. i thought the plants would drink up the water but i guess it is too much. i was wondering if planting more plants or planting moss will help out. i would rather not drill holes in it becase it gets messy and a resivour fills up and spills over. will more plants drink up the water...if moss is good which is best for chameleons
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0.1 veiled - Luna
0.2 green anoles Jaida & Jetta
0.1 brown anole - Jamaica
0.2 house geckos - Gaia & Tia
0.2 felines - Kyndra and Líta

I have a few suggestions for what you might to make things work out a little better.

First, like Lele said, if you are going to have plants in the cage, they should be in pots. After you pot them, I recommend covering the soil with walnut-sized rocks. This is to prevent your Chameleon from ingesting a chip of wood in the soil, or some other thing that might cause intestinal blockage. I had to learn this the hard way. I had a Veiled once, and I used those bark chip things for the substrate. What ahorrible idea. After about two months, I noticed he was not defecating. Then I noticed a quarter-sized piece of bark sticking half way out of his rectum. I can't believe it even got that far. Anyway, I had to remove it for him (not pretty) and he seemed to recover ok. No telling what damage that thing did inside. When they catch crickets on the substrate, it usually gets in their mouth. And they swallow most things they get in their mouths.

For my Jackson's, I have a potted tree on a bare plexi-glass bottom, with no substrate in his cage. You don't need it. Moss may yield fungus and mold, and bacteria. Bacteria loves moisture. You really don't need it as humid as you might think you do. I use a 24"x24"x48" cage, and mist three times a day, and my Guy has no problems at all. He sheds at a normal rate. The humidity level is usually around 60-70%. The live plants themselves actually help raise humidity levels. I also cup-feed to eliminate the problem of accidental ingestion of plant substrate, etc.

i don't know what kind of cage you have but if you insist on having that tropical/woodsy look you could try a "false bottom" setup...i forget the websites that show you how to do this but if you do a search for dart frogs you will undoubtedly stumble upon how to make a false bottom setup.

It has not gotten to the point that my plants will be choked by standing water just the soil is moist and water collects in tiny pools in certain uneven areas. Jacksonsrule with your jax do you not use a dripper and just mist?? it is the dripper casuing all the trouble here. My only problem is my jax love the dripper its hard to get them drinking otherwise...i dont feel like they are getting enough water when just licking wet leaves i have sprayed

i don't know how others do it but.....when i spray my jax i slowly squeeze the trigger so large drops come out...i do this for about 5 minutes right on him...the first 30 seconds he just stands there...then he begins to rub his eye "turrents" on a branch...he does this for another 30 seconds...he does not start to drink until after a minute or so of being sprayed..many times he will walk directly up to the bottle and drink just inches from the nozzle...i don't use a dripper at all because it always makes a mess....i spray him 3 times a day

Yeah, I kind of use the same technique as gutloader. I spray on and around him, and he does the eye thing for a bit then starts lapping up the big drops that collect on his lips/head. He will even just open his mouth and wait for big jets of water to fill it. He will also lick the leaves. For unknown reasons, mine won't touch a dripper. What a weirdo. I've only seen him do it once or twice. I'm actually waiting on the arrival of a ZooMed "Habba-Mist" I ordered. I'm going to give it a shot. Hopefully I can set the timer to spray him every three hours while I'm at work.

If you must use a dripper, just make a basin to catch the water as it drips down. I made one out of a rubbermaid container. Just cut a hole out of the lid and replace with mesh on the underside. You can use window screen mesh or my favorite, the plastic mesh sheets you find at craft stores used for crochet/knitting. Just make sure your catch basin is bigger than your drip reservoir!

I know it's tempting to want to create the garden of Eden on your cage floor, but a bare bottom really is the best solution. It prohibits bacteria/mold/fungus/, makes feces removal quick and easy, and prevents accidental ingestion of particles/substrate. You can still achieve a nice look with potted plants. And like I mentioned earlier, covering the soil in the pots with big rocks creates a barrier between Chameleon and substrate. I will try to take some pics of my setup and upload them if you're interested. Best of luck.