Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi, I am a newbie of Uroplatus and I have here my first U. fimbriatus.
Here is my problem, even I have spray at least twice a day, and use orchild bark in order to maintain humidity, the humidity in the vivarium can only be around 75-80% only, temperature is OK. Can anyone here give some advise about keep the humidity high?

Here are her recent pics, enjoy.




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Gecko Gecko
Hemidactylus frenatus 2.0
Eublepharis macularius
patternless 3.2
albino 4.9
blizzard 2.5
hi-yellow 0.5
Gecko geckoniachazaliae 1.3
Gekko gecko 1.3
Nephrurus levis levis 1.2
Nephrurus amyae 1.2
Oedura castelnaui 1.2
Rhacodactylus ciliatus 2.4
Rhacodactylus leachianus 1.2
Rhacodactylus auriculatus 1.2
Hemitheconyx caudicintus
albino 3.6
banded 1.2
orange striped 2.3
Teratoscincus scincus spp 2.4
........

Great pics and nice looking little guy there . Take a two liter pop bottle, fish tank air pump,some air tubing and an air stone. Take the pop bottle cap and drill two holes so the air line tubing will barely slide through the holes. I use the silicone type tubing more expensive but I like it best ozone does not harden it over time. Use silicone on the top and bottom of the cap to seal it good (use 100% silicone or aqaurium silicone). Make the one of the hoses that goes into the bottle go all the way to the bottom install the air stone here. The second hose only go in about 2 or 3 inches. This end must never go into the water or your gecko will be swimming. Where the hoses come out of the cap run the one with the air stone to the fish aquarium air pump. Run the other one to gecko enclosure. Fill the bottle half full or so. When the air pump pushes air into the bottle it will fizz through the air stone. Since the air has no way other than the other hose to exit the bottle it goes out there and into the gecko tank. Result 98% to 100% humidity air being pumped into the tank. If it is too much you can put it on a timer. Give it a try you will be amazed. There is a comercial product called "humidaire" or something like that, but why spend a bunch on something like that when you can build one for pennies. I hope I explained this well I can build most anything but can't explain or write it well,lol. Good luck
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"Why is it we treat the earth as if we have a spare in the trunk"

I guess I understand how to construct this "humidaire", then should I just drop the other end of the tube to any place inside the vivarium or a specific place where can achieve the best result? Also, my vivarium is topscreen type, will this effects the result too?
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Gecko Gecko
Hemidactylus frenatus 2.0
Eublepharis macularius
patternless 3.2
albino 4.9
blizzard 2.5
hi-yellow 0.5
Gecko geckoniachazaliae 1.3
Gekko gecko 1.3
Nephrurus levis levis 1.2
Nephrurus amyae 1.2
Oedura castelnaui 1.2
Rhacodactylus ciliatus 2.4
Rhacodactylus leachianus 1.2
Rhacodactylus auriculatus 1.2
Hemitheconyx caudicintus
albino 3.6
banded 1.2
orange striped 2.3
Teratoscincus scincus spp 2.4
........

yep just put the end of the tube anywhere in the tank you want. A screen top may be your biggest problem actually it is hard to keep humidity up in a screen to. Try covering part the top across with plastic wrap. Just use more or less till you find where it works best. When you find the proper combination do it with plexiglass or something else of your choice. This humidifier with a glass top on a 30 gallon high tank and 2 - 1.5 x 4 inch screen air vents along the back where you can cut out the plastic to put in a filter will run water from humdity right down the glass from condensation and make it kinda foggy sometimes. Without a timer you can't even see in the tank half the time because of the glass being foggy. If you can keep the water cool in the bottle it helps keep the temp down too. I am going to set up this system when I get some Phantaticus [taxes are coming horray horray ] and set it up so it actually runs a whole system of little enclosures with multiple hoses. Put the whole deal in a refrigerator along with a cooling pump system to pump cool water through a series of lines in the tank floor to cool the whole deal. Kinda like the under floor heat and cooling in houses that uses fluid air convection. The ideal thing to use would be a water chiller for saltwater aqauria if some body wanted to sink the money into it. It gets well into the 90's and low hundreds here for most of the summer. I have been useing it for frogs and such for probally 10 years. I wish I was smart enouph back then to patent it like whoever makes the "humidaire".
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"Why is it we treat the earth as if we have a spare in the trunk"

omg this gets my vote for best idea evar. im making one as soon as exams are over.

Here is the test humidifier that I made today, as you can see from the picture below, the humidity of the vivarium can only rearch to 65% only, which is not a satisfied level appreciated.
If I cover the screentop with something whatever, the temperature will rearch to a dangerous level which may fatal to my uro.
I have mist 4 times today, and wet the substance with water, with the help of the humidifier, the humidity do increased.
Please check this up to see if there are any additional methods to improve the circumstances.

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Gecko Gecko
Hemidactylus frenatus 2.0
Eublepharis macularius
patternless 3.2
albino 4.9
blizzard 2.5
hi-yellow 0.5
Gecko geckoniachazaliae 1.3
Gekko gecko 1.3
Nephrurus levis levis 1.2
Nephrurus amyae 1.2
Oedura castelnaui 1.2
Rhacodactylus ciliatus 2.4
Rhacodactylus leachianus 1.2
Rhacodactylus auriculatus 1.2
Hemitheconyx caudicintus
albino 3.6
banded 1.2
orange striped 2.3
Teratoscincus scincus spp 2.4
........

Why does the temp go up when the top is covered? Do you have lights or such in the tank? The extra humidity in the tank should actually keep it cooler. That humidity seems very low. Is it really dry where you are at? Our average humidity here is higher than that just in the air. Have you checked it with another style of humidity gauge? I just don't see the humidity coming up all the time with a full screen top. Without lights or a source of heat it should get no hotter than room temp in the tank.
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"Why is it we treat the earth as if we have a spare in the trunk"

I just witch on the light for daily sanitary make up, and the light that I am using is a UV tube which do not produce high heat, just I am worrying if the screen is covered and the ventilation will be blocked, then temperature will increase, and actually, the room temperture for me is always around 23-26c which will slightly increase in the vivarium, which is not the desire temperature for my U.F. I supposed.
I am guessing that the environment where I keep is quite dry indeed(below 50%), which makes the moisture inside the vivarium goes directly outside the tank from the screentop.
Let me try on covering the screen and check if the temperature can keep stable and increase the humidity inside.
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yea try covering the tank start with a little and work your way up. The higher humidity and tank damp should actually lower the temp a bit. Hope this works for you it works great for me. Was at the pet store yesterday and seen the deal I was talking about it is called Tropical Aire. Yea a flouresent should not really heat it.
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"Why is it we treat the earth as if we have a spare in the trunk"

If you want high humidity, you need to set up a hydroponics system before hand.

Depending on the size of your enclosure, you will need 2-3" of Terra-Lite, a substrate divider (i use fiberglass screen cut to the dimensions of the tank), a moist but well drained substrate (i use CoCo bedding mixed w/ tree fern fiber for the best aeration 8:1 ratio, maybe even higher), on top of that you need real plants and good wood that will hold well in high humidity. Cork wood holds up really well, cypress is another good choice. A lot of times, if conditions are right, the wood will grow moss which will help out in the humidity. Any kind of flowing small stream (also well planted w/ water plants and grass) will add to the humidity. Be sure to dig this layer out to the substrate divider then line w/ a well fitting plastic bag of sorts. Fill it w/ gravel and water, make sure to have a powerful filter also. Changing out water every day is a good practice to ensure the growth of good bacteria that will naturally clean out the water. Keeping it nice and clean! For a larger species like that, I would use about 30-40 plants and plenty of vines (which you did very nice BTW, good pics). A background is pretty important as well, to not stress your Uro out too bad. This should be the first thing you think about when making a cage. A good background will also aid in humidity since the water will creep up the background keeping it moist. You can also plant many kinds of epiphytes. There are some animal safe fertilizers that can be used as a spray. I use Dyna-Gro, and all my Arboreals are pretty happy.