Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi all. Well I'm getting ready to start putting my red eye tree frog tank set up and I was wondering what you guys think about my use for a substrate. I want to use a larger fish tank gravel to fill up the bottom of the tank and then slope the gravel to different hights. Then I can add water to the bottom of the tank and make a little pond. I also want to place a under water pump under the gravel (in the water) so I can make a water fall in the back of the terrarium. I was thinking about putting peat moss on the high side so I could get mosses to grow. I like this idea but I'm not sure if plants would do ok in this type of set up with my frogs.

If anyone has any suggestions on other ways to build my verrarium I would love to know. I really want to have a substrate that will be safe for both of my frogs and plants. As well as adding in a waterfall to help bring up the humidity.

I was also wondering what types of plants go good with red eyes that I could purchase in a local nursery.

Thank you for all your help.
JASON

Unfortunately, I don't have any experience with Red-Eyed Tree Frogs, so am not familiar with what kind of substrate to use. For my whites, I use a brand of dirt that I buy from Petco, in which you need to soak in water to let it expand. I change it about every 2-3 months (I have 3 frogs so it does get dirty faster.) It helps break down feces, and is not harmful if ingested by the frogs. Out of everything I've tried, this dirt works the best. But don't use potting soil! The plants that are also in there have grown and do well in this dirt. I've also strayed away from putting bark and rocks/pebbles in the tank for probably an obvious reason that they may be swallowed. If you're going to place the pebbles in the water, there's still a chance of ingestion, but the likeliness is definitely reduced. As far as plants, here is a great website that lists all the non-toxic plants, vines, and mosses for amphibians:

http://www.bmts.com/~csz/MingsExoticZoo/Mingsnontoxicplants.html

I prefer Snake Plants for my Australian Whites-they plant is very hardy for their big fat bodies! But something smaller would do just fine for Red-Eyes. I also had no difficulties finding them in a local nursery. I even found some of them at Wal-Mart (but I didn't buy them from Wal-Mart, I prefer the more professional plant-growers). Good luck!

rather than the small "fish tank gravel" I'd look into a larger river rock. With the rocks being covered on the land side you may not have much of a problem but getting rocks that are too big to fit into the frogs mouth would avoid any future problems Impaction is a nasty problem if a frog accidentally catches a rock rather than food). Pothos do GREAT in vivs, you can even put them directly into the water and they will grow. Mother-in-laws tongue (snake plant) also do well in humid enviroments and provid nice sturdy leaves for the REs to climb on. Other than that, everything else sounds just fine. There are quite a few RE keepers here that may have other plants to suggest as well, I just gave you the ones that are easiest.

Would love to see pictures when you have it all done!

Oh yeah, and bed-a-beast under the moss will work well for the plants too. Mine are thriving in it!!!

You can use rocks as long as they are like river rocks, big and smooth so there is absolutely no chance for impaction to occur. The only thing about rocks, (I had them in my viv) is that when the frogs land on them from a fair height, I worried about how hard they were.

Sometimes when my frogs are up the top of the viv and I put the crix in, one of them in particular likes to hang upside down from one of the branches in the viv and then drop down to the floor. Seeing as this in a little high, I decided rocks in the section wern't for me and just kept them in my water section and replaced the rest of the substrate with moss and dirt for a more softer landing.
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