Vivarium design help

[Auri]

Hey orchid people,
I'm starting a vivarium project, and I wondered if I could get some feedback before I start putting it together. Right now I'm leak-testing the tank. I'm hoping to order some supplies in the next week, and I'd love to have some more experienced folks look over my grand strategy, so that if I'm planning something silly, I can (hopefully) find out the easy way instead of the hard way.
Here goes:

The tank:
36" wide, 19" deep, and 25" tall It has 10 3" vent holes with screen covers, 6 at the back and 2 on either end. I'll probably seal four of the bottom vents since they'll have substrate against them, but that will leave me with 5 high vents and one low one over the pond area. No plans for a fan yet- I don't plan to seal the top and should get fine airflow without one, but I could add one in if needed.

The water:
Pond in the front right corner, waterfall back left. Stream connecting the two, probably made of half-round PVC prettied up with various rocks and such stuck in Great Stuff. Pump is scavenged from a tabletop fountain. Cord will run out through one of the vents that will be hidden in the backdrop, and I'm planning on hiding the pump itself in the back of the pond. Probably I'll use a log to hide the front and then a cork "lid" to hide it from top view. That way I'll still have access if it dies or I want to change the flow rate. Tubing from the pump will run behind the backdrop to the top of the back left corner to start the waterfall.

The substrate:
I'd like to save a bit on the weight of this beast. So current idea is to make a false bottom with egg crate and mesh that will rest on PVC fittings. I'll probably fill in some space underneath the false bottom with more Great Stuff, just to make the water shallower. Over the mesh I'm thinking about putting the NEHERP vivarium mix V.2. Anybody use this stuff? Anyway, I'm definitely going to plant with moss, and have various and sundry logs and rocks and such.

The backdrop:
More cork and branches and such, stuck on with silicone. More Great Stuff. I plan to cover the Great Stuff with tree fern. I also plan to incorporate a few pots hidden down low so that I can have 2 or 3 orchids "growing" on the wall that can be removed or switched out.

I do plan to actually plant some orchids, including something I can mount on cork, and I think I'd like to get some masdevallias. This will probably be a cool-ish tank. I can easy drop that room down into the 50's at night during the winter if I need to. I haven't lived in this house during the summer yet, but we have AC and the room is on the north end of the house. However, the orchids are going to wait a bit until I'm sure that the system is stable-ish. Except for the wall-mounted pots- I'll probably throw stuff in there pretty quick. No plans for critters yet. I may change my mind, but right now I'm in it for the plants, and not planning on a lid.

Light:
Umm. Yep. There's going to be light. Maybe some arrangement with some CFLs. Almost certainly a timer. Clearly I need to do some more work in this department, but I have some time.


So, there it is, the Grand Plan. Does it sound workable? Don't hesitate to tell me if I'm planning something impractical or just plain bad. My feelings won't be hurt and I would really REALLY rather find out now that after spending days assembling this thing.

Any feedback would be much appreciated!

-Auri

[harpspiel]

I'm obviously not an expert, but since I've just been going through this process myself and finding some great resources, maybe I can help:

I currently have a false bottom that I made quite cheaply from PVC pipe cut into 1.5" high rounds with 2 layers of plastic window screen on top, and soil on top of that. My tank is a little different since it doesn't have a water feature, however I think a layer of egg crate would be unnecessary.

I just ordered this from Ray: LED Vivarium-Grow Lamp. It looks like 1 of those should be sufficient for lower light orchids like Phals and the jewel orchids, and 2 should grow slightly higher light species. LEDs are recommended as grow lights for a number of reasons, including that they are quite cool compared to CFLs, they last a very long time, and they produce a lot of light for comparatively low wattage.

I feel like tree fern glued onto Great Stuff is going to be really difficult, unless there is some form of tree fern mulch that I am unaware of...I am currently using silicone to adhere coco fiber to a Great Stuff background. I bought some coco fiber basket liners for $1/ea at Home Depot, and am tearing them apart and then sticking them onto the background. I'm then going to use the Live Moss Slurry from NEHERP and see if the coco fiber will support moss growth. Since that experiment is still in the works, here's a possibly better looking and more certain way of doing it:

NEHERP Custom Background Texture Mix

Live Moss Slurry

P.S. I do not have any experience with NEHERP other than that they look knowledgeable. I've just placed my first order, so if anyone does have experience please weigh in!

[Auri]

Good info on the LED stuff, thanks! As to how you put the tree fern onto the Great Stuff.... Some guy named "Skillet" on YouTube reliably informs me that if you pour the tree fern substrate onto the Great Stuff before it dries, it'll stick in there fabulously. What could possibly go wrong?

[catherinecarney]

Hi Auri--

Some more resources for you:

Black Jungle Terrarium supply--dart frog specialists, but they carry all sorts of useful things for terrariums and vivariums. They used to have some good tutorials on terrarium/viv construction, including backgrounds but I haven't been on the site in a while to see if they're still there.

Dendroboard--it's a dart frog forum, but lots of info on there that you may find useful, and many of the dart frog people are incorporating mini orchids into their setups.

Viviarium and aquarium forums--lots of options here, including many, many different backgrounds (clay kitty litter, Great Stuff with coco fiber/peat, etc), water features, ventilation, lighting, and so on. Tend to be heavy on the DIY, but there are step by step build logs on many of these sites so you can see how other people did it.

Good luck and have fun! Keep us posted on how it turns out!

Catherine

[Auri]

At long last, I have the vivarium up and running! Forgive the terrible iphone pgotography.

So far, the residents are:
Colmenara Supernova (in a pot on the wall, not permanent)
Dendrobium Nobile (planted, bottom right)
Howeara Lava Burst Pacific Sunrise (wedged behind the branch on the left)
Tolumnia Genting Yellow (central, stuck in a crevice of the mopani wood chunk)

Turns out that Mr. Skillet's youtube tutorial was correct- tree fern sticks quite well in great stuff when it is still wet.


Right now, the temperature is sitting around 60 during the day. I might actually have to open the heating vents in that room at night... we'll see. Humidity is around 65-70%, goes up to 80% after I mist.

Now I'm just waiting to see how things stabilize, hoping to get some moss to grow. I made a DIY slurry, quickly realized that it was a terrible idea since it contained yogurt. Hopefully the frog moss I planted will revive and do well. And we'll see if the slurry can grow some moss OUTSIDE the tank which I can then transplant.

[Subrosa]

D. nobile is a less than ideal terrarium orchid. Giving it the cool temps and drier conditions it needs to bloom could prove problematic unless you expose the whole set up to those conditions, which is less than ideal for your others.

[Auri]

Yeah, the dendrobium is an experiment... I've got two of them. One of them is living in a windowsill, happy and about to bloom. The other one was living in a different windowsill and didn't seem to like it there, so I threw it in the vivarium. It's definitely going to be cool enough in there, but the humidity might be an issue. I guess I'll find out

[Kevinator]

How did you get the base for the LED light? I'm getting one soon but I need to find some way of putting it in my terarrium.

[catherinecarney]

Nice job!

I agree that you might have to swap out your orchids--but you never know until you try!

There's a pretty good sticky in this terrarium gardening heading that lists orchids for terrariums, including growing conditions. I've found it useful as I've been setting up a 20H day gecko tank.

Keep us posted on how your setup does!

Catherine

[Auri]

Kevinator, regarding the light... It's a $5 clip on lamp from walmart. I removed the plastic shade with a hacksaw. Not the prettiest, but very functional. Between the clamp and the flexible neck, I can pretty much position that light wherever I want it.