# Happy Habitat Rebuilding Day!



## Madkins007 (Apr 23, 2011)

Since October 2010, my little Cherryheads and hermit crabs have slowly managed to decimate my habitat, and the other day, the heating cable went out. So, it is Habitat Rebuilding Day, so designated by the Omaha Branch of the World-wide Association of Cherry-head Red-foot Keepers. (Membership info available upon request!)

Right now, I am resting, planning, procrastinating, and really hoping that this miserable 50f weather will warm up against all forecasts. But soon, I will leap into a flurry of action- strip the habitat down, clean it well, recaulk the main joints, reinstall the heat cable, and rebuild. Piece o' cake!

I'll post before and after photos, as well as things like costs and why I am using the stuff I am after I'm done.


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## Edna (Apr 23, 2011)

Yes, Mark, it's a collossal undertaking, but your torts will be so appreciative once your done. I'm looking forward to pictures and the play-by-play!


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## terryo (Apr 23, 2011)

I pitty you Mark, but I am so happy that I'm done with the "big clean up" until next Fall.


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## Madkins007 (Apr 24, 2011)

I forgot the 'before' photo and the act of taking photos screws up my 'flow', so...







The naked tank- the basics are a wood base, 48"x20", with thick Lexan 20" high pieces screwed onto both ends, then some thin Lexan across the front and back, screwed at the bottom, and (using very small screws) into the ends. Some aluminum angle stock is bolted into both ends and across the top to hang the lighting from and to hold the other electrical elements.






My under substrate heating plan uses waterproof cables, held in place by some hardware cloth. This is the chunk from last time.






Last time I used wire ties to hold the cables, but it was a pain and hard to adjust. This time I wove some wire through every few holes so I could more easily adjust things. it appears as the green threads across one end and near the other.






Heating cable in place. I left the end and a side unheated for cooler zones.






2" of cypress, hides, and live moss in place, and tortoises and crabs back home. The plan is to pour water in the substrate, the cables heat it and it rises back up as warm humidity. The habitat is about 80-90% covered, so the humidity mostly stays in. 






Plants in place. Notice the crab in the lower left, and the red nose up higher. Within an hour the whole thing was condensed over.


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## ALDABRAMAN (Apr 24, 2011)

Very nice sir!


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## Zouave (Apr 24, 2011)

That is awesome! :nod: would that work with a topsoil style substrate or do the cables need the air pockets that cypress provides so they don't over heat? also, how long a cable is that for a 4x2 area?


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## onarock (Apr 24, 2011)

Excellent. What brand of heat cable is that?


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## Torty Mom (Apr 24, 2011)

Awesome!! What a wonderful habitat for them, you did a great job!!! Love it!!


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## Jacob (Apr 24, 2011)

Looks Great!
Awesome!


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## Madkins007 (Apr 25, 2011)

This is the cable I use- http://www.bigappleherp.com/Big-Apple-Flexible-Heat-Ropes

It is 9 meters for $27, and does not use a lot of electricity. You can vary the heat by spacing the cable, as well as by using a thermostat, which I always do (I hope I remembered to mention that somewhere above.) 

If I took a photo of the habitat right now, you would mostly see a thick layer of condensation on the walls and a couple small viewing windows where the lamp and CHE are drying off the condensation nearest them.

When I open it up in the morning for feeding and fresh air (remember- it is not totally closed- there are two huge holes on top for the light domes to go through- they do not completely close the holes so there is about 10-20% open space), I feel a rush of warm, humid air flowing out. 

I feed them, do any cleaning needed (not much usually), pour about 50 ounces of water into the mulch, mist the plants and moss, close it up and call it good for the day.



Zouave said:


> That is awesome! :nod: would that work with a topsoil style substrate or do the cables need the air pockets that cypress provides so they don't over heat? also, how long a cable is that for a 4x2 area?



There is no need for air pockets- in fact, what is happening is that the cables are basically laying in a puddle of water most of the time. Heating the water is also how they heat the habitat- if it was dry in there, it would not heat as evenly or as safely.

If you use a soil substrate, check out the plans for a 'bioactive substrate'- it will give you much better results!

http://tortoiselibrary.com/indoorhousing.html down near the bottom.


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## dmarcus (Apr 25, 2011)

All looks good and the heat rope is a great idea..


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## luke (Apr 25, 2011)

Madkins007 said:


> This is the cable I use- http://www.bigappleherp.com/Big-Apple-Flexible-Heat-Ropes
> 
> It is 9 meters for $27, and does not use a lot of electricity. You can vary the heat by spacing the cable, as well as by using a thermostat, which I always do (I hope I remembered to mention that somewhere above.)
> 
> ...





I love your set up. 

Can you describe starting from the lowest and working your way up. What are the layers of your "substrate"? Looks to me like you have a wire screen there. Is that because you are trying to isolate the gravel from the rest of the substrate? How thick is your layer of actual substrate?

If I understand you right its not advisable to use heat cables with a True bioactive substrate system where the plant roots go all the way down to the gravel. Its better to just let the plant extract the humidity from the substrate and keep it at tortoise level.

thanks for pics

oops I should have read more closly. Your are only using 2" of cypress. And your moss apears to be growing on top of your hides. I though you only had a top layer of cypress and some soil under that.


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## Madkins007 (Apr 25, 2011)

From the bottom up: MDF board (1/2 or 3/4" thick- I forget), a sheet of rigid plastic over the top for waterproofing (and caulked to the edges).

Wire mesh to hold the cables in place- that is its only purpose. Originally I taped the cables to the plastic and it warped it a little. Waterproof heating cables.

2" of cypress mulch, although a soil or bioactive substrate should be OK (just leave a cool area for the roots when you run your heating cables)

Several chunks of bark (natural and store-bought cork) for hides. I used to add moss under them, but don't any more. They dig under and snuggle in- there are hides on the warm side and the cool side.

Live moss laid on the bark (it won't last long- the crabs and the torts like to dig in it), and some small foliage plants in ceramic pots for air conditioning, shade, and interest. If I needed more humidity, the plants and the clay pots would help.



I've been VERY happy with this set-up. Not much cost, not much work, LOTS of heat and humidity most of the time. On the very coldest days, I needed to add another small CHE and some bubble wrap insulation on the window side of the habitat (we keep our house pretty cool and the room is a bit drafty.)

I'll be sad when they finally outgrow it, but the current plan is to move 2 of them out to a similar-sized tub habitat, then to a large table-style habitat when those are too small.


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## Zouave (Apr 25, 2011)

Thanks for all the advice! I've had The  Library bookmarked for a while now. 

I'm planning a large table and exploring all options. I'd like to do a bio active substrate (definitely some worms but not too sure about the other creepy crawlies lol) and i want to make it rather deep so the only draw back i can see with the cabling is will it be effective 6 -10 inches deep and if there is a problem (shorted, burnt out etc.) it would be a pain to disassemble and reassemble as opposed to changing a fixture or bulb or CHE. 

But i might come up with another use for that cabled grid design.


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## Madkins007 (Apr 25, 2011)

In a bioactive substrate, wood lice (isopods, rolly polly bugs) are great! You'll never see them but they play a huge role in breaking down organic debris and preying on the eggs of pests. 

A tortoise table with 6-10" of soil is going to be really, really heavy, especially when you add water. Is there a reason you are going that deep? If you are doing it for plants, there are other ways you can accomplish it. 3" is enough for many plants, and you can make a raised area for the bigger stuff. 

Replacing a burnt-out cable is annoying- that is one reason I did the rebuild now instead of when it was nicer out, but it lasted a good 6 months of absolutely no attention or trouble, and the cypress was 'dead' anyway.


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## Tom (Apr 25, 2011)

Can you show us a pic of the whole thing all put together with the top on it, lights in place and condensation. That is very similar to what I want to put together to try out on some hatchling sulcatas. After seeing some members results, with sulcatas, leopards, and redfoots too I'm really thinking there is real benefit to that style of "humidity chamber".

Thanks for the inspiration and example.


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## Zouave (Apr 25, 2011)

Madkins007 said:


> In a bioactive substrate, wood lice (isopods, rolly polly bugs) are great! You'll never see them but they play a huge role in breaking down organic debris and preying on the eggs of pests.
> 
> A tortoise table with 6-10" of soil is going to be really, really heavy, especially when you add water. Is there a reason you are going that deep? If you are doing it for plants, there are other ways you can accomplish it. 3" is enough for many plants, and you can make a raised area for the bigger stuff.
> 
> Replacing a burnt-out cable is annoying- that is one reason I did the rebuild now instead of when it was nicer out, but it lasted a good 6 months of absolutely no attention or trouble, and the cypress was 'dead' anyway.


I don't want to take your thread to far off topic, but to answer your question yes, partly for plants and partly to allow natural burrowing activity. I plan on "landscaping" hills and valleys but since it must be rather difficult to predict with much certainty where they will "dig in" i figure minimum 3" maximum 10"- 12". 

Again, this is all just pie in the sky planning and, yes please, lets see more pics!


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## Madkins007 (Apr 26, 2011)

More photos, huh?









Overall habitat photos. The thing is 48" long, and the actual habitat is 20" high, the light frame is another 20" above that. 

From left to right the lights are a MVB-UVB set on a 6 hour day, the high one is a typical coiled fluorescent to balance the light and set on a 12 hour day, and the furthest right is a CHE. 

My misting bottle hangs on the light rack, and the watering can is sitting on the lids. The small black box on the right-hand upright is the thermostat.





Close up of a corner, showing how the front, thinner Lexan is screwed and caulked to the base and side pieces. You can also see the timers used to control the lights.





Close up of the water dish and the folded newspaper I use for a feeding dish (so I can toss it after use- no cross contamination.)





Close up of how I hang the lamps- S-hooks, chain, hole in lid...





The lid is three panels with bends on the front and back. The two end pieces have a half-circle cut out, and the middle piece as two so they fit around the lights.

Notice that the holes are pretty big, so lots of loss of heat and humidity, but still LOTS of condensation. This is probably THE benefit of the substrate heating option.

By the way, the BEST sprayer combination is the spray head from the Walgreens '2 for $1' sprayers which have small, weak bottles, and a larger bottle from a garden sprayer which had a mediocre mist.


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## Edna (Apr 26, 2011)

Mark, I tried using the heat cable per instructions you posted a while back, and ended up removing it (actually someone suggested I let my torts get cooler at night anyway). I had 3 problems that I hope you will address.
1. Your hail screen looks nice and flat. Mine came on a roll and I could not get it flattened out, no matter what I did.
2. Caused mostly by the above problem, my cypress mulch seemed to work itself under the hail screen, so the screen did not stay on the bottom of my enclosure.
3. Handling the hailscreen caused a nasty dermatitis on my hands that took 6 weeks, lots a cortizone cream and a gazillion bandaids to clear up. 

Your enclosure made with the lexan is beautiful. Do you heat it and bend it using a sheet metal break? Some other method?


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## Madkins007 (Apr 27, 2011)

The hardware cloth does come in a roll, but I just rolled it up backwards to take the curve out. My screen is also about the same size as the habitat floor, so there is not much room for anything to work under.

As far as the dermatitis- are you allergic to some coating on it or something? Hardware cloth is often galvenized, and of course, there are lots of little sharp studs to be wary of. 

I get the cooler temps at night by not running the cables under every hide area, and shutting off the overhead heating at night. One hide runs about 75F at night, while the other is around 80-85ish most of the time. I do not notice any patterns as to which hide they prefer. 

The only bent parts are the three top pieces. I bent them by making a thin dotted line where I wanted the bend, using a hot air gun to get the plastic flexible right along the line, bending it over a table edge, and misting it to lock it in place. I bent it to a bit more than 90 degrees since it generally flexes back a bit as it cools.


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## CtTortoiseMom (Apr 27, 2011)

Wow, no wonder you were procrastinating! That was an incredible amount of work! It is perfect! I am going to try to incorporate much of what you did in my new glass enclosure. Thank you so much for sharing and explaining the step by step.


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## luke (Apr 27, 2011)

Thank you again for those pics and detailed explinations. I'm sure that Polycarbonate set you back quite a few bucks. Can you provide the thicknesses of both sets of Lexan? I would have never thought of doing it that way. Very original.

Just wondering, how much water do you need to provied the enclosure per day in oreder to maintain proper humidity levels? Also, do you spray all that water into the enclosure via spary bottle or do you also add it by just pouring it directly?

Heating cables seem to be the way to go. May as well get some


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## Madkins007 (Apr 28, 2011)

CT Tortoise Mom- the rebuild took about 2 hours. Not a lot of time, but I work 3 jobs so don't get a lot of free time, and I am lazy SOB to being with! 

Luke- I got the base MDF and front/back walls at Home Depot. The polycarbonate was 48"x36"x.093" thick and ran me like $58 for a scratched piece. I was originally going to rip it in half and use faced plywood for the bottom 2-3", but the final 18" height was OK. (I misspoke when I said the walls were 20" high- I had forgotten this bit!)

The side panels are from US Plastics.com and I had in the shop. I don't remember if it is 3/32 or 1/8" thick.

If someone was to do this on a tighter budget, I would use MDF board for the ends (like melamine-coated shelf boards) and base (I had to use some other scrap rigid plastic to waterproof the base) and even the back if it was not going near a window, but I would still recommend polycarbonate for the front (and back if you want it transparent.) 

Another interesting building option is corrugated plastic (like corrugated cardboard), like so many signs are made of now. The stuff is light and cheap, waterproof and easy to clean, and if you get it in white or the semi-clear color, it is transparent. You can get it at many 'instant sign' places cut to the sizes you need for a fraction of the cost of many other materials.


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## DeanS (Apr 28, 2011)

Very nice Mark...glad your period of procrastination didn't last too long!


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## Hustler (Apr 28, 2011)

awesome post mate 
Im going to look into the heat cable for sure and the bio substrate and the hermit crabs lol havent had one of those in years 
Did you say the heat cable only last you 6 months? Did it burn out?
I will be needing a ton of it to do an 8 foot by 12 foot tank and there is no way I will be tearing that out so often...


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## Madkins007 (Apr 28, 2011)

Hustler, in a larger habitat, I am not sure the cables would be your best option. You might consider Flexowatt (from the same source) or pig blankets.

The cable just stopped working. There is no burnt or 'floppy' spot on it to give me a clue of what happened. I figure one of my bends was too tight and made a stress point. For $26 and since I needed to redo the mulch anyway, I am happy with the value.


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## Hustler (Apr 28, 2011)

Looks amazing mate 
Those are some spoiled torts....
Got the hermits an hour ago.... to be honest I was more excited about the crabs than i have been about going to the pet store in a while..... Had one when i was a kid lasted 7 years.


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