I am using coconut coir for my baby. It's about 4" deep. I also use a fogger to keep the humidity above 80%. Recently, my little guy has decided to excavate his basking rock (just a large piece of slate rock under his "sun"). He has made himself quite a little cave under there. But I noticed that it's got a little puddle of water in it. Its not pee. It's from the fogger. Is it too wet in there now? Do I need to change out the coir? If you move the coir, you will find under it is a layer of water. Truman is very proud of his new hidey hole and spends most of his time in there, but I am worried about two things...1, shell rot eventually? 2, won't that lower his body temp too much sitting in water all the time? His enclosure is about 6' long by 2' wide with a mostly closed top (opening for his "sun") The entire room that he is in is kept at or above 80 degrees as well. He is about 6 weeks old at the moment.
Substrate question
- Thread starter Kara B
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You don't want him sitting in water for long periods of time. maybe another bag of substrate is in order?
Think so? I was wondering if it should be deeper....
Ed mitch
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You can get small bags of gravelly substrate which you could put down there to stop him being in the water. Can we see a photo of this?
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That's pretty soggy.
Optimally, you want humidity, not sopping wet substrate.
It takes some tweaking.
Optimally, you want humidity, not sopping wet substrate.
It takes some tweaking.
I thought it seemed awfully wet. Should I stir or rake it up every so often or something? I will add more coir but won't it eventually just get that wet again?That's pretty soggy.
Optimally, you want humidity, not sopping wet substrate.
It takes some tweaking.
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This is just my experience....So it may or may not be your remedy.
I stopped using a fogger. I closed off the top of my enclosure and mounted the light to the inside, on the underside of the plexiglass lid. An 18" strip florescent 5.0.
I found that by pouring water into the corners of my potting soil over orchid bark substrate about once a week that my humidity stayed very high by itself.
The orchid bark absorbed the liquid. gave off humidity. And the top layer remained pretty dry.
I stopped using a fogger. I closed off the top of my enclosure and mounted the light to the inside, on the underside of the plexiglass lid. An 18" strip florescent 5.0.
I found that by pouring water into the corners of my potting soil over orchid bark substrate about once a week that my humidity stayed very high by itself.
The orchid bark absorbed the liquid. gave off humidity. And the top layer remained pretty dry.
I have the fogger on a hygrometer that goes on and off according to the level of humidity. I live in Michigan and it gets very dry here in the winters. At least in my house it does. Before I got the fogger I was misting the substrate several times a day but couldn't get the humidity to stay up even with the closed top. Maybe I should change the substrate to orchard bark instead?
Build a closed chamber and get rid of the fogger. Switch to orchid bark.
It is easy to maintain 80% humidity with dry substrate in a closed chamber.
It is easy to maintain 80% humidity with dry substrate in a closed chamber.
Where can I find Orchid bark?? Everything on Amazon is Fir bark is that basically the same thing? The only orchid bark that I can find is in small bags that are treated with something to help the plants grow and it's not very cheap.....am I missing something?
FOUND IT
Fir bark is the same thing as orchid bark. I use the fine grade. It can be found at garden centers and nursery's, but not usually at hardware stores.
I'm not a fan of mixing substrates. I just use plain orchid bark.
Coir and cypress mulch both work too, but I see no reason or purpose to blend them.
Damp, but not wet.
Coir and cypress mulch both work too, but I see no reason or purpose to blend them.
Damp, but not wet.
melissah
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Unfortunately I was unable to go to the store, my daughter brought back a bag that has both forest bed and coconut bark. Says she was told to mix them, spray them with a water bottle and that's that..... I'm not sure so wanted to check first.
