Trying my hand at a "naturalistic" vivarium...

[Floof]

I've been wanting to give this a try lately, and decided to go ahead and plant my rat snake's current 12x12x18" ZooMed terrarium yesterday.

The plants are 2 varieties of Dracaena and a Pothos vine. The colorful things up top are just temporary (as are the wooden dowels); I'm hoping to pick up a more appropriate climbing log at the reptile expo, and to ditch the fake daffodils just as soon as the pothos is big enough to offer some cover... Though, ideally, she'll be in something bigger by the time the Pothos really gets going.

The little lady exploring her refurbished home before I added the dowels and daffodils.

Down at the base of the hill, the PVC tee offers a nice little hiding place. I keep a flat faux stone piece leaned up against this so it's nice and dark inside.

And the little lady herself: Wyvern, my Taiwan Beauty rat snake, curled up under the cover of her Dracaena.

Thanks for peeking!

 

[Irwinshealth]

You should "try your hand" more often! It looks great She looks really happy with your work

 

[Floof]

Why, thank you very much! :mrgreen:

Depending on whether I can keep this one alive over the next couple weeks or so, I'm seriously thinking about doing another one. And even better, there'll be vendors with live plants at the reptile expo this month! Great... Instead of snakes (and things I should actually be buying), I'll be spending my whole expo budget on live plants. LOL.

Then it'll come down to deciding who gets spoiled... A corn snake, or a rosy boa? Hmmm... Oh--or the Gopher snake. Wonder what kind of interesting arrangement could be done for him? OR, all three! I just need to find vivariums to do it in!

This planted vivarium business is addicting! At least it's more practical than wanting more snakes, LOL.

 

[Irwinshealth]

This planted vivarium business is addicting! At least it's more practical than wanting more snakes,

That's for sure. Our loved ones can sure bust the budget quickly. They are so worth it though

 

[Floof]

Oh yes, busting budgets is what pets are good for!! Between the reptiles and the almost 13 year old boxer, I don't even want to think about how much goes toward their care each month... But, like you said, so worth it!

 

[kjinxx2]

Make sure you use lid clamps!

 

[ashleyelsha]

I thought about doing something like this for my ball python because I always have trouble keeping him humid enough. Currently I use a spagmum moss humid hide for him and he loves it. My question is though, how do you keep the viv sanitary after poops and stuff, and would the snake be more likely to get infection??? I got scale rot on my ball python once when he was about 2. He got bit by a live rat and it got infected. Of course he is 7 years old now and he eats frozen/thawed, but I have kept him on paper towels or newspaper since then and I sanitize his humid hide whenever he poops in it.

 

[Floof]

I'm not sure how well a ball python would do with a planted viv... They have a tendency to crawl over and smash things like plants, lol! If you can find sturdy enough plants and give them time to settle in and root before you add your snake (so he can't bend them over and smash them right away), then you might be able to do it...

As far as sanitizing, that's the point of the Bioactive Substrate. You scoop the poop itself, and stir the soiled substrate down to the lower layers to be eaten and broken down by good bacteria and, should you choose to add them, cleaner bugs (i.e. earthworms). You're essentially aiming to create a mini ecosystem.

I highly recommend reading "The Art of Keeping Snakes" by Phillipe de Vosjoli. It's a book dedicated to discussing the planted vivarium/Bioactive Substrate System (BSS) method of keeping snakes.

Hope this helps.

 

[ashleyelsha]

I'm not sure how well a ball python would do with a planted viv... They have a tendency to crawl over and smash things like plants, lol! If you can find sturdy enough plants and give them time to settle in and root before you add your snake (so he can't bend them over and smash them right away), then you might be able to do it...

As far as sanitizing, that's the point of the Bioactive Substrate. You scoop the poop itself, and stir the soiled substrate down to the lower layers to be eaten and broken down by good bacteria and, should you choose to add them, cleaner bugs (i.e. earthworms). You're essentially aiming to create a mini ecosystem.

I highly recommend reading "The Art of Keeping Snakes" by Phillipe de Vosjoli. It's a book dedicated to discussing the planted vivarium/Bioactive Substrate System (BSS) method of keeping snakes.

Hope this helps.

I think I'm going to stick to newspaper and papertowels, spagmum humid hide, and terracotta pot... lol.
I didn't think about him knocking things over, he is a pretty hefty snake. I could do one with one of my colubrids, but it just seems like a lot of work and my snakes are all pretty low maintenance. aspen, water bowl, UTH, teracotta pots. I have 7 snakes so I need to keep it as low maintenance as possible.

 

[Floof]

I haven't had this one set up long enough to find out if it's lower maintenance, but I keep hearing from those who've used it awhile that it is. Part of BSS is that you don't have to (in fact, shouldn't) change the substrate often, if at all. After all, the substrate is inhabited by that same beneficial bacteria that's cleaning up the waste. Water and stir around once a week, spot clean poops, and, in theory, that's it.

I think I did an accidental BSS thing with my tortoise. Some little cleaner bug made its way in, established a colony, and they did an excellent job cleaning up whatever waste and food I missed in spot cleaning. I didn't change his substrate in almost a year--just re-moistened and stirred the dirt as needed. Only changed it because he moved to a new enclosure. I didn't have anything planted in it, either. It should be feasible to do a BSS for your ball python without actually planting anything, if you wanted to.

I have 11 snakes (well... 27 if you count the hatchlings!), and, as it stands, the Beauty's viv is probably the lowest maintenance of them all... Granted, she's one of my smallest snakes; time will tell whether this remains low-maintenance as she gets larger (or when I try it with a larger snake). At the very least, it's lower maintenance than the paper towels she was on previously!