Questions on setting up a Paludarium

[mivec1997]

Dear All,

After going through what you guys had done and after doing some reading online, I am planning to setup one of my own in a 4ft * 2ft * 2ft tank.
I am looking at creating a paludarium, 50/50 ratio between water and land with a waterfall. I got some questions which I hope you guys can help me with:-

1) How do I put the fake wall in place without the need to silicon it to the tank?

2) What type of soil is most suitable for the setup? Taking into consideration that I will be keeping fish and maybe newts or frogs in the future, the soil must be safe for both.

3) Regarding the waterfall, will the cemented styroform be able to take the constant beating of the water? I am planning to use a existing pump which I have that is 2000-3000l/h.

Please feel free to shower me with tips and ideas.

Thanks

[cdckjn]

Answers to your questions,
1) for fake wall, you can use cork bark and just place it behind, but because it is not attached to the wall, many a times, insects such as crickets that you feed the frogs may get stuck there, so not very goodd. You have have styrofoam wall which is cut to size and force fitted in so that the water level will not push the foam up. The partition water can be made with many materials, such as slate rocks stack to form the partitio.

2) the soil can be a mixed of expanded clay pellets at the base, then larger pebbles, then a layer of garden compost soil for you to grow the plants or mosses as a top layer. If you want, you can just go with expanded clay and pebbles but that will limit the type of plants that you can plant.

3) the cemented styrofoam normally will be washed down with some sand and PVA glue so that the constant beating of water with be fine.

Do a quick sketch of how you want your scaping is to to do so we can give better comments. Cheers!

[mivec1997]

Answers to your questions,
1) for fake wall, you can use cork bark and just place it behind, but because it is not attached to the wall, many a times, insects such as crickets that you feed the frogs may get stuck there, so not very goodd. You have have styrofoam wall which is cut to size and force fitted in so that the water level will not push the foam up. The partition water can be made with many materials, such as slate rocks stack to form the partitio.

2) the soil can be a mixed of expanded clay pellets at the base, then larger pebbles, then a layer of garden compost soil for you to grow the plants or mosses as a top layer. If you want, you can just go with expanded clay and pebbles but that will limit the type of plants that you can plant.

3) the cemented styrofoam normally will be washed down with some sand and PVA glue so that the constant beating of water with be fine.

Do a quick sketch of how you want your scaping is to to do so we can give better comments. Cheers!

Thanks for your reply.

Noted on the fake wall, I will see what type of designs I can find in LFS.
Regarding the graden soil, will it be safe for the fish if the soil happen to get into the water? I intend to grow some plants therefore mixture of soil and expanded clay pebbles will be the choice.
The PVA glue that you had mention, is it those white in color glue (not transparent) that is use for art and craft?

Are you able to advise where will be a good place to shop for those materials that are aquarium safe?

I have tried to upload a picture but i was not able to do so which I had no idea why.

But to give you an idea of how I want to do my scape, please see below. Hope it is not too messy hehe

Front View:
_____________________________________________________
| |
| XX water fall XX |
| |
| |
|...............0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
|...............000000000000000000 Land 0000000000000000000
|...water.....0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
|__________0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000


Top View:

____________________water fall_________________________
|..............oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo|
|..............oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo|
|..............oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Land oooooo|
|..............oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo|
|..................................................................ooooooooo
|....................water.......................................ooooooooo
|..................................................................ooooooooo
|_________________________________________.oooooooooo

Please feel free to comment.

Thanks

[David Moses Heng]

if you can, you may want to visit me at my site to see how it is done?

[mivec1997]

if you can, you may want to visit me at my site to see how it is done?

I would love to but my work does not allows me to travel around the island.

[eddy planer]

Hi mivec1997

I just took a good look at your design. Wow this creatively way to place to location of the land part and water part ..oops of course the waterfall.

Mind ask you , how are you going to create waterfall ? Do share with me I will try my best to provide you some idea to create your dream built, hor? Now I'm camping here to hear your thoughts

[Justikanz]

So, did the project take off?

I will suggest using aquarium soil if you are intending to keep live stock. One never know whether there are chemical fertilizers in the garden soils sold in nurseries.