I’m confused by what you mean. To me, the fabric is the landscape fabric. It’s a solid piece of cloth-like material. I take the mesh to be screening. You need to keep the drainage layer seperated from the soil, with the landscape fabric. If you want to have the floor of the soil layer be more uniform/flatter and defined, you can then use either screening or plastic eggcrate just below the landscape fabric.
But won’t the dirt like seep out of the front service door and look gross because it’s mesh? That’s why I thought I would need a liner of some sort. I would be fine if I didn’t need one. Also concerned with keeping the air flow. But if I do ~5.5” of substrate total, then I’ll have ~2.5 for the air flow. I have holes drilled into the bottom of the pvc and that drain pan on the bottom I vacuum out every few days. I’m spraying about a gallon of water a night I figured, probably less but it seems I’m putting 2gal of water in my mister reservoir about every other day or so.
I like your way, but I do like having my substrate better contained, like in the root pouch. I’ve found the isopods also enjoy the root pouch as a place to avoid the hunting chameleons.
Okay yeah. So I’m thinking the landscape fabric or actual mesh/window screen would still catch her nails somehow when she digs down. So the egg crate would give me better reassurance that it won’t do that? Am I overthinking that?
Like I’m still going to put the lay bin in there. But what if she gets a wild hair and uses the other part
I wouldn’t worry about the landscape fabric at all, unless what you use is tissue paper thin. She might run into some plant roots and decide that is deep enough.
so glad you posted this! I just got some dragon strands and am debating on bioactive now….but I don’t know how I would do it.
It's not that difficult and wouldn't go back anymore. Most important part is your drainage and drainage layer. It did like this when I still had an Reptibreeze XL https://www.chameleonforums.com/blogs/low-budget-enclosure-setup.2462/
You just have the best set ups so I'm excited when you give input!
Thank you very much for the compliment
. I’m trying to do my best and hopefully I can inspire others
No. I had a mushroom pop up here and there, but I guess that’s a good thing. The biggest problems I had were every now and then the isopods would make a bid for freedom and I’d find them walking down the hall or their desiccated remains in the closet...and the weight of the enclosures was crazy and almost impossible to move. Make sure everything can be accessed without needing to move your enclosure! There were soil gnats, but I’m having more of a problem with them now from my non-bioactive enclosures than ever before.
Oh i didnt think about the weight of the enclosure. I am going to have to wait to do bioactive then because my enclosures are in a room that is not completed so I'll need to finish that first, then do the bioactive.....sad face.
It just gives you more time to plan and gather some incredible plants.
I ended up with that white hair mold in my dragon enclosure. It was on the coco coir that the isopods came in and I just dumped under and piece of cork bark. I picked it all out and good now. I’m also working on clover in there. Slow process
I can’t wait to do more with my Cham enclosure.
Interesting! I’m vacuuming a couple gallons out of the drainage tray every few days. Surprised how much those things hold. Maybe it’ll be less when I switch.With the free range setup I never had molt. The ones in the enclosure did, especially the large one from Neo. But after placing a bigger fan in that setup it was gone, same for excessive drainage water. I mist 5 minutes per day with 5 mistheads and almost no drainage water. Before the fan it was a bucket per week
