I put this together out of a 10 gallon fish tank

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Gekkonidae

Gekkonidae

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Independence, KY
I put these 4 "Mantis apartments" together this morning. I wanted each one to have a little different feel to it I'm likely going to arrange more stuff for them to hang from. The top is actually same material as the dividers I made, so they should do okay with just that, but i'll add a little more later, just in case. I made this out of a 10 gallon fish tank. I want a different species in each one, whenever my little one are big enough.

TcPaL4A.jpg


 
Thanks man! Dividers were all made from 2 things I bought at walmart on the cheap. I spent I think 6 bucks on 2 packs of the grids, and then another 3 bucks on project cover binders/bars. The grids are in the crafts section. Might have to hunt for them. The binder things are in the office supplies section. They come with the plastic covers for the projects, but i just threw those away lol. Here's the youtube I followed to get it done. The reason I went the DIY route is because dividers for tanks are a freakin rip off. I made 3 for less than the cost of paying for 1 pre-assembled divider you'd get from a fish care site/store, and I had enough left over to make a grid to cover the entire top of the tank also..

The other stuff is plain potting soil for substrate, a little sand I had from a vacation to Panama Beach. The rest of it: plants, moss and rocks I ended up getting at Hobby Lobby for 50% off (they have a deal running right now). I think i spent maybe 15-20 bucks on all the plants.

Oddly enough, I kind of picked up the idea from Minecraft. I like how you enter little biomes, so I thought I'd sort of apply that idea to individual enclosures for my Mantids. They will each have their own individual little world to live in, and it just looks damn cool.

I'm still not 100% done with it. I'm going to make a backdrop for each of the 4. I want 1 to be a rocky material, one to be a bark material and the other 2 I don't know. I'll try to stick with the theme/color schemes of each one though.

 
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Make one like a grassland. Kinda like a grassy field ;)

Man... I would've never thought about cross stitch mesh. That's perfect

 
Good call man! I'll do that. I mean, it does have potting soil substrate, and I do have grass seed in the shed. I'll just throw some in there and let it go wild lol

 
Amazing!

Question, how does one cleans the enclosures like these when they are full of poos? Dump everything out and recreate it?

I find that I have to clean all the deli containers at least once a week before it starts to smells really bad (poo and left over food). I use cotton pads so I just swaps new ones in.

 
This set-up is just gorgeous!

Do the binder edges go to the ridge that surrounds the top of the aquarium or all the way to the top?

Also, you know how the mantids like to hang on the lids? How will you open a one piece cover with four different mantids clinging to it? Do you have individual lids over each compartment first? (I realize you don't have mantids in your set-up yet, but how will you deal with this?)

Also, I'm with Chungy regarding the frass, etc. How do all you mantid keepers keep planted habitats clean?

 
Regarding the question in relation to the imminent "fecal frenzy" that will inevitably inhabit the surface of the enclosure floors, I imagine that I'll just clean it out as I go. Probably once a week or so.I have enough potting soil to last quite a while. However, I know some of these surfaces may be fairly hard to clean. I'll think about a way to do this. I'm really interested to hear an opinion about how some of those who already do have live plants in their enclosures approach cleaning them also!

As for the top. I do have one grid laying squarely over all of the enclosures, underneath the tank lid, that I'm planning to cut up into individual "lids", that are somewhat tightly zip tied along one edge, acting as a door for each enclosure. The lid on top does a nice job of adding a little weight on the edges, so I highly doubt they could be opened by any mantids.

Edit: Thanks for the compliments all :) I really tried to think about something a little different/artistic to make presentation a bit more attractive, but I also wanted it to be somewhat practical.

 
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You maybe able to find small hinges for like... Cabinet doors, at a hardware store?... I've seen smaller ones before but can't recall where I seen them.

Could hot glue those to the plastic "lip" of the tank and to the individual doors?

In regard to the poo.. I used to clean mine out, but pillbugs will do the job for you. ;)

 
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Nice tip on the pill bugs. LAME, do you feed the pills anything in addition to Scyther ######? Since I have potting soil, would I need anything else to assist them in being more self sufficient?

 
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They eat about anything that hits the ground In my tanks lol... Old exoskeletons, dead/dying leafs, remaining bits of prey from the mantids... Sticks,twigs, and old wood.... I also use springtails. With the two combined I NEVER have to worrie about mold

 
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Gekkonidae, thanks for showing your project. I was out gathering items today and can hardly wait to get started. I also understand about cutting the top grid into individual doors. Thanks for that. Mine will be much simpler and never as good looking as yours, but it is a great way to give each mantis more room---and I'm tired of looking through plastic!

Lame, I like the idea of tiny hinges. Maybe Hobby Lobby would have some (like for doll houses) if I can't find them at the hardware store. I have lots of isopods and springtails, too, and they do a good job. Right now all my tanks have a couple inches of coco fiber/sphagnum substrate full of cleaner bugs. My 108 oz containers just sit on top of it---the only way I can easily keep the humidity up. When I clean the containers, I just toss uneaten bugs, etc. into the substrate and stir it up occasionally to get it off the surface (never tried tossing the frass into it though. But Gekkonidae has his set up so beautifully that I can't see where anything could be stirred to hide the mess. I need to be less anal, I guess---gives me shivers.

Thanks, guys!

 
Deacon, this is exactly the idea I had when I wanted to put something like this together. I don't mind my plastic containers, but it would be a lot cooler to see them being more active through something clear! Good luck with yours!! :)

 
Gekkonidae, Thanks! I hope you get some older mantids to put in your beautiful set-up, too!

 

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