# 10G Waterfall Paludarium



## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

So this tank has been set up for a while now, and I wanted to post some pictures of it.



















Water Portion









Raft device made of styrofoam coated with black silicone.

















Weeping moss on the driftwood + ludwigia.


Sorry, I don't have any pictures of the setup. :/
It's hard to see the waterfall in the pictures, but I'll try to get a video of it later.
The background is made from black Great Stuff expanding foam, covered with silicone and coco fiber.


There's a tunnel in the rear-left corner, done with egg-crate, where the tube from the pump goes up and shoots out water in the middle of the tank.









And the land portion is an egg-crate bottom held up with Great stuff around the borders, creating a little planter area.
I put window screen over it to hold the gravel and soil.
Here's a shot of the underside of it:









*Fauna*: Red Cherry Shrimp
*Flora*_(aquatic)_: Anubias nana, Hydrocotyle sibthorpioides, Christmas moss, Weeping moss, Flame moss, HC, Marsilea minuta, Narrow-leaf java fern, Ludwigia repens x arcuata
_(non-aquatic)_: Ficus pumila, African violet, Bromeliads, Random orchid, Random ivy, random mosses.


Not the best of pictures, but thanks for viewing!


Edit: Video posted on 11/29/11
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ng1Kb_fHD1Y


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## flowmsp (Feb 6, 2010)

That is amazing looking. The ideas are genius and makes me want my own lol.


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## genomer (Mar 29, 2011)

Awesome!


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## Coursair (Apr 16, 2011)

Looks great


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## luke20037 (Jan 24, 2010)

thats really awsome! have you got any live stock in there?!


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## Fuzz (Mar 13, 2011)

Really cool! I like it


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## Sd760 (Apr 25, 2011)

Awesome project. Looks amazing. Out of curiosity what is maintenance going to be like on yhat bad boy


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Thanks guys ! 



luke20037 said:


> thats really awsome! have you got any live stock in there?!


The only thing I have in here is a couple of cherry shrimp; I'm a little scared to put any fish in there.. 



Sd760 said:


> Awesome project. Looks amazing. Out of curiosity what is maintenance going to be like on yhat bad boy


Not much maintenance is required at all. The water pump has a sponge attached to it, so I can just pull that off and put it back on when it needs cleaning. 
Besides water changing, that's pretty much all I do.


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## DanCottle (Apr 12, 2011)

So did you just silicone a small piece of glass to the rim?? Pretty cool btw


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## Ouagadougou (Jul 9, 2011)

Nice idea! your plants looks great!


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## Chrisinator (Jun 5, 2008)

What a beauty!


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## H82LOS3 (Mar 5, 2009)

Can u post a video of the waterfall pls? 
Btw awesome tank


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

DanCottle said:


> So did you just silicone a small piece of glass to the rim?? Pretty cool btw


Yeah, that's all I did.
Here's another vertical tank I have. It's a 10G terrarium.










with this little guy living in it. :smile:













H82LOS3 said:


> Can u post a video of the waterfall pls?
> Btw awesome tank


Thanks! Yeah, I'll try to get a video of it later.


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## MissCoryCat (Jul 5, 2011)

I love how lush your plants look. Very creative idea!


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## newportjon (Mar 22, 2011)

Seriously awesome!

You need to put up a step-by-step video on that! I want one now, too. :hihi:


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## newportjon (Mar 22, 2011)

What do you feed the frog?


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Flightless fruit flies


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## newportjon (Mar 22, 2011)

The frog is very cool!


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## NecoyX (Jun 13, 2011)

I love your tank!


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## Chrisinator (Jun 5, 2008)

Sweeetness


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## VincentK (Dec 16, 2009)

This is really awesome, did you have to put extra silicon between the rim and the tank? All my 10 gallon's rims are extremely weak, and fall off on their own after a while.


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## celine (Nov 19, 2010)

this is _the_ coolest thing ever!!!!


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## vespers_ (May 6, 2011)

roud:


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## 10gallonplanted (Oct 31, 2010)

Good job dude! I want to do that with my soon to be empty 20 gallon!


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## Chaos_Being (May 18, 2010)

I love those tanks! Great idea with modifying them so they could stand vertically.


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## karatekid14 (Jan 16, 2011)

I have been wanting to make a 5 gal vertical paludarium/terrarium with a kitty litter background. For livestock I would either have 1. none 2. praying mantis 3. vampire crab 
Would it work?


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## 100gal-Man (Jul 21, 2007)

Very _very_nice!

What light are you using?


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## bigboij (Jul 24, 2009)

amazing never had much intrest in palludariums until this thread now i want to tear down and rebuild my 10g :0


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Thank you all for the nice comments!



VincentK said:


> This is really awesome, did you have to put extra silicon between the rim and the tank? All my 10 gallon's rims are extremely weak, and fall off on their own after a while.


No, I didn't add any extra silicone. I checked to make sure there was plenty already though, and did some leak tests. 
I did have other 10 gallons that leaked at the rims in the past. 
I think they were a different brand. I got this one at petco.



karatekid14 said:


> I have been wanting to make a 5 gal vertical paludarium/terrarium with a kitty litter background. For livestock I would either have 1. none 2. praying mantis 3. vampire crab
> Would it work?


Hmm.. I haven't ever kept either of those, so I don't really know, but I think vampire crabs would be pretty nice. 
And I hear the kitty litter background is great too. I still haven't tried it, but plants can take root in the clay and it's much easier than great stuff. 
It is much heavier however.




100gal-Man said:


> Very _very_nice!
> 
> What light are you using?


Just a 23 watt spiral CFL daylight lamp.


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## Lil' Swimz$ (Jul 24, 2010)

What's species is that? I love thumbnails, I don't have any though. Just an auratus.

Go darts!


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

:icon_mrgr
It's Ranitomeya Intermedius but I don't know the exact morph lol.
This is my only frog too. haha
I wanna try one of the bigger frogs, like leucomelas or azureus.


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Here's a couple more close up pics:

Marsilea minuta with baby african violet



















Anubias and Hydrocotyle









Hydrocotyle sibthorpioides is probably one of my favorite plants. 
I'm holding it up on the background with a little toothpick, trying to get it 
to stick, but it doesn't seem to be grabbing on too well..


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## Lil' Swimz$ (Jul 24, 2010)

I love how moist your viv is. I'm building a vert right now, too, and love the how wet it looks. I'm sure your intermedius loves it, I'm pretty sure they are found near streams.

The emmersed aquarium plants are sweet, the marsilea looks so different!
Have you ever tried growing peacock, willow, christmas, or flame moss emmersed before? I bet they would look cool compared to emmersed java.


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

I do have christmas moss and flame moss in the tank.
Most of the moss in the picture is christmas moss, and it's hard to get a good picture of the flame moss, but it looks really nice! 

Strangely, I've never grown java moss emersed before. lol


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## luke20037 (Jan 24, 2010)

hey joonho, I hope you dont mind but i'm wanting to set up a simmalar set up for a musk turtle to live in the aquatic portion too though, this would need a slighlty larger submerged area and some kind of platform too. Also what have you made the back out of, I know it began with an egg crate but how have you got the plnats in, what is the "stuff" on the egg crate to give it its natural look. Any help would be a great help!! thanks!


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## plecostomouse (Jun 9, 2011)

wicked, this is a very cool tank never seen anything like it.


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

luke20037 said:


> hey joonho, I hope you dont mind but i'm wanting to set up a simmalar set up for a musk turtle to live in the aquatic portion too though, this would need a slighlty larger submerged area and some kind of platform too. Also what have you made the back out of, I know it began with an egg crate but how have you got the plnats in, what is the "stuff" on the egg crate to give it its natural look. Any help would be a great help!! thanks!


The background is made with a product called 'Great Stuff Expanding Foam.' I used Handi-foam (same thing, but black color). 
When you spray it, it sticks to the glass and expands out. I placed some planter pots on the wall, while spraying the foam; that's how I have some plants in the wall. 
After a while, the foam will harden, and you can sculpt it with a razor. After the foam cured, I covered it with silicone and stuck coco fiber on it.


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## firefiend (Sep 3, 2009)

Great Build... you know now that I'm jumping into planted aquariums I should diversify the plants in my Vivarium with some emersed aquatic plants!


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## luke20037 (Jan 24, 2010)

joonho said:


> The background is made with a product called 'Great Stuff Expanding Foam.' I used Handi-foam (same thing, but black color).
> When you spray it, it sticks to the glass and expands out. I placed some planter pots on the wall, while spraying the foam; that's how I have some plants in the wall.
> After a while, the foam will harden, and you can sculpt it with a razor. After the foam cured, I covered it with silicone and stuck coco fiber on it.


ok wicked giving me some good ideas



> And the land portion is an egg-crate bottom held up with Great stuff around the borders, creating a little planter area.
> I put window screen over it to hold the gravel and soil.


just one more question, what do you mean by a window screen?


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## mr.gaboozlebag (Feb 22, 2006)

Do you have more details on how you created and plumbed the waterfall? what is the volume of the water area?


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## firefiend (Sep 3, 2009)

luke20037 said:


> just one more question, what do you mean by a window screen?


regular nylon window screening from the hardware store... comes in a roll of varying lengths.


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Updaaaaaate

Sorry it's been so long, but here's an update, and with a video!
I kind of left it alone for a long time and things really grew out
..especially the hydrocotyle.

Sorry, pictures aren't too great and my water is a little yellow. :icon_redf














































And here's the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ng1Kb_fHD1Y

Thanks!


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

Any suggestions on a new plant to put in the pot at the top right corner of the tank?
The Ivy up there seems to be dying and I don't really know why.
(bump)


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## frenchymasters (Nov 28, 2011)

what is the non aquatic plant that is coming down the wall?


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## joonho (Nov 18, 2008)

On the left side? 
That's Ficus pumila


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