# Emersed "gardening" in a vivarium?



## rusticitas (Mar 10, 2004)

I was introduced last week to the concept of a _vivarium_ and the beautiful myriad poison dart frogs, orchids and plants that generally populate them. I am still reading and researching to learn as much as I can, but one thing makes me curious:

Can one combine emersed planting or gardening (ex. Cryptocorynes, etc) with vivaria? To me, a complete novice, it seems that the environmental criteria are the same: humid, warm, and well lit.

Does anyone do this? Would it be advisable and workable? Before I populate my house with hundreds of smaller glass houses for aquaria, emersed plant gardens and vivaria, I thought I'd see if there were ways to combine some of them (also before I send my electric bill through the roof).


----------



## Phil Edwards (Jan 22, 2004)

rusticitas,

Welcome to APC. To answer your question, yes, absolutely, definately, completely, uh-huh! Many of our aquarium plants are actually amphibious plants that live in the semi-aquatic zone on the banks of lakes and rivers. Just about all of them will do very well in the well lit, humid environment of a vivarium/terrarium. 

Best,
Phil


----------



## rusticitas (Mar 10, 2004)

Phil Edwards said:


> Welcome to APC. To answer your question, yes, absolutely, definately, completely, uh-huh! Many of our aquarium plants are actually amphibious plants that live in the semi-aquatic zone on the banks of lakes and rivers. Just about all of them will do very well in the well lit, humid environment of a vivarium/terrarium.


Excellent! Now off to get poison dart frogs.


----------



## Error (Apr 16, 2004)

Recently I saw a nice "wet" vivarium at a shop an hour from me. There were bromeliads and some mosses, but what really took me for a loop was the Hydrocotyle leucocephala that was growing both in and out of the water. It had actually started to creep up one of the corkbard panels.

I really want to try one of these things one day. My girlfriend likes frogs just as much as she likes fish, so she was pretty excited when the salesperson was explaining it to us.

I'm a guy who likes to breed things, so I was thinking that the Red Eye Leaf Frog was a cool animal and that I'd like to try to breed it if I ever got a vivarium. The salesperson told me that it's pretty difficult to do, but not impossible. Apparently they lay their eggs on the underside of a leaf that overhangs a body of water, and they curl the leaf and stick it together with an adhesive they secrete. When the eggs hatch, the tadpoles fall into the water and grow from there. I asked what to feed the tadpoles, and he said he plans on feeding them spirulina when they hatch (he said his haven't bred yet). 

It would be pretty cool to have a vivarium with this kind of stuff, a virtual rainforest micro-ecosystem in your living room. Fish and some kind of frog together would be darn neat.


----------

