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67825
Hey, everybody -- thought I'd explain what I did in Henrietta's new cage, since it seems to be working really well. Maybe it will help somebody, I don't know.
I just moved her into a 4x2 foot cage, higher in the back than in the front -- sort of an old museum display type of thing, bought cheap from some guy last winter. After it languished in the garage a long time, I cleaned it up, caulked, painted, & polyurethaned it inside, poly'ed the outside, put in a radiant heat panel & fluorescent fixture, and got ready to move the brb in. For the last year, though, I'd been misting her old cage twice daily, and still the humidity would sometimes fall down to 65% or so. Not ideal. So I went to the local hydroponic gardening store, and with the help of the friendly guy there I bought a 4' length of 1/2" tubing, a 1/2" pipe connector, a 1/2" rubber bushing, a 1/2" end cap, 5 short lengths of 1/4" tubing, 5 1/4" pipe connectors, and 5 adjustable drip stopcocks. Total bill: $8.50! I drilled a 13/16" hole in the bottom of a 14 qt. office trashcan I wasn't using, and a similar hole in the top of the cage, near the back corner. I put the bushing in the bottom of the can, the 1/2" connector through the bushing and into the cage, and attached the 1/2" tubing inside the cage. I poked 5 holes in this big tube, and attached the short lengths of small tubing at intervals, with the drippers on the ends. Finally, the big end cap is at the end of the big tube. I ran a taut nylon line from the upper left rear corner of the cage to the lower front right, so it goes diagonally downward, and I used cable ties to anchor the big tube to it. (I used a manzanita branch at first, but it started to mold). I filled the trash can with water, and adjusted the drippers so they go about one drop per minute. I'm using coarse shaved aspen substrate, which wicks the moisture and gives it huge surface area to evap' from. From the looks of it, one trash can full of water will go about a week, and the cage is an absolute swamp -- so much so that I'm thinking of putting in a dry platform just in case she doesn't want to be always damp.
I don't have any pictures, but if you're having trouble imagining it, try to make a little drawing from what I wrote here and I think you'll understand. It was really easy to do -- took me only about fifteen minutes, and I'm a home-improvement retard -- and it seems to be working very well so far. I got the idea from somebody who seemed to be using sort of a milk-jug IV drip thing, either here or on Kingsnake, I forget. Anyway, if that was you -- thanks for the idea.
All the best -
Matt
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You Need a Thneed!
- Dr. Seuss
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