Finally finished my new enclosure!!!!!!Any suggestions?

[concentratelab]

Hey all finally finished my enclosure build the dimensions are 2ftx2ftx7.5ft the cage portion is 4 ft tall. I made cabinets on top and bottom to conceal lights and drainage. There are 5 live plants 18 feet of fake vine and 12 ft of homemade jungle vine. I carved and coated the background myself and painted it to look like rock and waterproofed it. I have both basking and uvb lights it's screened in on 3 sides. Any suggestions would be awesome always down to make improvements!

 

[concentratelab]

 

[triggerfish2]

nice! mind sharing on how you make the background? Thanks in advance.

 

[concentratelab]

I got a sheet of styrofoam from home depot and trimmed it to fit and then took the scraps and sliced them into long thin pieces and glued them to the sheet of foam to make the bricks. Then coated the whole thing in non sanded tile grout in several coats and let it fully dry then painted it and sealed it with mod podge to close up all the pores in the grout and then coated it in non toxic waterproof

 

[Mike Fisher]

How did you make the Mayan calendar piece? That's a nice touch.

 

[junglefries]

Must be nice. I can't even draw a stick figure. Absolutely no artistic talent whatsoever on my end.

 

[concentratelab]

The mayan calender I got off amazon and grouted and painted it to match. it's made of ceramic where the rest of the background is foam and grout

 

[carol5208]

Very nice build! I know you don't want to cover up the back, but I would add some tall kind of plant in the middle for coverage. As your chameleon grows, those side vines are not going to be very supportive and will not provide much cover. Great job though!

 

[xephyr17]

I agree with carol but it looks fantastic otherwise!!! Awesome job

 

[jmwhitel]

Wow! You spent some time. But well worth it

 

[Rodcham]

Very nice, you must be proud after all the hard work you put in to it.

 

[mnlwfan]

Great job! I love how there are drainage cracks built in to the floor of the enclosure.

 

[concentratelab]

I have a 2.5 foot palm tree in the back left and plan on adding more branches and vines at the top for climbing he is still pretty small. At last weigh in he was 9.5 grams

 

[ShaneXD45]

your enclosure looks awesome.

 

[NosyBe15]

Sweet, Looks good.

 

[concentratelab]

All together it took me about 5 days of biulding and painting to make the cage and a day to decorate it I spent between 250-300 on all the materials and plants but I still need more vines and a mister system. And I could keep going on and on about ways I can add to or make the setup more elaborate with automated climate and lighting systems all controlled by a central processor which can be remote operated from my phone as long as I have Internet. I would be able to monitor and adjust my cage environment.

My materials list was fairly small for the project it was as follows
2 1/2 sheets of 1/2 inch plywood
10 2x2 8 ft boards
Box of screws
Wood glue
3 sets of hinges
3 cabinet pull handles
3 rolls of aluminium screen
Staple gun
Non toxic paint or stain of your choice
Non sanded tile grout (brown or grey)
Acrylic paint in dark grey, brown, moss green, light grey
2 sheets of 2 ft x 4 ft purple foam board
4 tubes of loctite power grab adhesive
8 ft of 1 inch rope (for vines)
8 ft of 1/2 inch rope (for small vines)
Aquarium silicone
1 bag of Eco-earth for coating vines
Non toxic water proofed
Mod podge sealant
1 - 2 inch screw in pvc shower drain
2 gallon bucket for catching drain water
24 ft of trim boards
3 tubes of Alex plus caulking

And I used the following tools
Cordless drill
Circular saw and miter saw
Paint roller
Staple gun
Nail gun

 

[crazychamzoo]

Looks nice!

 

[Cait0420]

That's an amazing design you've got going on!

 

[Renn]

That's just gorgeous, what a great enclosure.

 

[exasperatus2002]

Great job