# "Floor" Plants?



## Wallace Grover (Dec 6, 2009)

Most of the vivs I've seen here are very beautiful, but there is so much emphasis on a large wall of broms (which I love, dont get me wrong) on so many vivs. I generally see maybe one or two little shrubs to the side and the rest of the ground space is leaf litter and moss.

Can anyone point me to a vivarium that makes the ground space the star?


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## Groundhog (Dec 17, 2006)

Hey Buddy:

Why would you want to? Seriously, in many of these forest habitats, the substrate is, in fact, leaf litter. The epiphytes are up in the branches not to entertain us, but to access light!

I guess the types of tanks that would "focus" on the ground level might include:

--a drier tank for eublepharine geckos or savannah lizards;
--a "grassy" tank for lacertas or maybe bumblebee toads;
--a "shoreline" type set up for semi-aquatic amphibians (such as Cynops, Bombina, Rana erythrea, some Mantellas, maybe a smaller Theloderma sp. etc)

*I am using shoreline here in the herpetocultural, not necessarily ecological sense.

OR sometimes, someone may set up a plant terrarium that features terrestrial plants, such as Episcias, Jewel orchids, West African begonias, carnivores, etc.


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## Wallace Grover (Dec 6, 2009)

Errr, I dont really know what to say other than that was not what i was looking for.

Thanks anyways though, I did go and look some of those critters up...


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## earthfrog (May 18, 2008)

I really don't have a pic for you, but what I did was make pockets out of sight where I stashed a bunch of leaves in places where the viv walls meet the floor for the frogs' benefit, mostly in the sides and back. Then I planted begonias on the bottom and sides and top---everywhere. Part of the fun for me is conserving these rare plants, in addition to the rare frogs. 

Some of my features include chlorosticta, 'Shamus', (Lita 'Ecuador'), burkillii, crispula...and it looks like Mardi Gras in there with all the leaf color.


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## PeanutbuttER (Jan 1, 2011)

Wallace Grover said:


> Most of the vivs I've seen here are very beautiful, but there is so much emphasis on a large wall of broms (which I love, dont get me wrong) on so many vivs. I generally see maybe one or two little shrubs to the side and the rest of the ground space is leaf litter and moss.
> 
> Can anyone point me to a vivarium that makes the ground space the star?


http://gallery.me.com/brianstropicals/100013/DSCF0067/web.jpg?ver=12733266250001

I think this is what you're looking for. Check out his website as well, he's got more pictures of vivs with riccia lawns.


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## candm519 (Oct 15, 2006)

As Groundhog suggested, go for at least one plants-only tank. 

You'll be free to create a miniature world that satisfies your own creative, aesthetic needs.

Wanting frogs is what got me started, and I enjoy watching and following the adventures of other peoples'. (Like OP kids.)

On the journey toward fruit flies and fake waterfalls, though, I got trapped by the botanical world. So far, I am totally fascinated, satisfied and fulfilled growing delicate tropical miniature plants with special needs. 

Frogs may still happen to me someday. Until then, I'm fine this way.


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## Wallace Grover (Dec 6, 2009)

I was kind of referring to something like eos's beautiful tanks:
http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/members-frogs-vivariums/59977-full-tank-shots-my-dart-vivs.html


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## Arpeggio (Jan 15, 2011)

Well this was mine, its tore down now, cuase it was so ugly, but it had some nice creepers.


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## Wallace Grover (Dec 6, 2009)

Now THAT is what I'm talking about. Very pretty...

What type of fern is that directly to the right of the large piece of driftwood?


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## Groundhog (Dec 17, 2006)

Well, gee Wallace, it stilll depends on what animals you have, does it not?










My 6-yr old Episcia:









Or










But I really can't get much more rambunctious than Joe here (and this is when he was a baby):


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## tachikoma (Apr 16, 2009)

Took me a while to find the link again, but here is a beautiful example of a ""floor" tank. 
Frognet.org Gallery :: 90 gallon


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## phender (Jan 9, 2009)

I set up this tank to play with clay and not to be beautiful. Its a 10 gal horizontal, looking in from the small end. There is a layer of laterite clay on the bottom with gaps for drainage and then just leaf litter on top. There is just a little soil that was attached to some of the plant roots. The background is 1/2 sodium bentonite and 1/2 laterite with a little calcium carbonate.









The plants are Gesneria cuneifolia (front right), Selaginella plana (front left), Pellionia pulchra (forefront), two types of Alocasia in the back plus some Tradescantia sp. 'peru" weaving around and a small Microsporum fern.
Most of these plants sit up above the substrate and the 3 juvi leucs I have in there cruise the leaf litter (coastal live oak and magnolia) under the canopy.

From the top. The orange on the alocasia is mushroom spores.


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## Okapi (Oct 12, 2007)

This is how I do the floor of my vivariums:

























Thread: http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/parts-construction/60747-imitator-viv.html

















Thread: http://www.dendroboard.com/forum/parts-construction/64470-clay-tree.html

Substrate covered in leaf litter with a few plants planted here and there.


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## Wallace Grover (Dec 6, 2009)

@tach: Oooh, I love the dramatic "island" of plants. Looks a little too temperate for my tastes, but the overall design would look just as good if you replicated it in tropical looking plants I bet!!

Phender, Love those aclosia. I think that may have made it one of my "noted" plants to consider!! It may not be AMAZING, but I think it is worthy of display...

@Okapi, Lovely. I think it complements the broms really well. The bright reddish purple one is a cryptanthus, right? (Nice tree btw!)


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## PeanutbuttER (Jan 1, 2011)

Okapi, in the first and 2nd picture what is that plant on the ground with the two-toned leaves. Looks like it grows flat with relatively tight green/purple leaves.


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## Okapi (Oct 12, 2007)

Wallace Grover said:


> @Okapi, Lovely. I think it complements the broms really well. The bright reddish purple one is a cryptanthus, right? (Nice tree btw!)


Yes, Dane from Junglebox sent me two of them as extras in a plant order. And thanks, that tree was a test and it turned out better than expected.



PeanutbuttER said:


> Okapi, in the first and 2nd picture what is that plant on the ground with the two-toned leaves. Looks like it grows flat with relatively tight green/purple leaves.


Pellionia repens. Heres where I got it:
Pellionia repens – Jungle Box

Heres what it looked like when I first put the cutting in:








Under good light its leaves start off tiny and lime green. They then turn red, then as they get larger, the red fades out to a more maroon color and their centers become light green.








Ive noticed that in lower light, the older leaves take on a dark purplish maroon with a duller green center: (this image is not mine, I got it off google)









It sometimes grows larger leaves with a more lanky appearance as well. I took a cutting from a different viv where the pellionia is fighting the other plants for light and put it in the clay tree viv:


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## JoshH (Feb 13, 2008)

Hmmm....there are plenty of neotropical rainforest terrestrial habitats that are quite overgrown with foliage, and are not leaf litter based....

























Some old ones....


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## Groundhog (Dec 17, 2006)

Gee Josh, I would call several of your pics "leaf-litter based" 

1) The point I was trying to make is the same as yours in your article about tanks with moss that looks "like a golf course."

Very often, people set up a tank and do NOT anticipate future growth--the result is a tangle or one plant (er, Ficus pumila...) eventually dominating everyone. Actually ,I am now having this problem with my 6 yr old Episcia 'Silver Skies,' but I hate when I have to chop it back...

2) Sometimes, we see amazing pics from the rainforest---of say, a moist moss-covered boulder covered with begonias and/or gesneriads. Cool--but what herps actually live on them?!? (I don't mean pass by--I mean live on them).

For me, a more natural look would be a fallen, rotted log with a peperomia and a gesneriad, with maybe a small bromeliad or spathiphyllum behind it, off-center. 

Or, a forked branch or small Ficus tree with small tillandsias--perfect for certain anoles, small corythyohanids or phyllomedusines. And why not add a Cissus or or other vine draped over it or growing up it? 

In your pics, I would more inclined to look for herps in pics 1 and 3; pic #2 is where people get eaten by army ants or jaguars or locals pissed off I can't find Aintry, three of my least favorite activities (Props to any who get the reference 

As for the tank shots, they all rule with the possible exception of the next-to-last one (I just don't think of neos or discolor vrieseas growing that close to the forest floor; I would have done something similar with guzmanias or even mesic tillandsias). The 1st and last tanks are stunning in their naturalism!


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