# COOLING techniques?



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

So given the wonky layout of my house (my bathroom is over a hot water pipe AND has absolutely no air flow or circulation due to the floorplan) my house is alwasy 70F+++


normally this isn't an issue; at night its 68-70F and during the day its right around 72-75. The guys that need it a bit warmer have their respective lights to warm things up and everybody is happy.

However, this past week we have had a bit of a heat wave. Even with the AC on and the rest of the house (relatively) cooled down to around 78F, one of my frog tanks is still sitting at 87-89F during the day with a MINIMUM temperature of 82F at 3AM....it was around 82-84F all night.

I have been worried about my frogs so I went out and got some computer fans to vent it out....I have one fan blowing into the tank and one fan sucking air out. Simple 12V 80mm fans. My temps have not changed AT ALL but (as expected) my humidity has plummeted almost instantly to the 40-50% mark.....


how do you guys cool your tanks? 


also, how do you setup IN-tank air circulation on smaller tanks? I can easily create a cross-breeze if I build a hood (which I think I will do soon) but for the many members who have racks and tons of 10-20gal tanks...do you not use fans? I actually have not had a need for them really, the heat issue just made me start thinking about them...

right now, I have my 29gal lit by 4x 2' 32Watt 6.5K lights. I'm guessing this is overkill and am probably going to cut 2 lights to save heat, but that won't cut down 8 degrees++

Open to suggestions...I've tried putting a fan in the room to move some air, it helped like 2 degrees but not much....my AC in my house has been on mostly all day but that is obviously not a practical solution...my electric bill is going to kill me...


----------



## Julio (Oct 8, 2007)

sounds like your tank might need some more ventilation, but i have an ac that runs during the day along with floor fan to move the air int he room around and the tank get to about 84 max and that was today when it was 92 out, so you might need a stronger ac in the room


----------



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

@julio: my tank has a full screen top at the moment!


what I'm getting at is that it is simply not feasible for me to leave my house AC on 24/7....I'm trying to find a more "localized" way to cool the tank :\


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

have you ever measured the humidity in the tanks?


----------



## Julio (Oct 8, 2007)

well i dont' run my ac 24/7 the ac in the room only runs when the lights are on, but sounds like you need a more localized unit or an exhaust fan in the room


----------



## bshmerlie (Jun 2, 2010)

You could get one of those portable air conditioners or if you have a window in the room you can get a window AC. That way you don't have to cool down the entire house only that one room.


----------



## dartboard (Jan 30, 2011)

I have actually heard of people that will get a cooler of ice, and place it close to the tanks, and then put a fan that is blowing the air on top of the ice over to the tanks. While this would be a hassle to do every single day, it is something that can work to cool things down a bit during the very very hot days. It is worth a try.


----------



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

Brotherly Monkey said:


> have you ever measured the humidity in the tanks?


Yes. And..?


@julio & bshmerlie: unfortunately I do not have a window near that location....I have setup a normal fan to get some air moving and that has helped, but I was hoping for some more specific "tank-specific" or even "in-tank" solution  thanks tho!

@dartboard: that is not a bad idea....I was actually doing something very similar by putting a few ice cubes into the pond every hour


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> Yes. And..?



what is it and what was the measurement taken with?


----------



## brod322 (May 27, 2011)

dartboard said:


> I have actually heard of people that will get a cooler of ice, and place it close to the tanks, and then put a fan that is blowing the air on top of the ice over to the tanks. While this would be a hassle to do every single day, it is something that can work to cool things down a bit during the very very hot days. It is worth a try.


I like the idea. I'm going to keep it in mind, I'm in Texas and we are consistently over 100 degrees right now. With out refrigerated air I probably couldn't keep darts


----------



## travisc (Mar 30, 2009)

This is probably one of the more complex ways of building a swamp cooler but if you Google "Homemade Swamp Cooler" you will get many variations. As a homebrewer for several years, we would use this to keep fermentation temperatures in check. Because it works on evaporation to cool the air, the drier the climate the better. So somewhere in TX or AZ would be ideal. It never really worked well in FL where evaporation basically doesn't exist. 

In extreme cases, what about keeping a frozen case of sealed 12oz water bottles in the freezer and laying one or two on top of each cage a few times a day? Just rotate out the frozen bottles. The cold air would sink to the ground. I may actually experiment with this in a cage with no animals right now. Living in FL and being in the midst of hurricane season, it is really something we SHOULD all be thinking about. Even just one day of no power would result in some heavy temperature spikes here.


HOMEMADE SWAMP COOLER


----------



## johnyrocks (Jun 25, 2011)

i cool my tank by misting it


----------



## PeanutbuttER (Jan 1, 2011)

travisc said:


> Living in FL and being in the midst of hurricane season, it is really something we SHOULD all be thinking about. Even just one day of no power would result in some heavy temperature spikes here.


Very true. If you're without power for a day you'll need to be sure to have enough frozen waterbottles in the fridge to keep the tanks cool though. Since temps will be spiking, the frozen waterbottles will heat up faster which would require more waterbottles than under "normal" conditions. I'm not sure how feasible this would be (depending on how many vivs you have to keep cool) in practice during a power outage/heat spike.

Not trying to be a downer, but I wanted to throw that out there in case you hadn't considered that.


----------



## GregF (Sep 13, 2009)

I use little six-pack coolers, upside down, with two Coleman ice packs. Basically, the only "exposed" part of the ice pack is facing downward towards the screen. They are the perfect size. If you have a lot of water in the bottom of the tank, it's going to take some extra work to cool the water first, and then the temps are more stable, and cooler, after that.

Replace ice packs every 12 hours, as needed.

I maintain ~5-6 degrees cooler than the room the viv is in. It works great.


----------



## Julio (Oct 8, 2007)

luid nitrogen always works best, if you can get some at a local welding shop usually.


----------



## GregF (Sep 13, 2009)

travisc said:


> So somewhere in TX or AZ would be ideal. It never really worked well in FL where evaporation basically doesn't exist.


Ha. I'm sure that SOMEWHERE in Texas, that could be true. El Paso, maybe. But most of Texas is really humid.


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

Julio said:


> luid nitrogen always works best, if you can get some at a local welding shop usually.


really?...


----------



## Julio (Oct 8, 2007)

You can freeze a can of soda in 3.5 seconds, but if you do not have any experience handling it, i would not do it, it can be extremely dangerous


----------



## Darts15 (Jun 5, 2011)

Another way to cool the water (just an idea...I've never tried it.....) but you could freeze some purified or spring water into cubes and drop one or two of those in there every now and then.....but I guess that could make it too cold? I dunno.


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

Julio said:


> You can freeze a can of soda in 3.5 seconds, but if you do not have any experience handling it, i would not do it, it can be extremely dangerous


I understand what it is, and how it works, but just can't imagine using it safely to cool a viv


----------



## Darts15 (Jun 5, 2011)

Also, there's dry ice and you could put it in a container with a lot of holes down into the vivarium.


----------



## Boondoggle (Dec 9, 2007)

Darts15 said:


> Also, there's dry ice and you could put it in a container with a lot of holes down into the vivarium.


That would asphyxiate your frogs in a matter of minutes, but it would cool down the vivarium.


----------



## Darts15 (Jun 5, 2011)

Ah. Didn't think about that. haha


----------



## PeanutbuttER (Jan 1, 2011)

Boondoggle said:


> That would asphyxiate your frogs in a matter of minutes, but it would cool down the vivarium.


Why does everything have to have so many freaking drawbacks...


----------



## Boondoggle (Dec 9, 2007)

Darts15 said:


> Ah. Didn't think about that. haha


No worries 

I'm dealing with this myself right now...maybe not as extreme temps as you, though

We are having our typical summer ridiculous heat wave here and even with the AC on I can't get the house below 77. In the frog room with computer it is even higher. I have a Ranco thermostat hooked up to shut off all the lights when temps hit 80 degrees. If I remember right the thermostat only cost about 50 bucks.

Ranco ETC-111000 Electronic Temperature Controller (120 / 240v)

I have to admit I'm not wild about the lights shutting off a few times an hour, but the plants aren't suffering noticeably, and I don't think it's thrown the frogs off any. I have fans on the lights too, but that heat has to go somewhere. I've also upped my misting. At least this method keeps tank temps no hotter than room temps.

I was toying with the idea of having the misters go on frequently for much shorter times after putting a frozen 2 liter bottle of water in the misting reservoir. Optimally that would lower the temp of the tank 5 or so degrees with each misting. That has not been tested, though, and I would hesitate to try it with a hand sprayer that doesn't provide a fine mist. For that matter, I suppose you could hook up the Ranco thermostat to a "cool water mister" system, but it would take some tinkering.


----------



## PeanutbuttER (Jan 1, 2011)

Boondoggle said:


> I was toying with the idea of having the misters go on frequently for much shorter times after putting a frozen 2 liter bottle of water in the misting reservoir. Optimally that would lower the temp of the tank 5 or so degrees with each misting. That has not been tested, though, and I would hesitate to try it with a hand sprayer that doesn't provide a fine mist. For that matter, I suppose you could hook up the Ranco thermostat to a "cool water mister" system, but it would take some tinkering.


That makes me think that you could also get a beat up "college-sized" fridge on craigslist for cheap, turn the temp as warm as you could go (still fairly cool), drill a hold in the top to run your waterlines through and place your misting reservoir in there. Probably more work than it's worth, but it has the plus of being automatable (no need to freeze/replace 2-liter bottles in the reservoir).

But, I don't think it's necessarily a great idea to spray chilled water on the frogs. My wife poured a cold glass of water on me when I was taking a shower and oh boy was I upset


----------



## Boondoggle (Dec 9, 2007)

PeanutbuttER said:


> But, I don't think it's necessarily a great idea to spray chilled water on the frogs. My wife poured a cold glass of water on me when I was taking a shower and oh boy was I upset


Yeah, that's the rub. The object would be to maintain a cooler temp, not just throw cold water on hot frogs. Maybe with a fine enough mist and if the water was in the upper 60's/lower 70's? I like your idea because you could vary the amount of tubing going through the fridge to bring water temps up or down.

I guess at a certain point, though, it would just be a lot easier to throw a swamp cooler on the window and be done with it.


----------



## illinoisfrogs (Apr 16, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> Yes. And..?
> 
> 
> @julio & bshmerlie: unfortunately I do not have a window near that location....I have setup a normal fan to get some air moving and that has helped, but I was hoping for some more specific "tank-specific" or even "in-tank" solution  thanks tho!
> ...


any chance you can move them to a room with a window, and put a window AC unit in? I think that is the easiest way to cool a single room.


----------



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

luckily the heat wave was only 2 days and things are ok now, but I'm glad we got some good discussion going 

@travisc and gregf: great idea with the frozen bottles. I will get some of those.

@darts15: that is basically what I was doing but I quickly realized that it is a bad idea to put the ice cube directly into the water (similar to what someone else said about spraying with cold water)....I just set the ice directly on the screen, similar to the method travis and greg suggested. Except their method is way better....they don't have to drain their tank because of all the added water 

the dry ice as others mentioned will kill your frogs....but do note dry ice is a FANTASTIC way to clean an infested tank! you take OUT your animals first and then put a few cups with dry ice in there and let the ice sublime out...it will kill all the BUGS in your tank, your plants won't mind the co2 at all and then after you air it out a bit you can put your animals back in without any residue 

@jonnyrocks: misting doesn't cool remotely enough and if you sit there misting all day you will overwater and soak everything. 

@lincoln: unfortunately no i cannot, its a "display" tank that is essentially embedded underneath my bathroom cabinet. I have some computer fans hooked up to move the air but I can only point them horizontal to the cage, if i point them directly inward the humidity plummets as I mentioned.




Brotherly Monkey said:


> what is it and what was the measurement taken with?


I mentioned more than enough information in my opening thread regarding my humidity. Besides, that is irrelevant to this thread. Whatever you are trying to do, this isn't the thread for that.


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> I mentioned more than enough information in my opening thread regarding my humidity. Besides, that is irrelevant to this thread. Whatever you are trying to do, this isn't the thread for that.


Stop being so insecure. It was a legitimate question, and asked sincerely


----------



## illinoisfrogs (Apr 16, 2010)

If I were you I'd put together a back up tank where the frogs could be moved.....if it gets too hot for more than a few hours, they could die.....this way in case of an emergency you could move them......


----------



## illinoisfrogs (Apr 16, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> I mentioned more than enough information in my opening thread regarding my humidity. Besides, that is irrelevant to this thread. Whatever you are trying to do, this isn't the thread for that.


I thought this was a decent question. If your whole top is screen, keeping the humidity in a range that darts need is difficult, and it'll be worse come winter time.


----------



## Baltimore Bryan (Sep 6, 2006)

I actually thought the humidity was important because I feel it does influence temps. For example, when it is pretty hot out but very humid and hazy at the same time, it will feel a lot hotter and you get much more tired faster than if it was just hot and dry out. In the same way, my tanks always feel warmer when I mist and they are humid, so I actually mist less when I'm needing to cool them. I might mist with cool water in the morning as the lights come on, but then throughout the day I will go in, open the lids, and point a fan in them for a few seconds to let cooler (drier) air in. I do give them a shallow water dish to use, though, and moist hiding places if they feel too dry. 
It is important to still know what your humidity is, especially if you do manipulate it to help with temperatures. Many cheap pet store humidity gauges are known to be unreliable, so I think asking what the humidity is and how it is being measured is an important aspect of the tank's overall environmental control.
Bryan


----------



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

Brotherly Monkey said:


> Stop being so insecure. It was a legitimate question, and asked sincerely


No, it wasn't. You are merely trying to highjack and derail this thread; I'm guessing because you don't like me from another thread. Quite frankly, I don't care. 

Asking "what" I used to measure my humidity says enough about your intent. It has nothing to do with me being insecure. This thread isn't even ABOUT me. It's *about cooling*. Like I said earlier, you are just trying to instigate. Others have contributed quite positively to this discussion; you can go troll elsewhere.

The responses after yours are already going downhill....I have no problems maintaining my humidity. I never mentioned anything about having problems maintaining my humidity. If you actually read and comprehended my post, I clearly stated that my humidity "plummeted" to 40-50% after I put fans on my tank. Plummeted means it fell a long long way; a little logic would tell you that before I put my fans in my humidity was much higher! EDIT: Hint: its always over 90%.


@lincolnrailers: I never said humidity wasn't an important factor. I said BrotherlyMonkey was purposely trying to start a fight. As I said above, my humidity was mentioned in my original post. I never said, nor do I understand why you would assume, that I am having problems keeping my humidity "in a range that darts need". I have no such problem. Similarly your conclusion that "it'll be much worse in the winter" is wrong; I live in socal, we have a bit of extra-hot summer and otherwise perfect weather all year. We don't have winter; it won't affect me. If you read my original post, I said that my humidity plummeted when I had my fans on in my tank. 

And no, my tanks are not open-screen tops...otherwise I'd have tons of problems normally....not only when I turn on the fans. Regardless, as I say below, that is entirely irrelevant to the purpose of this thread anyway..


@BaltimoreBryan: I agree with you that those analog gauges are useless. 1) why do you assume I have one? 2) who cares what I have, the question presented was regarding cooling methods, not "what am I doing wrong"...so why does it matter?; 3) i agree with u humidity is just as important as temperature; 4) I don't follow your misting theory....yes it "feels" hot out, but a feeling isn't a logical argument...I'm not negating or confirming your theory, but I would be curious to think more about it. 5) I have no idea why I am using a numbered list 



lets try to stay on track ya? Good COOLING TECHNIQUES, especially for SMALL tanks?


----------



## Brotherly Monkey (Jul 20, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> No, it wasn't. You are merely trying to highjack and derail this thread; I'm guessing because you don't like me from another thread. Quite frankly, I don't care.


Jebus, talk about senseless paranoia~!!! Honestly, it would take a lot for me to develop some silly grudge with you, or anyone else online. Because I just don't really care enough to even bother



EvilLost said:


> Asking "what" I used to measure my humidity says enough about your intent.


or it could be due to the fact that most humidity gauges are complete shit, especially those that find their way into the pet hobby...



EvilLost said:


> It has nothing to do with me being insecure.


clearly...


----------



## Leuc_Skywalker (Sep 5, 2009)

Well I live in phx az. Pretty sure I have most beat with high temp and low humidity. I was faced with needing a new 5ton ac unit a little bit ago bc the whole house was 95 plus. I decided to make sure the frogs were evacuated to temp cages and they stayed w grandma for a week who had steady ac in her living room while we found refuge in a hotel. A stressed frog from moving for a couple of days is better than a dead frog imo. Good luck with temp control.


----------



## illinoisfrogs (Apr 16, 2010)

EvilLost said:


> @julio: my tank has a full screen top at the moment!


I guess I was confused by this.......I thought this meant your tank had a screen top....


----------



## Baltimore Bryan (Sep 6, 2006)

EvilLost said:


> @BaltimoreBryan: I agree with you that those analog gauges are useless. 1) why do you assume I have one? 2) who cares what I have, the question presented was regarding cooling methods, not "what am I doing wrong"...so why does it matter?; 3) i agree with u humidity is just as important as temperature; 4) I don't follow your misting theory....yes it "feels" hot out, but a feeling isn't a logical argument...I'm not negating or confirming your theory, but I would be curious to think more about it. 5) I have no idea why I am using a numbered list


All I'm trying to say is that humidity plays a part in temperature control, and for me, it's one way I help keep temps down. I never assumed you had a pet store humidity gauge, but how would I know since you never said what kind you had. I am not questioning your husbandry or your ability to keep the humidity at an acceptable level, but just pointing out that if you were to try cooling with drier air, it is important to know that being too dry can be bad, and the instruments used to measure temperature and humidity are important.
Some of my frogs are in a room that, even with the AC on all day, is still much hotter than the rest of the house and the tanks could get too hot. To combat this, I go in a few times daily and blow air from the surrounding room into the tanks with a fan. The outside air is not that much cooler in terms of temperatures, because I have the lights off sometimes so there is no heat being added to the vivs, but it is drier and so it feels much cooler and more comfortable than the humid and muggy tanks. At the same time, I need to continue to check that by doing this I don't drop the humidity down too far that it is below healthy levels for the frogs.
That's all I'm trying to say. It can be hard to cool tanks, especially smaller ones that heat up more quickly, but this is one way I do it.
Good luck,
Bryan


----------



## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Baltimore Bryan said:


> All I'm trying to say is that humidity plays a part in temperature control, and for me, it's one way I help keep temps down. I never assumed you had a pet store humidity gauge, but how would I know since you never said what kind you had.


Actually it is a very valid question as humidity has a direct impact on the ability of the frog to use evaporative cooling as a method of avoiding issues when the temperature could reach thermal maxima. As one example see JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie

Asking about the humidity gauge is also valid as most of the commonly available ones (regardless if it from a pet store or radio shack) can have significant errors in them. One of the things we commonly see is that the hobby maintains a high humidity year round to encourage a maximal activity level as well as year round reproductive behaviors even wild frogs have different activity periods see JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie 




Baltimore Bryan said:


> I am not questioning your husbandry or your ability to keep the humidity at an acceptable level, but just pointing out that if you were to try cooling with drier air, it is important to know that being too dry can be bad, and the instruments used to measure temperature and humidity are important.


Having a lower humidity as part of the day isn't going to harm them as when the air input slows or stops, the humidity is going to rise again as evaporation from the moisture already in the enclosure is going to raise it. To have a real impact, the substrate, bromeliads etc all would have to dry out.


----------



## EvilLost (Jan 10, 2011)

@lincoln: i understand your confusion....I had put on the all screen top in an attempt to cool my tank. It does not always have an all-screen top and I have since switched back. I see where you were coming from though 

@Brotherly: you are assuming I have improper equipment/bad husbandry techniques and trying to "fix" the issue by "fixing" my husbandry. The reason I am irked at your responses is because this thread is about COOLING, it is *NOT* about my personal husbandry. Even if my personal husbandry is failing, that does not address the question presented regarding cooling techniques. 

If we are going to have a valid discussion about COOLING, then we have to assume that anyone involved has at least a baseline of proper husbandry. Otherwise its just a crapshoot.


@Baltimore: I follow what you are saying in terms of what you physically do, but I still fail to follow the "it feels cooler"....why so? I realize you are saying this based on personal feeling, but that does not necessarily mean that the frogs feel it in the same way. Again, I'm not confirming nor denying what you are saying, just trying to factually understand it.




I am still curious about airflow paths in larger vs. smaller tanks. Do you "serious" keepers just keep good airflow going OVER your small tanks but INTO your large tanks? Large tanks would have an input and an output, but do you do the same for small tanks? Or do you blow air into your small tanks using only an input and let it vent out on its own? Do things change if you have a hood vs. not (such as on a rack)?


----------



## Boondoggle (Dec 9, 2007)

Can't remember if you said you have external fans blowing on your lights or not. I just installed fans in my rack setup and dropped "top of the vivarium" temps by 4 degrees. Bottom line, though, if you need to lower your temps lower than the rooms temperature, you're not going to find a lot of previously successful experience from others.


----------



## JakkBauer (Jul 11, 2011)

EvilLost said:


> @julio: my tank has a full screen top at the moment!
> 
> 
> what I'm getting at is that it is simply not feasible for me to leave my house AC on 24/7....I'm trying to find a more "localized" way to cool the tank :\


I am currently fighting the same issue!


----------

