Introducing...

[Draeju's_world]

Hello everyone!
Happy to join the forum. I've been in the aquarium hobby for ages and just recently decided to join the herp community. It's been a long time coming. I recently built my own dragon enclosure and it's set up for the most part but I'm still waiting on a few more key pieces of equipment and need to fine-tune things a bit before purchasing a pair of beardies! Can't wait. I'm using this time to research as much as I can and hope to hear from some of the veteran herp keepers here during my initial newbie period. Luckily, my aquarium experience has given me a very good foundation to work with here. This should be fun.

I work for a custom cabinet shop so building my own enclosure was a no-brainer. I used cabinet-grade yellow pine for the bulk of construction and sealed/finished it with Minwax Polycrylic. My cost to "DIY" this enclosure was about $150 with the 1/4" glass incurring almost half the cost. The overall dimensions are 34"X 34"X 31" while the habitable portion inside the enclosure measures 32.5"x 32.5"x 20". The base portion of the enclosure has a 6" deep drawer with 22" full extension slides for storage.

The decor was purchased online and at a local garden center. I added a few potted succulent plants as well as snake plant in the back corner. I used a cactus/palm soil mix with no additional ferts. We will have to wait and see if they'll be able to survive the long-term with bearded dragons. Ha!. If not, I'll probably just try some tall arid grasses or something. The water dish has some duckweed I scooped from my aquariums. I'm not sure if this will be an issue or not, but I doubt it. It does look kind of cool. I love the natural look so opted for a real rock structure and added some driftwood for climbing and it just adds to the overall beauty of the layout. The background is a custom-made vinyl back drop ordered from petbackdrops.com and is attached with velcro. I uploaded them the picture of my choice and they did the rest. The substrate is two 40g Exo terra Sand Mats for Desert Terrariums that I cut to custom fit my enclosure. We'll give this a try for now but I'll probably switch over to textured tiles later on down the road. I do love the look of these mats, however! The floor of the enclosure is constructed of 3/4" pre-finished plywood with a layer of cork sheeting for cushioning and protect against moisture. All cracks/seams and the glass were siliconed with aquarium sealant, as well.

My current equipment includes a 30" ZooMed Reptisun T5HO 24W fixture that came with a 5.0 UVB bulb. I'll probably eventually replace it with an Arcadia 12% desert bulb. For the basking light, I'm set up with a 160w ZooMed Powersun mercury vapor bulb in a deep dome fixture. I've also installed two 6,000K full spectrum 10w led spotlights to help brighten/illuminate things and provide the plants with additional light. There's also a 10w led fixture with a warmer color spectrum that I will put on a separate timer to turn on an hour before and turn off an hour after the other lights to simulate a dawn/dusk period. The basking spot is approximately 12-14" from the basking light. Right now, I'm just waiting on some quality thermometers and a temperature gun I ordered to replace the cheap ones I initially purchased and was not impressed with at all.

Here are a few pics. Hope you enjoy!

I'll be happy to answer any additional questions about the enclosure if you have them.

 

[Hdrydr31]

Welcome to the forum!! Your enclosure is awesome very nice job on it.. I look forward to seeing how things progress..

The one thing I need to say just so you are aware.. Dragon's are solitary creatures and only come together to mate, Some have had success in co-habbing I often think it's pure luck and the personality of the dragons. But they will compete for resources lighting, food...it really doesn't matter the sex of the dragon they can and often do cause serious wounds to eachother. Male and female well the obvious but also the male will mate the female quite literally to exhaustion/death.

I just want you to have a good experience. A few of us have put together links of helpful information you'll find them under some of our comments. In there you'll find food items, lighting, supplements, plants that are safe and unsafe and more...

Good luck and looking forward to seeing more of you...

 

[Draeju's_world]

Thanks for the info. That's something I'll definitely need to consider moving forward. I was hoping to buy a pair of juvies, raising them together and breeding them later down the road. I'm sure it's more likely to work out the larger the enclosure is. Mine is approximately 90g in volume and the basking spot is about a square foot in size. I'll definitely read up on this and would like to hear from more people with experience with keeping pairs/ multiples together in the same enclosure. If a mod/admin wants to move this thread to a busier section of the forum, I wouldn't have a problem with that.

 

[Draeju's_world]

I'd like to add that breeding them isn't something I "definitely" plan on doing. There is a ton of work and cost involved, I'm sure. I am in no hurry.

 

[Draeju's_world]

After a lot of researching it seems the general consensus everywhere is pretty much in agreement. Keeping them together is fine as babies, but a really bad idea when mature. Not worth the risk so thanks for pointing that out. Looks like I'll just stick with one for this enclosure.

 

[PatsyB]

Looks AMAZING! My brother builds custom cabinets for a living and he actually built a fish tank 10 years ago out of corian, it was beautiful! I always said if he lived closer we could collaborate on bearded dragon tanks.

Like Hdrydr31 said, they are solitary animals so keeping two together could result in bullying. I have a girl myself that has part of her tail missing because of a tank mate and I have a friend who's dragon is missing limbs because of cohabing. Even if you want to mate them further down the line, they should be kept in separate tanks then put together to do the deed and then separated again.

Being a short person there is one thing that I wonder about. are you able to easily get to the bottom of the tank to clean? And what about getting to the back corner? I have a problem getting clothes out of our washing machine, I couldn't imagine trying to scoop a dragon out of a tank this tall

 

[Draeju's_world]

Lol..yeah, i'm 6'2" and the top is removable, but still a bit of a stretch even for me. It is reachable, however. I can easily reach in and grab the pot in the back corner through the door itself without removing the top.

It's a little disappointing that i won't be getting two, but the animals' well-being is top priority. I origionally was going to do a harem of Redhead Agamas so i already had the multiple lizard idea in my head. It carried over to the Beardies when i changed my plans. Part of the learning process i suppose.