Ideas for forest themed viv

Hello, all! As some of you may already know, my boyfriend has recently decided that he would like to get a corn snake. Yay! As it turns out, he has some very specific ideas about the kind of corn snake he wants, one of them being that he wants a young snake. This means, he may have to wait for new hatchlings to arrive. I don't want him to get discouraged, as it took me a long time to get him interested in snakes, so I thought it would be a good idea to focus, for now, on creating his ideal viv. I have ordered up all the required stuff, like uth, thermostat, etc. So now we can focus on the fun part, decorating! I asked him what he had it mind, he says he wants to make it feel like a beautiful Wisconsin forest. I love it! What a sweet idea. I have been looking online to try to find decorations, but I keep wondering if we could do better than what I'm finding. Mostly, it's the trees I can't figure out. You can't have a forest with out trees! I use a peice of driftwood with plastic vines in my viv, when it's a 10 gallon tank for babies, it would be hard to fit more than one in there. I can find palm trees, or desert trees, made for pets, but none that look foresty. I have even been looking at fairy garden accessories, and plastic bonsai trees, but it's like they are all way too big, or way too little. I'm wondering if anyone has any thoughts on where to find better sizes, or maybe making some with out spending too much money.
Another thing I was thinking, is that maybe I should let him use my leftover jungle mix substrate I bought for another pet. It would look more forest like than the aspen I use, but are there any issues with using it for corns? I wouldn't think so, but I thought I'd ask, just in case.
Any ideas to help me help him create a super cool forest viv would be greatly appreciated. I understand how frustrating it can be to get excited about something, and then realize you have to wait. I am really excited that he is taking such an interest in something I really love, and I want to make it as fun and exciting as possible. It's always great to share the things you love, with the people you love. Plus, I love creative decorating for all my pets. I am always building something. Thanks so much for your help everyone! You were all right. One snake just wasn't enough. Lol

Oak leaves suggest a forest, and they are pretty sturdy. you can buy them if you don't have access to any nice ones under the snow.

I use a lot of large sections of bark in my vivs. This practice is controversial, but the bark comes off fire wood that has been out under the sun for about three years. I haven't had any problems with it. You can buy some moss slurry, and grow moss on bark and branches. Requires daily misting, but not a big deal if you already tend to your snakes frequently anyway.

I like faux rock ledges and planters in foam (safe and light weight) from Magnaturals. They attach with very strong magnets (Careful, or they will SLAM onto the glass). Pricey, but I think they look nice, and I'm not going to make them on my own in the forseeable future. Not hard to do, however.

The planter ledges accept a 3" (4"??) pot - you could add a live or plastic fern. Actually plastic/silk plants can be a better choice if you want decor specific to a mid-western forest. I can't think of any viv suitable/snake sturdy live plants (except moss) that would be found in a Mid-western forest/prairie woodland.

You can also get a nice rock background that suggests a forest outcropping. The aquarium people actually seem to have the best ones for easy install - at least those are my favs in the photos. I like the ones that are flexible, and 3-D. Again, haven't used one myself, just seen videos with them. You can go all out with "Great Stuff" foam, and make a really naturalistic background. Check out the dart frog vivs for that. These are lovely, but more of a project than I've ever wanted to get into.

These are all great ideas. I do love those magnetic ledges! I don't like anything that is too permenant in the glass aquariums, because as animals grow, they move, and we alway end up with new and pets, and also we just enjoy changing things up once in a while. I guess I was thinking more of a miniaturized forest, but I didn't really ask him if that's what he had in mind. The nice thing about having time, is that we can do a lot of planning before we decide. I know that when I move my snake into the big viv, I want to get one of those planter ledges and get him a live plant of two. My theme is just whatever I think is cool, and that my snake would enjoy.

Instead of a vertical forest, which has all kinds of problems with scale and space in a small enclosure, go with a hollow fallen log with some ferns and shelf fungi. Bark or cork background, vines, a fake mushroom, twigs, leaf litter. It'll look nice.

Oh, yes. I have already found a few really cute log hides with grass, mushrooms, moss, and all kinds of cool looking stuff, that I'm going to let him choose from. I just thought that a few smallish vertical trees might be fun too. Plus, I just wanted to offer up a lot of choices when I present all these ideas to my bf. I even thought that perhaps a little project to do together, like creating some of our own tree decorations might be fun.
On the plus side, we may actually be welcoming our new addition sooner than expected! We just got an email about a sweet little female bloodred, and we are now just waiting to hear back about payment options, and shipping dates! It's a good thing we already have the important stuff covered. Keep your fingers crossed for us.

There is a bark that works great and that is cork. It's also pretty lightweight, yet insulating. Cork rounds look like fallen logs. I have cork in both of my vivs. My snakes love it.

I actually just found a website with some cool cork bark pieces, and my bf had asked me earlier about making a mini retention wall to create a second level, so I suggested to him that he could do it with the cork bark. My idea was to section off a corner, and he could even put a toilet paper roll down, and then rest the cork bark on top of the outer edge of it, and build up the substrate in a corner behind it. That way, it would create both a tunnel/hide, and a small upper level in one corner. And the cork bark does look pretty cool. I was even thinking we could get some tiny fairy garden mushrooms, and we could use a hot glue gun to put a few along the edge of the cork bark. (Hot glue is reptile safe, right?) I'm getting a lot of cute ideas for my own new viv as I do all this research.

Actually, you can make almost anything you can imagine. It's cheaper than buying ready-made stuff, and you're not stuck with just whatever you find.

http://www.lizard-landscapes.com/reptile-terrarium.html

Your only limit is how much time you want to invest and how much room you have. Some tips, however: 1. Make sure you have access to every nook and cranny. You don't want to have to disassemble the entire enclosure every time you want to remove the snake. 2. Keep it simple to facilitate cleaning. 3. Don't create unexpected hiding places where your animal can disappear and leave you searching the house for days only to have them magically appear back in their enclosure again.

I made an Avatar themed cage that didn't follow any of the above advice. That's how I learned...

http://www.cornsnakes.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=141218

Jim

AFAIK hot glue is safe. It has been recommended here more than once and I've used it in my vivs.

Thanks everyone. I couldn't get pictures of the avatar themed viv to load because my phone is low on data, but I should be able to check it out tomorrow. It sounds amazing! I have been searching around, and I think I have some good ideas of things he can use. I have some really cool wood that I originally bought for my bunny to chew, but she doesn't like all of it, so I think some of those pieces would be greal. I do have a hot glue gun, so I can get some of that hot glue that's safe, and we can make whatever my boyfriend wants. I am super excited to decorate or big viv for Nightmare, as well, and I'm trying to decide how I want to do his decorations now that I will have so much room to work with. I always like the jungle/rain forest look, but I want it to be somewhat unique as well. We are having fun with it. My boyfriend did end up buying that little bloodred girl, so it won't be too long now, before we get to see our ideas in action. I hope she loves her new home.