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Hey everyone! I know it has been a while. I am getting ready for another upgrade to Raph's habitat a would like so insite on a few things. First off, it came to my attention that her basking area is not holding up well. Literally. I need to weigh it down more. Instead i am considering on doing an above tank basking area like most others do. Any tips or suggestions on that would be awesome! I mostly need help on making the ramp for her to get on. Another thing that has come to my attention is that she is being over fed. She's been getting a hand full of pellets every day. A side from that, i also dont think she is getting enough excursize so i plan on getting some fish to chase. However i dont want her to eat most of them. Any suggestions on habitat friendly fish, particulary on the bottem feeding kind, would be great. I also will get her some water plants for her and such. Any help and suggestions are greatly appreciated.
And a reminder. She is about, to the best of my knowledge, 10 years old. Full grown, a whole foot long! Her current tank is 150 gallons
THANKS!

Hey Litch. Above tank basking areas can be a little tricky, but we've seen a lot of very nice ones. I would consider making a simple one, at least to see if she'll be OK with using one. I've seen ramps made with egg crate, acrylic and bark - or a combination of these. Acrylic with rubber grips seems like a good option to consider. I don't know much about fish and they can be a nice addition but she might not bother chasing them.... so I wouldn't use them just for an exercise perspective.

Acrylic with rubber grips you say? As in non-toxic hot glue or some kind of silicone?

I love that avatar. So funny.

As far as exercise goes, Steve is right, don't count on the fish. I tried a feeder fish, back when my Sheldon wouldn't eat and he showed no interest until one day the poor little guy pissed Sheldon off. Yeah that wasn't pretty. Needless to say I had to scoop and flush poor Fishy.

I don't know about your Ralph but Sheldon loves it when people come into the room. He does his trademark "swimming to China" routine and that seems to be working. Of course I feed him every other day so maybe cut back on the food to every other day and see what you think.

Silicone doesn't adhere will to acrylic. Maybe some acrylic cemented slats? They sell reptile carpet, I'm not specifically sure if they have reptile carpet tape but you might want to look for something non-toxic or find a way to attach it (zip ties, plastic screws, etc).

The ramp on my ATBA is super easy to make and no glue or anything to mess with. I just used a piece of acrylic, drilled holes in it for grip when climbing and attached it to the underside of my atba. I heated the acrylic to bend it, so the entire ramp is made from one solid piece. Nothing to break or fall apart. Pics are in my build thread linked in my signature if you're interested. The downside of my ramp is that it's not the most natural looking thing. If you want something that looks like a log... this is not the ramp for you. If you want cheap / easy to clean / simple / durable... I think my ramp is hard to beat.

If you're looking for natural looking and simple... then cork bark is the way to go. The problem with cork bark is it's hard to find larger pieces for big tanks.