First of all, I think you have made good plant choices in your tank, and you have good material to work with. You are definitely not making use of the height of your tank though! A 40 gallon tall is a very good size to be working with. Can you give us the exact dimentions? I would get it out of your window, BTW, because the sun could heat that thing up way too much way too fast, and with the blinds down your plants won't be able to grow well anyways. How much light do you have on your tank? And is your waterfall running? It doesn't look like it is in the pictures.
I would look at pictures of other terrariums for inspiration. Since you have so much height, you should put coir or cork panels on the back wall and maybe the side walls too, if you want to. This way plants will be able to climb up the walls without needing to be attached with suction cups. =) You can attach cork tiles or coir panels with aquarium silicone. It is totally safe for frogs. You should do this while the frog is in a holding tank though, and keep the frog there until it's all dried and cured and everything is set up again. I would also get some fake or real vines (liana) to hang from the top of your tank. This would add interest, and you could also attach plants to them, like your air plants. I would make your ground higher, and give it a slope or some different levels, like a terraced effect, for greater interest. This would also increase the surface area that your frog has to hop around on. I've linked a really great site for you below, so that you can see some truly amazing vivariums! You should also read a few of the old posts on this forum. There are lots of ideas here, and I recently changed my tank around to make it more interesting as well! Enjoy!

Here is a link that might be useful: Dutch Vivariums

Thanks for responding. My tank is 25 inches tall, 30 inches long and 12 inches wide. I have a false bottom with a power head fish tank pump running the waterfall. I have live moss growing on the bottom and a longer kind of live moss covering the baskets hanging on the walls. I also have a fogger that I run for a little while every few days. The light is a grow light bulb in an aquarium hood. I have plexie glass on top with some holes covered in screen in the back. I will take your suggestions and try to improve the looks of the tank. I just finished putting coconut fiber on the back wall. I loved the links you sent. I was worried about putting too many plants in and making it overcrowed but now I see how good that looks. I purchased 3 diffrent kind of pitcher plants but have been waiting to add them until I find out if they are safe for the PDFs. Thanks for the suggestions and if you have anymore please let me know.

Betty

Pitcher plants are safe for PDFs, so no worries there. I've even seen a picture of a frog actually sitting in a pitcher! What species/hybrids did you get? BTW, if you're creative and like to make things, you could do a lot more in terms of waterfeatures since you already have a false bottom. PDFs drink through their skin (as I'm sure you already know), so they need to be able to sit in some water, and your waterfall doesn't look like it has much surface area for sitting in. The water can be up to 2" deep. Oh yeah, and do you only have one frog in there? I think they are supposed to be kept in pairs at a minimum, groups are better (read that somewhere reliable). I hope you used lots of silicone for attaching that coconut fibre, because if you didn't it may fall off as soon as a year from now due to the constant moisture. The longer moss you mentionned is probably sphagnum moss. Great stuff!

As for your lighting, one tube is not nearly enough. What is the wattage? Did it come with the tank? Is it a fluorscent? If you have any electrician friends or are handy, you should make an additional light fixture. Pitcher plants need especially high light, so make sure you hang them up high, closer to the bulbs. I would make a little light fixture with the screw-in compact fluorescents. Search the forum for more info. on those, as this has been covered before. Oh, and that wandering jew can be planted right in your substrate and it will naturally attach itself to the cocofiber wall and climb up and around. Same goes for those episcas (I think that's what they are) in the other moss basket. Your pitcher plants would love those moss baskets!

Hi,

Thanks for all the advice. I worked on my tank and have made some imporvements. I have 3 PDF's (had 4 but could not find the 4th one when I was removing them for remoldeling). The light is a 20 wt grow light. I will work on the lighting. Can't remeber the names of the pitcher plants but one is a parrot. Check out my photo and let me know what more imporvements I can make. I do plan on covering the water area more just have to go collect so more of the moss.

Betty

Here is a link that might be useful:

Great job! I think it looks much better. You could raise your ground level more though. Or at least make it slope more, up towards the back, so that you don't have a flat ground and then an abrupt switch to straight up the back. Another option is to terrace it. Are you just using wild-collected moss? Are you doing anything to clean it first?

Hi,

Not sure what you mean by just using wild-collected moss. I have a mixture of peat, a mix for terriums (purchased from a reptile show), a layer of garden charcoal, a layer of cotton batting and screen over the false bottom egg crate. The moss is collected from 600 acres of land behind my house. There is no chemicals anywere around. I do hose it off and pull out any pine needles or other debris on it. There is 2 diffrent kind. I use the short kind on the bottom (grows on logs and tree bases) and the longer kind (spagmum I think)in the baskets that hang on the back. I will add more peat to build up a slope at the back. Thanks for your suggestions and if you have anymore please feel free to tell me.

Thanks
Betty

I wouldn't use straight peat as a substrate. I used normal potting soil at first, but recently I replaced it all with shredded cedar bark, and I like that much better. It looks nicer, is a more aerated substrate (important for plants), and will decompose much more slowly. It also smells nicer. Soil that stays constantly moist can get really smelly, and the charcoal will only absorb so much!

Wild-collected moss is what you have. Moss that you are collecting from the wild. =) You shouldn't be harvesting wild sphagnum, because it is already vastly over-harvested. Just let the stuff that you have grow, and then snip it when you need more for another plant. The reason I asked is that we don't know how long wild-collected moss lives in terrariums. You may be okay, living in zone 9, but most wild moss requires that cold winter dormancy that it gets naturally outside, but it won't get that in your terrarium. As a result, it may die after two years, because it will just get too 'tired' from growing all the time without a break. But, since you live in a much warmer climate than I do, and your moss would be adapted to that climate, it might do just fine for years and years. Only time will tell. I have some wild mosses in my terrarium as well, but they haven't been in there for very long (just since this spring), so it's too early to tell how they do long term. If your moss does eventually die, I would replace it with a tropical moss like java moss (sold in aquarium stores). As for cleaning it, I'd do more than just hose it off. I soak my pieces of wild moss in RO water (which you should also be using) for an hour or so to drown bugs. It also helps to loosen any debris, like pine needles. Then inspect it for snails and the like. I have some snails in my tank now, and i strongly suspect that they came from some wild moss. They can be really hard to see, so check carefully!