Mike
Have built a bunch of terrariums and let me say that you're starting out the right way especially for a DF habitat. The false bottom setup solves so many problems.
I use a standard 75 gallon aquarium with 10 inches odf water on the bottom so mine is actually a paludarium but the principle is the same

1. I use a submersible heater located in the water area.
   Has worked well for many years.be sure to get a good quailty one with digital settings.They are worth the extra bucks.. Be sure there is enough water in your resevoir to cover the tube at all times..Of course if you're setting up a tenk under 20 gallons an under tank heater is the wat to go.
2. I use a Magnum 350 to filter the water .Drawn up through the back and discharged at the top of the tank onto a foam "rock" outcropping at the top of the tank via a PVC spraybar. Works for months with no attention.
3. Best thing I've found for this purpose is fiberglass screen.Cannot be blocked The weedblock will work but over time collects small particles,
4. For a pool boundary use either live or dead shagnum moss. Wet it and squeeze together to form a wall.Many specie of water plats love this situation and their roots will soon bind it together.
   I had always been under the impression that DF's will drown?? if so you'd probably want to add rocks or keep it shallow.
   Someday would like to setup a large terrarium to keep the DF's but they keep getting new birds at the bird store lol. Can't afford both lol
   Hope this helps
   gary

Here are a few things I have learned in building my large viv for my snakes and plants.

1) I use a 100 watt heater to keep my water at 85 degrees. It works as advertised :)

2) I have a 5.5 gallon sump tank under my viv where water is pumped, heated and filtered.

3) I have weed blocking sheets sitting on a heavy gauge steel mesh to hold the weight. Weed guard however flows very poorly, so in the spot where my waterfall flows over into the tank, I have a much more open aluminium gutter guard with rocks over it to hide it.

4) Use rocks and wood. It's easy enough. You just have to hold it back a bit, afterall.

Thanks so much for the great replies! This helps quite a bit. The canister filter and spraybar seems like a good idea. I think I'll use that approach as well.
What do you guys use for bedding? Ideally, I'd like this to look as much like a rain forest as I can make it and to that end, I want lots of moss and am not sure how to grow it. Are there any plants anyone would suggest to go with the moss? Something simple and easy preferably. I don't have much luck with growing plants thus far. Also, what lights should be used for those plants. My tank has two full-length standard aquarium light fixtures... What type of bulbs should I use?

Also, I have purchased enough cork for the background and am in the process of making it into a removably backdrop. It's starting to come together nicely. I'll have pictures online soon.

Thanks again for all the help!

I use coco fiber, sometimes called coir. You can get it at www.blackjungle.com and probably many other places. Moss is slow to grow and I havent really put much effort into it yet myself (also on my first vivarium). I've heard that tossing it in a blender with some buttermilk and spreading it around the terrarium works. As for bulbs, volumes could (and probably have) been written. The more light the better, and you want the highest CRI rating possible, with 100 being equal to the sun. Also stick to a color temp around 6500K, as it will look the nicest. As for quantity, I am really not sure on that one. It depends on the plants, and if you have any natural light near by as well. Search the forums, and I am sure other people will chime in.

-DH

Webgeek
Where are you located in Kansas?? I grew up in Hutchinson.
gary

Thanks for all the information DH, appreciate it!

Gary, I'm in Lenexa currently. Thanks!

Your questions have pretty much all been answered, but I just have to add my 2 cents. =)

1) Submersible heaters are great, but only if you can keep it away from the frogs. Many frogs sit on them and are burned and die when the heater suddenly turns on. So look for a canister filter that allows you to stick the heater in the filter, or hide the filter deep into your false bottom and away from your waterfeature, and make sure that your frogs can't get into the pool and get stuck under (in) the false bottom. You will also find that your lights do a good job of heating the tank. Yes, even fluo's and compact fluo's give off some heat, and it's always been enough to heat my tanks.

2) Canister filter. If you go to the Frogworld site, you'll see that most of the dutch use ehiems.

3) Fibreglass screen works great. I never had any problems with mine. It drains well and doesn't get clogged, and weed-barrier sheets sometimes come with herbicides in them, something you definitely don't want.

4) You can either not use soil as your substrate, thereby avoiding the soupy mess completely (I used shredded cedar bark mulch and loved it! But apparently cedar is bad for frogs, so use cypress mulch instead. Other options include coconut husk chips and fir bark chips, both commonly used to grow orchids. All of these will provide a very nice, open, well-aerated substrate for your plants, will not stink over time, and look very natural.), or, since you will need to stop your froggies from getting stuck under the eggcrate and drowning, use driftwood and/or 'river rocks' to block this area off. For my first terrarium, I built a styrofoam form, covered it in black silicone and aquarium gravel (for a natural look), and used this as my stream bed. The whole thing actually sat on top of the false bottom. Here's a pic:

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And an older pic, but more of a close-up:

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There was a small pool at the bottom of the waterfall. Only about an inch deep, so not enough to drown a PDF. I never actually had frogs in there, but I was planning on it, so the whole thing was basically PDF-friendly. =)

Coir can be a good substrate, but it tends to degrade into a soggy mess in as short as a year, so I didn't use it. But whichever of these natural substrates you choose, you will get tea-coloured water. Don't worry, it's not harmful to the frogs at all (as long as you're only using distilled or RO water), and you might EVENTUALLY (like in 10 years) be able to get the water clear once all the tannins are washed out of the substrate and you've done enough water changes.

As for moss, DO NOT collect some from the wild and toss it into a blender with some buttermilk and pour that all over your terrarium! The buttermilk will go sour and stink like crazy, and you may get all kinds of nasty bacteria and fungi growing in your tank because of it. This trick only works OUTSIDE when you want some more moss in your garden. The best moss I've found for terrariums, especially for PDF vivs, which are very humid and moist all the time, is java moss. Having had aquariums, I'm sure you're familiar with it. You can start it out in your water feature and let it climb out and cover everything, but you don't have to. It's not a true aquatic moss, and actually grows better (and looks nicer) on land. It must be kept constantly moist-wet though, so make sure you pre-soak whatever substrate you choose in your clean RO/distilled water so that it's already moist. Java moss is also the fastest-growing of the tropical mosses that I've found. If you buy a nice large clump or two right away, you should have a wait of about a year or two before everything is covered in moss.

Other great plants include ferns (mini versions only! They still grow quite large in a terrarium! 'Fluffy Ruffles' is good), bromeliads (also only small ones), tillandsias (air plants), cryptanthus, tropical carnivorous plants like Nepenthes, Ficus pumila (if you don't mind trimming it back all the time), Selaginella, mini orchids, small alocasias and other aroids, african violets (though I never had any luck with them. They grow, but stopped flowering, and do need a drier spot), neanthe bella palm (will eventually outgrow the tank, so buy the smallest one you can find to start with), and others that you can learn about by doing a search on this forum.

I've read on this forum and the aquarium forum about heaters accidently going too hot and burning the fish and other creatures in the tank. I would use lighting to heat the water just so that wouldn't happen. I used a peat moss/cypress mulch mix for the bottom layer and a peat moss/coconut orchid mix for the top layer. I planted a Frittonia 'White Brocade', Frittonia 'Red Vein', a small bromeliad, a silver philodendrum, a Tillandsia cyanea '3D', a creeping ficus (Ficus pumila), Peperomia 'Golden Gate', and a small neanthe bella palm in my frog's tank. Also, dart frogs love small huts made of coconut halves called Cocohuts. I've never had luck with ferns - they died on me.