# Treating wood before building vivarium



## Red9 (Apr 17, 2012)

I'm making a vivarium out of wood for my bosc...7x4x4 it's going to have 2 foot of soil/sand substrate, just wondering will I have to treat the wood (furniture board) with anything to prevent damage from that kind of substrate? Cheers. :2thumb:


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## Madhouse5 (Jun 6, 2011)

*viv*

hi i take you mean same sort of wood most viv`s are made out of if so then you don't need to treat it i would seal all the edges with mastic, less your also doing a custom back ground then you need to seal that with varnish or a sealant 


Hope it helps 

Paul


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## my_shed (Jan 5, 2011)

Assuming there will be some level of humidity in there, yes, as the moisture will collect in your substrate. As a minimum you will need to seal all the edges thoroughly, but you may save yourself time and effort in the future by putting in a bit more effort now, i'e, by tiling the floor and lower 2 foot of the walls, or by using pondliner or perspex or something similar to prevent moisture breaking through.

Hope this helps,

Dave


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## Red9 (Apr 17, 2012)

Madhouse5 said:


> hi i take you mean same sort of wood most viv`s are made out of if so then you don't need to treat it i would seal all the edges with mastic, less your also doing a custom back ground then you need to seal that with varnish or a sealant
> 
> 
> Hope it helps
> ...


Yeah its just ordinary furniture board from BnQ, thanks for the advice




my_shed said:


> Assuming there will be some level of humidity in there, yes, as the moisture will collect in your substrate. As a minimum you will need to seal all the edges thoroughly, but you may save yourself time and effort in the future by putting in a bit more effort now, i'e, by tiling the floor and lower 2 foot of the walls, or by using pondliner or perspex or something similar to prevent moisture breaking through.
> 
> Hope this helps,
> 
> Dave


Ah I never thought of putting pondliner down ontop of the wood thanks for that. If I cover the floor and 2 foot of the walls all around that should work a treat. cheers


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## my_shed (Jan 5, 2011)

Red9 said:


> Yeah its just ordinary furniture board from BnQ, thanks for the advice
> 
> 
> 
> ...


No probs, just make sure the pond liner isn't too vulnerable, as a bosc's claws could probably make short work of it  Personally i prefer tiling or perspex but weight is an issue with tiles and perspex isn't exactly cheap. I know others have had success with pond liner though, and if it's installed carefully with a decent bead of silicon around the whole top joint it does a good job not only of protecting against moisture but making full substrate changes easy, as you can remove most of the substrate and then slide a stanley through the sealant and lift it all out 

Let us know how it goes 

Dave


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