Helping building/sealing my large indoor water monitor cage.

[Billy305]

Happy holidays everyone!

I am looking for help with the water monitor cage I'm going to start building. I just got a hatch-ling U.S. captive born water monitor this week and I'm very excited to work with it. I live in south Florida and I'm going to build a large primary cage outside for it (15x10x8 or so), but I'm also going to build another cage for now. A cage it can grow up in for a year or so, and stay in during the few very cold nights we have here. I plan to build it 8x4x6. The problem with this is that I currently don't have any doors big enough to build it in my garage and then get it inside. I may be having big enough french style door installed soon but I'm not sure when. This basically means that I need to build it inside. I want to protect the lizard from any building materials used and also the cage from the humidity it will encounter. Id be building it in my 'reptile room' which is 12' x 25', but this is also where I keep my sav monitor and all of my snakes.

My fear is that when I go to use any sealer on the wood, the fumes will harm me and the other animals inside of the house. Is there any kind of wood sheeting I could use that isn't toxic to the monitor and wouldn't need to be sealed. Or is there any type of sealer I could use to protect the wood that is going to hurt my other animals while it dries? Even if I was able to build the cage in my garage, thats where I keep/breed my rats so the fumes could hurt them as well. I used some minwax poly something on part of my sav cage a while ago and the smell was rough.

[Billy305]

Would outdoor paint possibly be a good choice?

[jclaiborne]

You could skip the sealer and use FRP as a liner for the inner walls.


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[Billy305]

I was thinking about that but it's pricey and I don't want white. I was reading and a lot of people have success with outdoor waterbased latex paint. I think the smell/ fumes would be a lot less than other sealers

[Kris Mclaughlin]

Dryloc

[Darkbird]

Build the cage in sections, as in a base part and then the upper part/parts. You could make the base 2' tall to hold the needed substrate, and make it so the top could be assembled once the base is in place. That way it should still fit through the doors. The seal between the two sections could be as simple as either nothing or a bead of silicone. The upper parts could then be sealed with polycrylic, and the base done with something much more durable, like the frp or maybe an epoxy based product.

[JoshSloane]

Use Drylok. It is water tight after a couple coats and can actually be used to seal fish tanks. The finish is grainy and perfect for withstanding large lizard's claws.

[Billy305]

How are the fumes from the dry loc I may need to coat it inside

[JoshSloane]

How are the fumes from the dry loc I may need to coat it inside

Fumes were minimal. I would say they dissipated in a day or two.

[Billy305]

That's good to know. Is it paintable? I wouldn't mind adding a little color to the inside