Escape proofing a lid

[ChrissyBee]

Hi everyone, I'm looking for some suggestions about escape proofing a newt tank.

I currently have 3 Chinese fire bellied newts in an acrylic tank with a solid lid (apart from a few holes for ventilation). But I'm going to be freeing up another tank I have that I'd like to move them into - it's wider and holds a larger volume.

Here is the tank when it was set up for hermit crabs


Notice the lid. It's just a grate-style cover that was fine for the crabs, but won't keep the newts in. The problem is the tank is an odd shape and I've never been able to find anything else to fit it. I'm wondering if there's anything I can do with this lid to make it work?

In the photo I have plastic wrap over most of it to keep the humidity high, could I possibly do something like that? Maybe tape the wrap onto the rim of the tank? Or should I consider having something custom made (I'd rather not).

Any suggestions would be welcome, I'd really like to get my newts into this tank!

[Heather Jewett]

It may be too labor intensive or not even work, but I wonder if you were to use fishing line or another thread or thread like material to "sew" a fine meshed fabric to the lid?
I have used odd shaped tanks in the past where I have had to custom make and jimmy rig my own lids, and one of the most secure and tight fitting was simply 2 screen lids "sewed" end to end with 12lb fishing line. It worked well for me, but did take me quite a long time to weave the line sufficiently for a tight fit.
The fabric I had in mind for your situation is tulle or some other fine mesh that would not be too affected by moisture.
I hope you can figure something out for your situation!
Heather

[Eva]

Velcro might be good for this - they make a version called "Sew and stick". You can attach the sticky part to the tank and make a mesh fabric lid (I use pieces of net curtain) which attaches to it. I've done this for three tanks and it works really well, I just had to super-glue the Velcro to one place where it wouldn't stick well enough.

[ChrissyBee]

Thanks for those suggestions! Now that I'm looking at the lid I'm wondering it the openings might actually too small for the newts to fit through anyway. But better safe than sorry! I like the velcro idea, I may try that.

[jane1187]

Just adding an idea here.

I use greenhouse shading to escape-roof my lids. Its a fine meshed plastic netting but it is fairly rigid compared to curtain netting. I get it from my local garden centre. I am sure with needle and thread or something similar you could easily stitchthe velcro to the mesh and voila!

I don't currently use velcro but I'm going to try using it on my current mesh lids to see if it allows them to fit better and easier than my current lids.

[Keith]

Just lay some fly screen and silicone it down to the sections you need to cover up. If you do it on the inside it wont be that notable but should make it pretty well newt proof but still give you decent ventilation.