A couple of (probably) silly questions.

IanF

New member
Joined
Mar 12, 2008
Messages
305
Reaction score
7
Points
0
Age
30
Location
Ayr, Scotland
Country
United States
Display Name
Ian Faux
I've just gone out and bought myself a tank for a fire salamander. I've taken a look at substrates and decided to buy B&Qs Multi purpose organic compost (no chemicals, some peat in it) and some gravel for filtration. Also I bought some wood chips(large) for the top. Now my questions are, is this suitable? How do I go about sterilising the soil? How do I sterilise the Wood chips? Anything else I should do or know?
 
Last edited:
Micorowave the bark and you can bake the soil in the oven to sterilise it.
I find hydroleca works really well as a drainage layer.
 
you can bake the soil in the oven to sterilise it.

As a onetime student of soil science, I would not recommend this. If you dry the soil completely, you can damage its structure, and reduce the water-holding capacity. It's also not a particularly effective means of sterilization- wet heat (e.g. autoclave/pressure cooker) is much better than dry heat.

I can't really see any reason to sterilize soil unless there's a good reason to suspect it's contaminated in some way- and commercial compost is unlikely to harbour anything particularly nasty.
 
As a onetime student of soil science, I would not recommend this. If you dry the soil completely, you can damage its structure, and reduce the water-holding capacity. It's also not a particularly effective means of sterilization- wet heat (e.g. autoclave/pressure cooker) is much better than dry heat.

That's a great piece of information about soil.

I'd agree that sterilization is not necessary.
 
Ok well only put in the bark chips and the soil for about 5 minutes, and a found a couple of dead insects, which is pretty much why I put it in. I just wanted to be sure there wasn't anything in there. Thats me finished setting everything up, I think I might post a thread on it to see if I can better it in anyway. Thanks for your input.
 
General chit-chat
Help Users
  • No one is chatting at the moment.
    There are no messages in the chat. Be the first one to say Hi!
    Back
    Top