Established:2024
Sleepy Fox Forest is a 24x24x36 pvc (from Animal Plastics) enclosure that I worked on building out starting in early 2024. It has…like, a ton…of cork, including a cork flat background and a couple of pretty large cork tubes.
I named this enclosure in memory of my late dog, Kitsune. His name, simply put, means fox in Japanese. My beloved Kit sadly passed away in early 2024 at the age of 15. He was my first dog, and I took his death really hard. Working on this enclosure in the weeks afterwards brought me a lot of joy, in what was a very sad time. I found this really cute little fox figurine that I decided to tuck away inside one of the cork rounds, a peaceful, sleeping fox to remind me of my fox boy. Using this enclosure build as a type of therapy of sorts, the cute sleepy fox figurine, and memories of my sweet Kitsune lead me to naming this enclosure “Sleepy Fox Forest”.
For some reason, I really struggled to get plants established in this enclosure at first. My first two rounds of planting it out resulted in huge plant die-offs, so even though I’ve had this tank up and running for a few years now, it’s not as grown in as I’d like it to be. Current plants include two random grocery store bromeliads (that are living their best lives despite every specialty store-purchased bromeliad dying in this tank), a Ficus pumila Variegata, Monstera adansonii, Nephrolepis exaltata (Fluffy ruffles fern), a spider plant (that I think might die off), ‘mood’ moss, a dracaena, and my favorite in this tank – a jewel orchid.
Sleepy Fox Forest is fully equipped with heat rope, a small UVB light, a sweet plant light that simulates sunrise and sunset each day, two fans (one draws air into the tank, the other blows outwards), and a drainage system that allows me to remove excess moisture. Here’s an image of the entire enclosure, taken in August of 2026. I’ll try to update this page regularly. Hopefully, future photos will show this tank being more grown in.
Current Inhabitants:
Call me crazy, but the current residents of my huge display tank are my smallest reptiles, my mourning geckos.
I made this enclosure especially with them in mind, because they needed an upgrade. How fitting that my enclosure I named after my beloved Kitsune be full of mourning geckos? I have NO idea how many geckos call Sleepy Fox Forest home. They are constantly growing their population. I occasionally sell off babies, and thus the cycle continues. My colony consists of yellow bellies, Hawaiians, and high-expression Hawaiian geckos.
I’m considering adding a pair of dart frogs to Sleepy Fox Forest in the future, but so far haven’t.