Category 04 of 06
Tavlixos stocks the canister filter media and terrarium heat mats that wear out on aquarium and reptile setups people already own — cut and rated by litres and watts, checked against your tank before it ships.
Basis for pricing: a canister filter media set runs from $19, a terrarium heat mat from $16. Both are estimated bases — the price you get back depends on the exact filter or enclosure and the quantity you order.
Send your tank's litre rating or your filter's model number and we tell you what fits before you pay for anything.
Canister media clogs and channels after a few months of hard use. Heat mats delaminate at the corner where the adhesive was pulled off once too often. Neither failure means the equipment is finished — it means the consumable inside it is.
We have supplied this shop's own fish room and reptile shelves since 2014, which is where most of the fit notes on this page come from directly, not from a spec sheet.
Every canister filter media inquiry gets checked against the filter's rated litres and the canister's internal basket depth. Every heat mat inquiry gets checked against the enclosure floor area and the wattage the animal's species actually needs — too hot is worse than too cold for most reptiles, so we would rather ask a second question than guess.
We will also tell you plainly when a reptile UVB bulb replacement is what you actually need rather than a heat mat — the two solve different problems and get confused constantly. If your tube burned out, send us the wattage and the canopy length and we will confirm what we can match before you order.
What we will not do: sell you a universal media pad and call it a fit. Foam that is cut a centimetre short lets water bypass the media entirely, and a heat mat run on the wrong wattage either does nothing or cooks a corner of the substrate. We would rather answer three follow-up questions by email than ship the wrong thing fast.
Three stages in one set: coarse foam for mechanical filtration, activated carbon for polish and odour, and ceramic bio-media rings for the colony that actually processes ammonia. Cut and boxed to fit canister filters running up to 20 litres of aquarium volume.
We check the basket depth of your specific canister against the media dimensions before we confirm the order — a media block that is a centimetre too tall jams the canister lid, and one too short lets water bypass around the edge instead of through it.
$19priced per set, estimated basis
Estimate only. We confirm the final price and ship date once we have matched your filter model or tank litres.
A thin adhesive-backed heating pad that sits under one corner of a glass terrarium, never underneath the whole floor — reptiles need a cool side to retreat to, and a mat run edge to edge takes that choice away from the animal. Available from 7 watt for small enclosures up to 24 watt for larger setups.
Tell us the enclosure's floor dimensions and the species you are keeping, and we tell you which wattage is right rather than letting you guess and risk a hot spot.
$16priced per mat, estimated basis
Estimate only. Final price and wattage are confirmed once we know the enclosure size and the species.
Two numbers decide most of this category: how many litres your tank or canister actually holds, and how many watts a heat mat needs to run without overshooting the enclosure's safe temperature. Both are on the equipment itself, usually printed near the intake or the power cord.
Most canister filters print a rated litre range on the housing or the box it came in. A media set built for a 20 litre canister will not seal correctly in a smaller unit, and it will underperform badly in a larger one. If the rating is worn off, measure the internal basket instead and send us the three dimensions.
A 7 watt mat suits a small enclosure under roughly 45cm on its longest side. Larger vivariums need 15 to 24 watt mats, and the right wattage also depends on room temperature — a mat in an unheated garage room needs more watts than the same tank in a heated house. Tell us both numbers.
We will not sell a mat sized purely by tank length if the room it sits in runs cold — ambient temperature changes what a mat needs to do, and getting that wrong either starves the animal of heat or overheats it. We ask about the room on purpose.
What people usually ask before writing in about filter media or a heat mat.
No. We stock the media, mats and small fittings that wear out on equipment you already own, not the filter units or lighting fixtures themselves. If your canister motor has failed, that is a different repair than a media swap and we will tell you so.
Send the filter's brand and model in your inquiry, or just the tank size in litres. We check the media dimensions against either one before confirming a fit, and we will ask a follow-up question rather than guess.
Sometimes. Send the old tube's wattage and length and we will tell you plainly whether we carry a match — this is checked case by case, not stocked as a fixed catalog line, so we would rather say we cannot help than ship something close enough to be wrong.
No cart, no guessing. Describe the setup, and we check it against real stock before we quote a firm price and ship date.
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