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Fortitude - 60x45x30

Djoko Sauza

Member
Joined
23 Jul 2017
Messages
260
Location
SE London
Hi all,

After learning so much from everyone here on UKAPS I thought I'd give back and share my journey, whatever may come.

In August I moved to a new house and with the moving of course came a rescape of my (now oldie) TMC signature 600. I've been planning this new setup for more than 6 months now and unable to take much action due to the moving. Now that's done and I have some time it's finally taking shape. I'll be reusing some plants and gear while trying out some new plants and methods.

The Specs
Tank - TMC signature 600 (60x45x30), custom cabinet
Filter - Oase Biomaster 250 with Aquario Neo media and ceramic rings, poppy lily pipe and inlet skimmer (let's see how the poppy does, can always change)
Light - Chihiros WRGB2 45cm hung from ceiling, for now using old Chihiros A series since I need to replace the controller on the new lamp
CO2 - Pressurized with Qanvee inline diffuser into a Sunsun canister used as reactor
Substrate - Tropica Soil, ADA La Plata sand
Hardscape - Seiryu Stone and Talawa Wood connected with stainless steel screws and cable ties
Ferts - DIY mix

Plant list
Stems - Rotala sp. Green, Rotala Rotundifolia, Rotala Orange Juice, Rotala H'ra, Myriophyllum Guyana
Epiphytes - Bolbitis Heudelotii, Microsorum Pteropus Trident, Anubias Pangolino
Moss - Fissidens Fontanus and Weeping moss
Ground cover - Eleocharis Mini, Eleocharis Parvula, Helanthium Tellenum Green, Cryptocoryne Mollmanii, Cryptocoryne Nevellii

IMG-20201007-WA0002.jpg

IMG-20201007-WA0000.jpg

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Thanks for watching.
 
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Hi,
that’s a really dynamic looking scape, the wood has a really nice flow and the rock work transition looks really natural perhaps with the exception of the far upper right most one which seems a little overpowering currently. Perhaps your planting plan will soften it :)
Looking forward to updates on this one.
Cheerio,
 
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Thanks @Ady34. In regards to the rock, it was my intention to have a really big rock on the right side of the scape to add some "drama". Looking at it bare it does seem quite overpowering and I am also very curious what the planting will do to it. In my previous scapes the rocks always became covered by plants so at least this one probably won't.

Plants are arriving tomorrow and I'll be planting and flooding during the weekend. Exciting times!
 
I love the scape looks excellent as ady says very dramatic but really looking forward to this

Thanks for sharing
Dean

Sent from my SM-G970F using Tapatalk
 
After spending most of Saturday planting the tank was finally filled. No problems arose except for a small leak in the filter which was fixed by replacing some o-rings.

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Light is on for 7h at 50% with co2 coming on 6h before lights on at 2bps. I'm dosing light version of EI daily and see how that goes.
 
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Any updates on this?
Hope all is well.
 
4 weeks update:

Plants are growing well, especially the stems. Ok, the bolbitis and the trident fern are growing very slowly but that is as expected since I removed all the leaves before planting. I did a co2 profile and adjusted the bps to 1.5 bps which gives me a steady ppm of co2 during the day. Plants are pearling away by the end of the photoperiod so I'm happy with that. Cleaning crew was added around 2 weeks ago, some nerite, trumpet and ramshorn snails and a small army of red cherry shrimp, around 100 I'd guess. All look happy munching away on algae.

Talking about algae, had the usual brown diatom outbreak early on which is now in the past. Now I get some green dust and spot algae which appears mostly on hardscape, glass and the tiny Anubias Pangolino. If only that was the whole of it... staghorn algae is appearing almost everywhere except on the fast growing plants! I'm pretty sure it came with the plants that I added from my low tech tank. In there I would get some staghorn algae if I added too many nutrients so for now I'm cutting back drastically on plant feeding and lowering light by 20%. Started dosing glut as well, I want the thing gone!

Today was the first trim. Took me 3 hours in total including a water change. Pain in the butt when plants are not properly rooted after 4 weeks of good growth... I guess it's a combination of the large size of the tropica soil and fragile tissue culture plants not being really robust to start with.

Oh and I soundproofed my cabinet. Foam everywhere and filters on foam pads. Bliss!

That's it for now, I'll try to keep posting some pics sometimes even if life is busy! Thanks for watching.
 
After yesterday's maintenance session, Chihiros WRGB2 installed with a working controller:

IMG_5285.jpg

Growth is quite slow since I lowered the lights and reduced ferts, will gradually increase both and see what happens with the staghorn algae. Spot dosing with glut is working but since it is growing in so many places I would rather find the way to keep it from growing altogether. Perhaps reducing only iron? Has anyone tried this?
 
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Nice :) Did you get the lights of ebay or amazon, or is it sold in stores where you live?
I bought the lights from a french online store, that was the closest place I could get them from since I live in the Netherlands. I'll pm you the name if you are interested.
Best part is you get the manufacturer's warranty of 1 year when you buy from a retailer as opposed to ebay or aliexpress.

Hi all,

I have to ask, why just iron (Fe)?

Is there a reference (or posts etc.) that links high iron levels with Staghorn algae (Compsopogon caeruleus)?

cheers Darrel
From Aquasabi's website:
https://www.aquasabi.com/aquascaping-wiki_algae_staghorn-algae

"In planted tanks that are supplied with liquid fertilisers the appearance of these algae is often an indicator for an overdose of the iron fertiliser."

Perhaps you'd know if there's any thruth to this statement? I know what causes the appearance of staghorn algae is still mostly unknown so at this point I'm just happy to try a bit of everything and see what happens.

For sure glut kills it but I want to get to the root cause.
 
Hi all,
"In planted tanks that are supplied with liquid fertilisers the appearance of these algae is often an indicator for an overdose of the iron fertiliser."
That certainly seems to be a reason. Give it a try. In terms of the plants you need to look for any signs of <"paling and chlorosis"> of the new growth, which would indicate that the plants have run out of (plant available) iron (Fe).
Perhaps you'd know if there's any thruth to this statement?
For sure glut kills it but I want to get to the root cause.
No idea really, but we don't what causes any of the algae to outbreak. I'd definitely agree with the aim of getting to the root cause.

cheers Darrel
 
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3 months update.

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Staghorn algae is pretty much gone, glut or iron deprivation killed it. Right now running 1.5bps for CO2 and lights on at 60% for 7 hours.

Some rocks were removed, sand was replaced once but is already turning green again. Some of the moss was removed as well.

Working on getting the rotalas more bushy and red, tried light at 100% and 0 nitrates for a while but I think they need a bit more volume before attempting again. Waiting for the anubias, ferns and bolbitis to grow bigger.

The middle area under the wood is very dark so added some crypts there which I hope will have enough light to grow.

Current inhabitants are 5 White Cloud Mountain Minnows, 8 Green Neon Tetras, 2 Flame Tetras, 1 Otocinclus Affinis, few Nerite and Red Ramshorn snails and loads of Cherry Shrimps.

Will let it run for now as it is but I am very tempted to change the background. It's just not getting as dense as I would like it to be and I don't know if I want to trim it so often. Let's see...
 
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4 months update.

IMG-20210213-WA0014.jpg


Added some new plants: Nymphaea Lotus red and Hydrocotyle Leucocephala. Trimmed the stems low and they are due for a trim again soon. Hra still not red though... Very disappointing!
Have been trimming the moss quite regularly as well.
Staghorn algae is gone but there are some tufts of BBA on the rocks, gotta get off my ass and scrape them off.

Some old leaves of the hairgrass are turning yellow at the tips. Anyone know if this is normal and how to prevent it? I didn't trim them at all yet. Perhaps it all started when I stopped dosing nitrate. I'm back to dosing 5ppm but am afraid the damage is done and those leaves are just dead.

Main regrets until now:

Trimming the leaves off the bolbitis and trident fern when planting. They are still so small after all this time... Like they are just waking up.

Shading the background with the hardscape. Makes it hard to grow a full bush of rotala, there is a massive shadowy spot right in the middle where stuff doesn't grow nearly as fast.

I'm getting the itch to rescape. Fighting it for now.

Some more pics:
IMG-20210213-WA0010.jpg IMG-20210213-WA0011.jpg IMG-20210213-WA0013.jpg IMG-20210213-WA0012.jpg

Cheers and thanks for watching.
 
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