Restarting aquarium, need advice

[mafoo]

I've moved house, and while I was waiting for my new place to come through my cousin kindly gave me a place in her house for them to live. Sadly she's not a fish person so what she said were "1 or 2 dead" turned out to be 0 alive and guppie soup.

Thankfully most the celestial daneo's in my 130L tank survived.

This weekend I'm moving the tanks into my new flat. and I'm doing things a bit diffrently. Last time i drained out most of the water and moved the tanks fully planted with the fish in them. Carrying the tanks up to her flat almost killed me.

This time I'm going tear down the large aquarium, bag the fish and plants and siphon off 2x25L barrels of tank water to take with me. The substrate is sand, and i think thats going to go on the garden.

I have a 110L pvc crate for the fish to live in as a temporary aquarium while I cycle the new setup.

I have bought the following for the new scape and i was wondering what people reccon. I have some miracle grow osomocote type stuff, I was wondering if it was a good or bad idea.

The substrate is 2 bags of akaedama bonsai soil, I've got a 700g of florapol, a tub of bacter ae and some left over crypt tabs.

The lighting is 2x18w, a 1kL/h filter and i will probably hook up a FE with a JBL solenoid regulator.

What do people think?

 

[EnderUK]

looks good, what are you planning to plant in it?

 

[X3NiTH]

As long as you are planting heavily and keep up with the water changes I wouldn't worry about cycling the tank, you don't need to break your back taking the water with you as fresh treated water from the tap when you get to your new place would do. You can QuickStart cycle if your filter sponges/media are ok since they are already used in a tank that is cycled and can be reused to seed any new filter media you add and help take care of any ammonia issues you may have with the new substrate if it leaches. The old substrate will also harbour beneficial bacteria and small amounts can be bagged up in mesh or filter sock and used to reseed a filter (gravel is easiest).

When I gutted my tank and did a complete wash down I used the old sponge from the internal nano filter i was replacing and cut a space for it in the sponge of the new external canister filter, this way I got a head start in cycling the tank, obviously new substrate is void of the good stuff but it quickly gets colonised. Within a couple of weeks of running the new canister filter with a torn down and replanted tank the diminutive sponge had done its job by the evidence of my clear piping become opaque all the way to the tank due to surface colonisation by bacteria, I imagine the substrate colonised at the same rate. I did this with my CRS tank as well using the exact same sponge jammed between the air driven sponge filter and the heater, never had water quality issues, shrimp were fine.

The BacterAE is another good way to colonise the substrate, generous sprinkle on the glass at the bottom before you cover with substrate.

 

[mafoo]

looks good, what are you planning to plant in it?

Here is the tank from a year ago, the crypts from the back have pretty much taken over. Im not sure if the akadama is suitable for any carpeting plants. I have some posmegon hefferi from another tank i might shove in . I have a little Brazilian chain sword that might work well at the front. Im also toying with the idea of getting some Marsilea.

 

[mafoo]

I am thinking of only putting in the pava crypts and ordering these:

Bucephalandra sp: Kedagang Mini
Bucephalandra sp: Alamanda V3
Marsilea Hirsuta
Sagittaria subulata Dwarf Grass

with the Marsilea in the foreground, and the Sagittaria in the mid-background and the Bucephalandra attached to wood and the hardscape.

I am going to do away with the stonework except the lava rock, as it kept the pH and hardness too high - considering most the species i intend to keep prefer slight acidic water.

I've always wanted to keep Bucephalandra - and they seems to becoming more available in this country now.