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I wouldn't think it would be needed wit ADA AS as it is already 'filled up' with nutrients and you may 'wash' some out using this method. This is more for the substrates that aren't 're-loaded'. For example Akadama will take my hard water from 19KH down to 0KH witin 24 hours the first time...

Personally I would fill it up to the top as per normal wit tap water. run an internal filter with floss in it to take out the dust that gets stirred up. Then after 24 ours the cat litter should have soaked up a lot of the KH and other nutrients. Drain it down to te lowest substrate level and...

So there will only be 3 or 4 entering then?? I don't agree with this sentiment. There are 3-4 in this country that do this particular type of competition scape maybe? I think people need to stop this UK catch up argument. The internet has made things much more global. This forum is not UK...

TBH it might just be the pictures at the beginning of the thread but the light doesn't look very high to me. YEs looking at the light they may look really bright but in the tank it looks pretty dark to me. Like I say it might just be the pictures.

The key to begin with is planning really. That basically covers everything including patience and research. A lot of people start the tank off before they have everything they need and then tinker through it's first month(s) So plan everything you need, equipment and plants, patience until...

I use it purely because it amkes my 'crystal clear' water 'gin clear' instead. It really is awesome at water polishing.

Looks to me like someone has use arcadia luminaire grippers and fitted something like the inards of a 6.3mm jack.

frosted film on the back. The sides reflect it

Here it is. Just under 50% loss at the top and about 30% loss at the substrate http://www.livingreefs.com/threads/photosynthetically-active-radiation-par.25217/

Theres a reef thread somewhere that show this being measured. 30% sounds about right to me with clean glass. the condensation doesn't play too much of a part really its more dust and salt deposits and the fact that clear glass / acrylic isn't as clear as air. The reef thread that measured it...

In all honesty if you are adding such a small amount of something as in 5mls of fert in 125 litres of water then unless it is purely ammonia that is being added I wouldn't think it would register at all. I doubt anyone tests their solutions because of the amount of dilution here. The only...

I would dilute the test down further and test again. After all you are going to be dosing minimal amounts compared to the volume of the tank water.

They help reduce ammonia traces in the water, remove organic wastes etc.

If you only need a connector for the wiring, rather than use that connector you may as well get a switched one.

I use white distilled vinegar on a sponge. Let the water level down (water change) Wipe it all thoroughly with the sponge. Leave it for 10 minutes or so and then scrape with a credit card or carefully with a stanley blade. Repeat the process if necessary. You don't need to worry about the...

I only use heaters if the fish in the tank require heating. My house temperature is about 18C and the water in the tanks in my house tends to stay around the 21-22C range unless its a hot summer. At the moment I don't have any tanks with heaters in.

On a heavily planted hi tec setup I will clean the pipes and filter and media once a month or so for an external or every week for an internal.

There are articles about ambient light out of the photoperiod interfering with nature. I read one that said that any light outside of the photoperiod that gets to the plants can interfere with the way the plants grow. i.e. don't get a proper rest at night. I read a recent article the other...

The reason they don't put out PAR readings is because that is a measurement at source. They have no way of knowing where your source is or what barriers there are. i.e. if they said PAR without lenses @ 3ft = 150 we would then need to know what about 2ft, 1.5ft, 1ft. What about with...

Lol. flashback 5 or 6 years on the ADA argument. I think it was the beginning of the LEDs that spurred on the debate over lighting levels in reality rather then the 4 - 6WPG we were told was high light and necessary by the APC crowd. That was back in the day of me writing 10,000 character posts...

Not really, depends how often they forget and for how long. a day here or there wouldn't be too much of a problem and some of us can be a little 'blase' so to speak when talking about our own tanks. Sometimes we can say something off the cuff that sounds different to the listener than we...

+1 on the credit card. Funnily enough it was a tip from one of George's journals years and years ago. lol.

Nice one. Do you want bank transfer or paypal? Can you pm those sensitive details :) Andy

yep still interested :)

Yes :) Still interested as per pm description.

Because those that ask without searching will still ask without searching :) It's hard to bear for some but there are many these days who's lifes are 'so busy with other important stuff' that they do not have time to search, just the time to post and then shoot off to 'more important things'...

That's not what Wet was saying. He was questioning why when a person actually wants to know more about uptake, monitoring nutrients, in depth chemistry that the response they effectively get (although I exaggerate a little) is 'Use EI, you don't need to know what you're asking'. I can see the...

aesthetics AND even clean glass reduces PAR substantially. I once saw a PAR test on flouros over a marine tank and the PAR was virtually halved with the glass covers on!!! They weren't crystal clear of course but by no way dirty. Even evaporation leaves a layer of droplets on the underside...

I agree totally. Just answered similar on ASW. ridiculous rule. My anaolgy: If I go to see a Van Gogh exhibition I want to see all the works. Not just the best from each year. If someone is talented and prolific enough to finish high on 2, 3,4 scapes then why not. They are talented there...

Luis Ask SuperWen. lol Andy

It comes back down to the question: Are the high light plants or are they actually high CO2 demand plants (which in most cases is pushed up at the same time as the light is increased. I make no secret that I favour the latter description here and think that if the CO2 was pushed up and the...

I think it's like some tanks are listed on both ADA and AGA. That means that someone can enter ours as long as we don't publish results until after the ADA ;) That seems to be how the AGA works anyway. Andy

Hello. We are proud to announce the result of the 2011 Aquascapingworld contest. Was a tough first year and hopefully we have learned some lessons to improve for next year. Thanks to all who entered and hope you enjoyed entering or viewing the scapes. All scapes that were entereed are now...

you're lucky. When mine was 3 he nipped downstairs before the wife woke up and tried to emulate daddy dosing the tank........with washing up liquid!!!.. Came home to a very frothy tank with of course no inhabitants alive :( Andy

You are not allowed to send fish and shrimp via Royal mail, however you are allowed to send fry. Therefore we all send shrimp as they are so small that if RM were to open the package they can be told they are fry. Fish are a different matter though. You should not send fish through the post...

If you're after honest opinions then mine would be to find any way to fit a standard rectangular tank into the space. They just look so much better IMO. Mine is in a corner :) Andy

Its apparently low in iron and much clearer than float glass though. looking at the picture they are a little cubish for what I want. I want something small but tradition long at the moment so I can move my shrimp to a new home :) AC

Nice one. I'll pop down there now (400 yards away) and they don't have it I'll look in the bigger one in town tomorrow. AC

Opti white in P@H? Do you have the brand name etc Luis. I may take a peeklater. AC

The competition is drawing to a close now however this is where you guys come in :) The judging panel have submitted their results to us and after combining their results we have a top 12. The competition now goes to a public vote so you can help decide which scape is the winner. This is the...

Lol. The tank would indeed be safer in the garage than on the driveway :) Viktor. Indeed they are proud of their gear. What they wanted for ages and that is a compliment to the brand. However it is the brand name that is the prestige not the actual components in reality. Yes the gear is...

Come on Mark you know it is true. I have nothing against it. People will always be more likely to open a thread by yourself or George or any other top scaper. Its is natural to want to see what the best are doing etc and to see the quality of photography. Thats fine. Nothing wrong with...

I don't think it is as bad as Garuf is saying however I do notice that if someone does a scape in an ADA tank the title of the journal will include ADA 60P or whatever that tank is. I don't see many journals that have 'Fluval 125' or 'Juwel 125' in their title. There are some of course but...

I wouldn't be so sure Viktor. POwersand is an old product before AS and rather than remove it once AS came along they marketed it as complimenatary to AS. Thats an old argument though. Also Amano freely admits he uses low light and rather than ADA lights upsetting the highlight crowd they...

In the 2 in Lincoln they do often state that you can't add X fish to a certain tank because of size or because of the existing stocking but I agree. All a bit pointless really. Not many of them know what they are talking about otherwise they would correct the labels recognising that some of...

Indeed so Gill. I remember the wrench it took to sell the vinyl albums. Eventually I caved in and replaced with CD but I miss the crackle, the ambience and the different sound of vinyl. That doesn't get to the excitement and joy of gatefold covers and picture disc. lol These days however I...

Lol most of the above are asking about a hard copy after they have read the online one. Same thing apart from one is on a screen and the other is printed on paper. I however am on your lines. Paper magazines aren't my kind of thing. However each to their own. AC

Thanks for the compliments. As with all things in life it is demand that dictates what we do and therefore I think putting something on itunes when it is already available online for free is not really viable but something to look at I guess. As for donations I can't help you there but will...

George is on the money. I don't think you can call PFK pants. Aquascaping is just part of what it covers. It is a magazine that caters for all fishkeeping.Therefore you are comparing a dedicated niche magazine to a wide ranging subject magazine. Its like a brunette lover comparing a magazine...

Lol 5 people interested so far. That'll be £50 a copy + delivery AC

Watch this space..........You never know what can happen if there is enough interest ;) AC

I will accept the compliments on behalf of the ASW team. I play a very small part TBH. AC

I've redone the link. We're sorting out the articles for the next one already. Promises to be even better. Andy

Aquascaping World Magazine is in production again. Its been a year or so since the last issue but we've been hard at work getting it back up and with more input we will be releasing a new issue every 2 months. It is free and online. You can download it as a pdf file or just view it online ...

Can anyone who has been affected by the '24 DD' problem please contact me at the info e-mail address on my site. Can be found on the 'contact' page. I would put it here but don't want loads of spam (or more than I already get. lol) Please provide your name and username on this forum within...

Re: Show me your tidy cabinet! (Now piccies of my tidy cabi AC

We can move this subject to here rather than clutter up UKaps with legal stuff. This is a more appropriate site to discuss this subject and with knowledge too. this is where I got help when bmibaby left my family and I stranded in Lisbon 2 years ago (still in the courts now. lol) They are...

If I buy anything over DD it will come up with a pre confirmation screen detailing the frequency and amount to be taken. this did not appear at all in the process. Not until the e-mail I saw this. I will give them the option though. Collect it or accept standing orders quarterly. Wording is...

Not PFK's fault. You click on the link and it goes straight to Great Magazines pages. They should state on there it is a one off payment. So any good solicitors on here? lol. If they send it to me they can either let me pay quarterly or collect it. Bad news for them but then big companies...

You stole my words. Whilst it doesn't mention it is a a whole £93 payment it does mention that you can cancel the subscription at any time but if any gift is related to the subscription then they can ask for the gift to be returned (my words not theirs. but along the right lines of their...

They should detail that on the page!!! Oh well. Off to cancel that then. Little disappointed now :( George - You should have a word. 'Its in the smallprint' is not viable in UK courts these days' AC

You can sign up monthly. 2 year Direct debit. Doesn't say how much each month so maybe wrongly I am assuming £4/month? Maybe George can clear that one up. A bit bad for them to not detail this little bit of ifo. Is quite important :) I just did it anyway so I would be quite interested in...

Re: If you had £8 to the free delivery @ TGM what would you depends how much delivery is. If delivery is £4 the I would probably get the delivery with the £8 and then keep the other £4 in my pocket. AC

Impatient on a low tec tank pm :) However BBA seems to be pretty normal on the hardscape in my experience. No idea why. In hitec and lo tec no algae anywhere exept a few lfluffy black patches on the wood. Always been there and I don't worry too much about it. Whats in phyton git? Here's a...

Flick through the pictures. He/she looks like they've cut the glass and made the lids. I would guess he bought the jars though :) http://www.flickr.com/photos/mobile_gno ... hotostream This one looks like a cereal storage jar or similar. It has a hinged lid :)...

Lol They were out of the tank last week, back in now. Sorry. I was reshaping the rear section of the tank. Those 3 in that picture were actually me removing all the Spiralis from the tank. Problem with Crypts is you leave a biot of root and you guessed it :) A couple of months time I may...

Justbeware these aren't just tall plants. They can get real real big) I sold some Spiralis a couple of years ago that had 'outgrown' my 125tr (13" from substrat to water surface.) It was erm 24 inches tall and very well grown :) AC

Or Crypt balansae, crypt Spiralis, Crypt Undulata. AC

There is no problem with anaerobic conditions in a planted tank assuming there are a reasonable amount of plants in there. That is one of those non planted problems that people transfer into the planted world. Different systems though. Not a problem at all. I have had more sand than that in...

I have several old 10ltr paint tubs which I use :) Fish come out white thoug. lol AC

I take out plants and hardscape, These go in a bucket. Then I put tank water in a lidded 10 litre tub. Then put the fish in, wrap with blanket and put it somewhere safe. Then I sort out all the duties I need to do i.e. substrate, re hardscape, replant, fill with water. Then as soon as water...

To my way of thinking the substrate should be left undisturbed if possible. To disturb it when vacing not only means you can risk releasing lots of stuff into the water column whilst vaccing but also you are just taking awway ferts and then adding them back in later. In a hi tec tank you...

Personallly I would clean internal filters weekly. Need to keep what circulation you can. I used to do my internal weekly before I got an external and that was a much higher capacity. In fact it was the same turnover as my external however which much smaller media capacity I found that even...

I think you misread Tom a little here. Tom will suggest CO2 is the problem in 95% of cases.NOw from there you can basically assume the factors to rule out which are causing the CO2 to be a problem will be light first. Ammonia is the algae trigger BUT only if the circumstances are good for...

As I said. Probably the filter. The tank MAY ned some extra ferts BUT we shouldn't be suggesting that the OP 'speeds things up' by adding Excel. That will only makes things worse. Circulation is not as big an issue with low tech. I sort of knew it and George pushed me to go down to just the...

I am leaning towards Bob's way of thinking here. Yes ferts need to contain N and P. No-one disputes that BUT lets look at the particular tanks in question. -They are both running on stock lighting at a reasonably low level. -They are both run with a good photoperiod length of 8 hours. -They...

Not particularly sure I agree on there suddenly being a problem. there was always a problem for this hobby and it did get a little better a few years ago but I do agree it has slipped back to where it was. There are a few reasons. Lots of smaller 'webshops' being one of them but that is...

Nope. I tend to use UKaps for mostly my journal and a few other aspects like lighting, TFF for general use, barrreport for learning (plus a little from UKaps), ASW for being a superb all round aquascaping site, BC aquaria because they invited me to join and it is a little more laid back than...

Ukaps, TFF, Barrreport, ASW, APC, BC Aquaria, planet catfish, cichlidforums and a few others. As per Garuf. I like to see different opinions. AC

I'm not arguing...it is a waste BUT I wasted loads and pushed the upper boundaries. Makes perfect sense that if it is hard to reach a 'real' 30ppm then it will be much easier to reach the 'real' target if you inject more at the beginning. By real I mean the whole system and not just the area...

The plants won't be able to utilise it all, after all there are suggestions that as much as 95% of the injected CO2 is lost and never sees a plant. I used to be in the region of 35ppm on my tank (0.9WPG) with no problems. However I had 3 DCs in different positions and plenty of fish to tell me...

Yes indeed ;) You have to provide enough 'food' for the plants. C is a nutrient just as NPK+traces are. They use the nitrate/nitrite/ammonia to get nitrogen. They use the CO2 to get carbon. By limiting CO2 you are technically limiting nutrients however I can't explain why it doesn't work...

The first statement is true 'The plants will really appreciate it' but the last one 'it will make no difference' isn't. If you have a lo-tec setup say 0.9wpg ;) and then add CO2 (as Ceg says becoming a hi-tec tank) you will see an almost immediate difference. Growth speed will increase...

I wouldn't worry too much. My tank heater is set at 26ºC however when the heater is turned off it can get as low as 20ºC!!! I have turned it off by accident before and not noticed for a week (or 2 ;)) I also turn it off for 5 days when I want the Corys to breed. No problems encountered at...

I was about to do a mega post until I read Ceg's and he has basically said what I was going to say. Brenmuk above has also added the little that was left. basically we talk flow but mean circulation. If we say 10x flow then we are meaning after flow reduction in the filter (actual output)...

Superman has already beaten me to it but............ ...........I have curved and straight scissors. Curved and straight tweezers plus a 'substrate leveller'. All about 30cm long I use them for...............show!!! They are in the cabinet virtually unused!!!!! By that I mean that I find a...

Re: Discussion: What's your favourite part of the hobby and For me its seeing how close the 'end' result is to the original idea. At the moment I am enjoying seeing how long it can stay 'within' the original plan :) AC

Nah I think they are basically as you see. As Mark will tell you I have my diffuser about same height. I think George does too. However I would suspect George and I both have much higher PAR than these. I think its a question of light meaning he doesn't need so much diffused. Also remember...

There are a few considerations to take into account: - ADA tanks although the specs may suggest otherwise use low light!!! The ones Tom Barr measured on display at AFA were 50 Par at the substrate and 150 par at the water surface. This is equivalent to 1 x full length T5HO!!! This of course...

I use the Koralia 1 as well as a 700 lph filter in my 125 and it is always setup to be a high plant mass like yours. It is silent apart from the first 2 weeks where it may make some noises as it 'breaks in'. Easily sorted by turning it off and on again. After this period you seriously cannot...

I don't really think you need to spend anything. You say the Crypts and Anubias are doing well and that would say to me there is enough nutrient in the tank. You could take the hardscape and plants out empty and give the subtrate a good stir up and then put a fresh layer of cheap gravel or...

I keep mine raised 24/7 and turn up the CO2 a little more to compensate. If it were a case of raise/lower every day and the lily was under water in the day and a third above the water at night then I would either forget to lower it and lose the CO2 due to the injection being lower or forget to...

Go on be daring: http://www.barrreport.com/articles/433-non-co2-methods.html AC

The simple answer is No. My Non CO2 tank has not had a water change for nearly 3 months with no casualties :) AC

Indeed like Dave says Ph is not the problem. People warble on about Ph problems with fish when in reality it is KH that is the problem. KH doesn't change with CO2 realted Ph swings so the problem is a non event. I have a lot of surface turbulence so my Ph changes from 6.2 to 7.2 within an...

DIY Nano auto top off system. Will cost you nothing :) http://www.bcaquaria.com/forum/showthread.php?t=25813

I tend to go through spells where I aget ideas but problem is I have quite a few interests and my motivation isn't good at the best of times. lol Currently in a dip where I have to force myself even to dose the tanks and do the maintenance. My pool games rubbish and I wish I didn't have to go...

nice one Garuf. I think we've all had periods where outside issues as well as disasters/failures with the hobby itself have made us question whether or not we want to continue. I guess that is something that happens with any hobby let alone a hobby that it can be pretty easy to lose control...

My tips: 1 - Water quality as said above 2 - Keep the water level lower. don't fill it up to 1cm of the top. They effectively can swim out then. lol 3 - Stop the little kids from playing noisily and moving suddenly in front of the tank because you don't notice the escapees that go behind...

Tom Over here almost everything is a case of 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' It's like I've said many times before r.e. wind turbines etc. People will support them until they are proposed close to them and suddenly they turn from supporter to protestor. Everything is a case of we...