I've just bought myself an Aquanano 40 which is 55 litres and 40x40x40cm for the kitchen (the only place in my entire house I can fit a tank). But I have to wait for the plug sockets to be installed before I can start.
In the meantime I've been doing a lot of reading and trying to come up with what I want to do and I think I might need some advice as so much has changed in the planted aquarium world since I left it about 5 years ago.
Being realistic and having a baby I don't have a lot of time anymore, so I think I'm settled on the fact that it needs to be fairly low maintenance.
Light: The light that came with the tank is an 18W PLU. This means 1.24WPG.
Substrate: I've bought sand for substrate just because I prefer it. My current tank is gravel, and I had sand prior to that and I think I prefer sand.
Fish: I have 3 botia striata to go in. This doesn't leave me much room for anything else, so any suggestions are welcome.
Fertilisers: I still have all my EI stuff (does it go off?!), also have some Kent bottles, I believe iron and something else. I need to dig out the box and have a look. I recall EI being time consuming, so is there something easier on the market these days you can recommend? I see many new products (had a good look at green machine and aqua essentials).
CO2: I have the JBL pressurized system, but don't want to use it as I have nowhere to hide the gear. So either I go without CO2 altogether, use the liquid carbon, or get the nano disposable pressurized kits that hangs off the glass edge. Any opinions?
Aquascaping: I had wanted to do some carpeting with maybe some of the smaller anubis species (always liked these). But from a google last night it seems the carpeting plants are quite demanding. Maybe I need to add more light? But then is carpeting quite time consuming in terms of maintenance, I vaguely remember forever pulling it all up and replanting it before!
I'm going to remove the picture behind and tidy up the fridge paperwork! Don't want it ruining the aesthetics of my tank!
In the meantime I've been doing a lot of reading and trying to come up with what I want to do and I think I might need some advice as so much has changed in the planted aquarium world since I left it about 5 years ago.
Being realistic and having a baby I don't have a lot of time anymore, so I think I'm settled on the fact that it needs to be fairly low maintenance.
Light: The light that came with the tank is an 18W PLU. This means 1.24WPG.
Substrate: I've bought sand for substrate just because I prefer it. My current tank is gravel, and I had sand prior to that and I think I prefer sand.
Fish: I have 3 botia striata to go in. This doesn't leave me much room for anything else, so any suggestions are welcome.
Fertilisers: I still have all my EI stuff (does it go off?!), also have some Kent bottles, I believe iron and something else. I need to dig out the box and have a look. I recall EI being time consuming, so is there something easier on the market these days you can recommend? I see many new products (had a good look at green machine and aqua essentials).
CO2: I have the JBL pressurized system, but don't want to use it as I have nowhere to hide the gear. So either I go without CO2 altogether, use the liquid carbon, or get the nano disposable pressurized kits that hangs off the glass edge. Any opinions?
Aquascaping: I had wanted to do some carpeting with maybe some of the smaller anubis species (always liked these). But from a google last night it seems the carpeting plants are quite demanding. Maybe I need to add more light? But then is carpeting quite time consuming in terms of maintenance, I vaguely remember forever pulling it all up and replanting it before!
I'm going to remove the picture behind and tidy up the fridge paperwork! Don't want it ruining the aesthetics of my tank!
