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Back to my roots

Ian Holdich

Ian Holdich

Member
Joined
18 Feb 2010
Messages
3,313
Location
lincoln uk
Hi everyone, Brandis edge is now gone, and I'm really happy about that. The reason being,that I lost my aquascaping mojo a fair while back. I was getting very bored with the whole thing. I did try and get it back, but there was just no excitement in for me anymore.
This is far from and aquascape, this is a planted tank. Something I love years ago. I still do, I still love seeing those planted tanks done with really easy plants. So, that's what this is, it's a good old planted tank, it'll end up as a jungle.
I want to move plants around, buy different plants when I see something different in a shop.
There are also plants in here that probably won't suit the actual tank, but I don't really care...lol
The plants are dead easy plants, just something I need to do at the moment. I'm also quite excited about adding different crypts and the like over the coming week/months. God, I've missed crypts...
As said, this is no aquascape, this is just a basic planted tank...just for me.
There is space at the back as you'll see, but there are a few bulbs laying around at the back, so the back will soon fill in.

So, this took me two and a half hours from stripping the last scape, to filling it back up with water. You can probably tell lol.


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Thanks guys.
 
What are you using for your substrate?
 
OllieNZ said:
What are you using for your substrate?
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I used a little bit of old Colombo flora base as a undersubstrate and capped it with the remaining unipac sand I have left over from the last scape. The bogwood was from a previous scape also. No expense spared!
 
Flamingo is a lovely plant. :) I won't have a bad word said against it. . As for your bout of scaping indifference - its quite a narrow hobby, high techs tend to converge and look similar, but then there are not so many plants to choose from. but yeah, the convergence as I see it is an issue. . Enjoy your jungle - you've earned some ' whimsical time'
 
Maybe try breeding something different and a bit oddball that would love your jungle tank. After all most of us started with fish first:D
 
Wallace said:
That's a good thing, it's awesome!


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I'm glad you think so, as there's a lot of haters out there ; )

tim said:
Crypts rock mate hope you get your mojo back :thumbup:
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I'm hoping just to cover the bottom in crypts, there's nothing like a mature crypt in the planted work IMO

darren636 said:
Flamingo is a lovely plant. :) I won't have a bad word said against it. . As for your bout of scaping indifference - its quite a narrow hobby, high techs tend to converge and look similar, but then there are not so many plants to choose from. but yeah, the convergence as I see it is an issue. . Enjoy your jungle - you've earned some ' whimsical time'
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Hahahahahaha love it. Thank you Darren, I'm finding the aquascapes being produced for the like of the iaplc really not to my liking. I can't stand these landscape scenes, I can't have one in my living room, I'd end up actually dying of boredom. Hopefully I'll take a few more pics of this one through its maturity as well.

OllieNZ said:
Maybe try breeding something different and a bit oddball that would love your jungle tank. After all most of us started with fish first:D
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It's a good idea Ollie, and did cross my mind. I'm not sure what though, as I'm using tap water again, so I'm limited to what I can keep in out hard water.
 
It's always nice to get back to basics. Annoyingly, the most uncomplicated, minimum effort setups tend to turn out looking the best.
I've spent so much money over the years on fertilisers, CO2, diffusers, monster filters, lights etc, that I started to see tank as a chore rather than a hobby. After getting fed up, I dumped some soil under some gravel, planted it to the brim with Crypts, Hydrocotyl, and Hygrophila, and let it run.

Enjoy the immersive nature of your jungle :thumbup:
 
Henry said:
It's always nice to get back to basics. Annoyingly, the most uncomplicated, minimum effort setups tend to turn out looking the best.
I've spent so much money over the years on fertilisers, CO2, diffusers, monster filters, lights etc, that I started to see tank as a chore rather than a hobby. After getting fed up, I dumped some soil under some gravel, planted it to the brim with Crypts, Hydrocotyl, and Hygrophila, and let it run.

Enjoy the immersive nature of your jungle :thumbup:
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Cheers Henry, I know it doesn't look much at the moment, but like I say it'll be nice to add plants as and when I see them. I think I have missed that a bit. I know what you mean though Henry, at this time of year also, it can be hard work maintaining a tank.

Aron_Dip said:
I get the feeling you don't care... lol

But hey its nice to just sit back sometimes and let things go wild :thumbup:
The question is for how long haha
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Hahaha, I do care, I just don't really care with how people think it looks tbh. I'm just a little sick of setting tanks up purely for the ''competition' look. IMO the likes of the iaplc are not what I would call planted layouts. They are purely hardscape layouts. Look at the winner, it wasn't heavily planted. The hardscape won that. I also don't like the scenery style scapes, I reckon they're boring.
 
As long as you take pleasure from it, who gives a feck what others think. None of my tanks have ever even been close to the standard of some of the tanks on here, yours included, but I take pleasure from sitting in my lounge and seeing them. That's all I care about.

The tank will look great when grown in more, or just when you throw some random bunch of plants in just cos you feel like it.

Are you using gas, or just letting it grow?


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And im just about to set up my high tech iaplc type scape!

But I have my 260 jungle to keep me happy too. I've missed high tech
 
Wallace said:
As long as you take pleasure from it, who gives a feck what others think. None of my tanks have ever even been close to the standard of some of the tanks on here, yours included, but I take pleasure from sitting in my lounge and seeing them. That's all I care about.

The tank will look great when grown in more, or just when you throw some random bunch of plants in just cos you feel like it.

Are you using gas, or just letting it grow?


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I'm sure ill set up an iwagumi or 2 in the future, but for now, this will do me. I'm gonna take great enjoyment in this.

And yes it'll be running c02 as the tile won't really permit it without.


darren636 said:
And im just about to set up my high tech iaplc type scape!

But I have my 260 jungle to keep me happy too. I've missed high tech
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Good on ya Darren, there's nothing wrong with it, I think it's good to give it try. I will put 50p on that you'll get bored...
 
do what makes you happy mate, i think its easy to be influenced by iaplc and forget that we have to look at it every day.....

I look forward to watching it evolve fella as you add bits and bobs, im sure your enjoyment from it will show in the look of the tank also. :thumbup:
 
Iain Sutherland said:
do what makes you happy mate, i think its easy to be influenced by iaplc and forget that we have to look at it every day.....

I look forward to watching it evolve fella as you add bits and bobs, im sure your enjoyment from it will show in the look of the tank also. :thumbup:
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Cheers Iain, I haven't even got names for most of the crypts in the and there's some I don't recognise. There's also a madagasca lace plant bulb, a tiger lotus, and crispus. These are something I haven't used in a few years. Bring on the jungle.
 
Nice one Ian, go for it.

Sometimes we don't have time to maintain the 'perfect' aquascape. I have very little spare time at the moment, so unfortunately my aquascape is suffering, I could do with something like what you've set up. This should be nice and easy, and I can see it being very enjoyable :) It's still very pleasing to look at, which is the idea!
 
Looks good to me mate! I got very bored of my last scape if I'm honest...these things happen, besides its nice to get your hands wet having a tinker about :) .... I would say up to your elbows wet, but I know yours is not that deep.

*edit - I've just read that back and it sounds kind of wrong, but I'll leave it anyway :lol:
 
I agree with you Ian on the competition scapes. The landscape ones to me seem strange because it's no longer a fish tank with fish... I understand it takes some skill to pull them off (skill which I don't have!) but I'd have my crazy planted tank over the work of pruning moss to look like a tree any day. Although I wish my algae would just feck off hahaha.
 
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