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"Dutch something or the other" 120 Gal

Tank is hazy from the pearling and CO2 etc. Note the trim method I use for the Monte Carlo, this is really well highlighted here.
The Erio parkeri need some time to fatten up and adapt, I mowed the L senegalensis and replanted the tops in the bare rear corner, this would do well as a contrast in and of itself.

I'll still get a couple of different pondweeds and add them in the back corner, but I may modify the shape of each of the groups to do this.
Monte Carlo is really looking nice, as you can tell by my trim method, which I seem to be the only person I've ever witness do this technique..........
I cut a 1-2" sod in the front, then the plant cascades down to the front edge nicely like this. Other foreground plants do this and it does not look tacky with the foreground plant all pressed up against the glass. I've never liked that look. I think this method looks far better and merely requires some easy to do pruning methods. You also get a nice sod to sell and recovery is fairly quick.
"Mini" A. renieckii is doing better than I'd anticipated. I'll have more to sell in a week or so. It'll get taller, but if you trim it once every 1-2 months, it'll stay fairly nice and short.
UG is at that threshold from looking crappy to where it'll look like a nice thick consistent mat. In 1-2 weeks, it'll be looking pretty good again. R macrandra has survived the high current and many repeated aggressive trimmings.




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They really do not go after Assassins or the side winder little snailers, god, I hate those.
They leave the shrimps alone also.
Most eat Physa pond snails is all and not very well.
Botia striata, that is the most effective snail eaters I've found.
Another nice loach, but not as nice as 50 of the dwarfs.
Not sure if B striata would go after the RCS. I doubt they would mess with Amano's.
 
I'll be trimming some more sod, this time in the middle of the Monte Carlo, the plant will fill back in maybe 2-3 weeks and be thinned out. You end up having these nice cool looking waves depending at what time you cut the sod and wait for the new growth to reinvade.
 
No matter at which angle you view this tank,...the plant health is next to none. Tom you are an absolute genius. The plants look so thick & plumpy. How do you manage such high light levels & correspondingly high co2 levels without affecting the fauna?Also a very dumb question here but do you run an airstone during lights off period?
 
I never liked aeration at night, all it does is suspend more particles which cause the water to be cloudy.

A decent filter, good surface movement etc, that...does better than the best aeration.

Good O2, filtration and good adjustment of the CO2.

Realize that CO2 goes in, but it also goes out(degassing), if the degassing is stable, and the addition is stable, then you can add a fair amount, and then you also have a lot of O2, that makes it easier on the livestock.
 
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Quite a few changes and reworked areas, added about another 9 liter bag of ADA AS to the tank.
Removed most of the wood row dividers and replaced them.
Red Ludwigia is gone, replaced with a short row of L. ovalis "pink". Not much different, but grows slower and more bushy, so I like it.
Gone are 2 weeds: L pantanal and L. gigantea.
To hell with them.
I expanded the Tonia, trimming it and making it look nice with this no# is a PITA, but they sell well and does not grow fast.
I moved the R macrandra to the rear, pulled the A. renieckii small form up front. Seems to be doing well after a couple of weeks.
UG is out of control and will need uprooted and replanted soon. It tends to look bad and ratty while growing back in longer than it looks good.
But, I've never seen anyone's UG look like mine.
Erios are back, they are nice to deal with.
I may try to bring back the Erio type 3 into this tank also.
I like the plant a great deal, but the current was wrong for the location I had it.
I added a very nice piece of wood behind the main piece, and will need to prop it up after it settles a bit more, so it can be seen better and the placement is correct.
I needed to add a couple of stones to weigh down the new wood divider.
I'll allow the downoi to fill out and take over the foreground as it grows in there.
The L segengalsis will be pruned like a hedge from now on, I am not uprooting and replanting the tops every week or two.
I did this to the mini butter fly and it responded very well.
I need to redo some of the smaller piece of wood/add Mini pellia to them, prop the larger piece in the back up some, but the general placement is fairly decided for the next few weeks.
Till I change my mind once again.
Tank is very cloudy due to the rework, at least you can see the fish some.


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Hi Tom, it was interesting to me how many types of plants you grow so far. And is there ever a plant that you have failed to grow?
 
anasarka said:
Hi Tom, it was interesting to me how many types of plants you grow so far. And is there ever a plant that you have failed to grow?
Click to expand...


Well, no, but some have failed to grow the way I want them to grow.
Some did not LIKE the placement, or the current, or the light, or to be crowded, or trimmed more frequently etc.

Growing is a rather easy aspect. Aesthetic pruning is quite another matter.
 
A day or two after a lot of reworking.
I trimmed and replanted some of the UG.
Added all new divider wood slats.
Re tied the and expanded the Mini pellia covered branches.
Trimmed the background plants back a lot.
I'll likely swap the Ludwigia senegalensis and the Alternanthera mini.
The long Downoi row will look nice in a few weeks.
The old Ludwigia red is no longer in this aquarium, the plant in the middle is the Much rarer "pink ovalis".

Where the L senegalensis is now, that was where the pantanal was prior, it's a PITA spot to trim because of the wood over head.
It also takes the full brunt of the current if I let things over grow, then I'll get algae on the plants at that spot.
You will note the return is now white and has a larger outflow, instead of the older 3/4" PVC, I went to a loc Line, which bis about 40% smaller than the 3/4" PVC, now this is a 3/4 to 1" elbow and this produces a nicer current, lower pressure and wider dispersion.
I'm going to see how a 1 and 1/4" and 1.5" elbow return works, then have one made out pyrex/kimax glass.
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plantbrain said:
A day or two after a lot of reworking.
I trimmed and replanted some of the UG.
Added all new divider wood slats.
Re tied the and expanded the Mini pellia covered branches.
Trimmed the background plants back a lot.
I'll likely swap the Ludwigia senegalensis and the Alternanthera mini.
The long Downoi row will look nice in a few weeks.
The old Ludwigia red is no longer in this aquarium, the plant in the middle is the Much rarer "pink ovalis".

Where the L senegalensis is now, that was where the pantanal was prior, it's a PITA spot to trim because of the wood over head.
It also takes the full brunt of the current if I let things over grow, then I'll get algae on the plants at that spot.
You will note the return is now white and has a larger outflow, instead of the older 3/4" PVC, I went to a loc Line, which bis about 40% smaller than the 3/4" PVC, now this is a 3/4 to 1" elbow and this produces a nicer current, lower pressure and wider dispersion.
I'm going to see how a 1 and 1/4" and 1.5" elbow return works, then have one made out pyrex/kimax glass.
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Beuatiful tom. I love the layout and colours are really vibrant

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
The reds of this bunch of plants are less intense, but the same type of patterning. I'll move some things around to make it a bit better for myself, trimming easier etc, better access to the weedy species etc.

The Ludwigia Pink ovalis is nice because it's a slower grower than the L. "red" which looks very similar.
The L senegalensis I can trim by topping, no uprooting required, same for the Rotala mini butterfly it responds very well to that method, making the job easier and then dust and muck less.
 
Hi Tom

This tank never fails to impress me. It's a fine example of a high-energy set-up where any plant can be grown at peak performance.

The colours are incredible. Not particularly to my taste as an aquascaper but I have total respect as a gardener.

If you had to sum up the top 5 lessons you've learnt from this tank so far, what would they be?

Can you remind us all about some of the technical specs, please? Lighting, CO2, dosing, filtration etc.

Cheers,
George
 
Tide pools are another one of my hobbies also. i have not set up a marine tank for myself in a awhile.
I am waiting till we buy a home, then I'll add 2. One a reef and then the old will be a cold water marine macro/seagrass system.
 
George Farmer said:
Hi Tom

This tank never fails to impress me. It's a fine example of a high-energy set-up where any plant can be grown at peak performance.

The colours are incredible. Not particularly to my taste as an aquascaper but I have total respect as a gardener.

If you had to sum up the top 5 lessons you've learnt from this tank so far, what would they be?

Can you remind us all about some of the technical specs, please? Lighting, CO2, dosing, filtration etc.

Cheers,
George
Click to expand...


1. Contrast between species is an excellent teacher of what and where to place plant groups, regardless of style of the aquascaper. Teaches you how to use the colors as painter.
2. As always, as you learn to grow a new species, you learn more about gardening overall
3. Color has a strong impact, even as much as the best done scape without much color.
4. Not to pay attention to "styles", if it looks good, it is good.
5. Demonstrates a clear example of having an aquarium where you can make $ selling/farming plants/livestock and rotate them as new species become available, and have a nice scape to show various gardening methods.

Tank clearly shows there are no long term issues when you add high levels of light, CO2 and ferts at the gardening/aquascaping or growing scales with virtually every species of plant combination.
The only issues really are where to sell the plants. If you make 500$ a month from trimming a single aquarium in plant sales alone, then you have much more motivation to care for the aquarium correctly.
Only took me 30 years to figure out how to do it:)

Light is an ATI dimmer control 8x54 W bulb(8 hours total, but the ramp up is 1-2 hours at each end of the light cycle).

CO2 comes on with the lights, but the ramping up of the CO2 and the Light match evenly. CO2 goes off about 30 minutes before the lights do.
Dual stage CO2 custom made regulator and high end stainless steel set up. CO2, best I can assess: 50 ppm most of the time.


Filter is a CPR overflow with dual pipes and a CPR 1000 sump sealed lid.
Flow is about 900 gph, had a Vortech MP20, but removed it, no need really.
Switched back to a larger outflow 26 mm vs about 18 mm, will modify this to get a larger flow, with less pressure, more even flow seems critical, but you want nice even flow, not just high flow.
High flow but low velocity/pressure is ideal, like a slow moving river, vs a a single intense water coming into a large pool.

This is what is key about flow, not so much total volume of the filter etc.

Dosing is somewhat EI, modified.
I dose this amount 2-3x a week:
15 ppm of NO3/K+(1.5 teaspoons KNO3)
5 ppm of PO4(a little under 1 teaspoon)
GH booster; about 1.5 Tablespoons after each water change
Traces: CMS+B with DTPA Fe and Fe Gluconate: 4:1:1 teaspoons in 1 liter of hot tap water: dose about 30-60mls daily, some days I miss etc.

Fish about 40 Botia sidthimunkii, 4 G. elephas elephant nose, 4 Gold nuggets, 2-3 otto cats, 1 red arc pencil that never jumped out with the rest of the others. 70 Amano shrimp? 200 Fire shrimp?

I have 2 new tanks coming up that will very different from this tank.
Much lower energy tanks, but will have some similar elements: rare species, unique use of hardscape materials, Farming that will pay for the tank and equipment many times over the next 1-2 years.
While I have some pricey high grade aquarium toys, they have made their $ back many times over now.

No sense is stopping that now.

Does not matter if you are the best aquascaper in the world, you will always enjoy an eclectic species tank. Appeals to the collectoritus in all of us.
Dutch, Nature, grower, does not matter, it's a universal trait. But, I do not enjoy just one method or style.
So one tank like this one, then some others over the spectrum are fine.
 
Also, after a few weeks of new growth and tweaking, the tank will fill in nice and you'll see the end result then.
 
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