• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up
This tank is amazing :clap: this is what i hope to achive one day in future and i also love the fluval studio tanks , love the look of the tank full of plants and wood and stones just looks great keep the pics coming

Dean
 
Ady, awesome looking tank,lovely mixture of plants. marbled hatchets are superb fish, got 8 in mine and getting another 8 :thumbup:
 
coming together very nicely indeed Ady, your positioning of the photos of the equipment was great, right in front of the tank :lol: those hatch fish are awesome!!
Ha, yeah you gotta do it like that ;)
looks great mate and that lobelia looks lush. I agree with jack too the hatchets are fantastic. wish I could keep those but it will never happen.
great work as always Mate.
Cheers guys, love the hatchetfish, they're a great way of adding some surface interest in this tank that is lacking much else going on up there! Lol I know what you mean Alastair, open top is a no no.....I have a 2" gap at the front of my tank that the glass covers miss due to the glassware hung over the side, I'm terrified they find it and jump.....good so far, touch wood.
Cheerio
Ady.
 
This tank is amazing :clap: this is what i hope to achive one day in future and i also love the fluval studio tanks , love the look of the tank full of plants and wood and stones just looks great keep the pics coming

Dean
Thanks very much Dean, I'm sure in the future you'll be able to try this sort of hardscape. It's good to try different ones, and I really like your iwagumi and am looking forward to the flood. I love my studio tank, but I must say I'm now itching for a rimless optiwhite like yours....:)
Ady, awesome looking tank,lovely mixture of plants. marbled hatchets are superb fish, got 8 in mine and getting another 8 :thumbup:
I'd love a bigger group of them, I'm sure they would too, but I can't seem to resist multiple species so the tank is getting a bit full of livestock now.....next time I'm going to try and resist and go for a nice shoal of one or two species maximum!

I much appreciate everybodys comments, its great to hear all the positive feedback and any critiques too, it makes doing the journal all the more worthwhile :)
Thanks,
Ady.
 
Hi,
little update.
Tried to dial in c02 further last weekend as id previously been beginning injection 4hrs pre photoperiod to get a nice lime green dc for lights on and maintain a good but safe level throughout the photoperiod. I upped the bubble rate and reduced the injection period by 1 hour, but it just didnt work out, fish were starting to show signs of stress mid way through the photoperiod and i had to shut down c02 and switch off the lights early. Ive since been trying to tweak it, but have had to return to the previous set up of 4hrs pre lights on to get a good balance. Between this, and being a little slack with water changes i noticed the beginnings of some filamentous algae on the foreground moss and lobelia, as well as a little on the tips of the vallis nana.....some maybe the start of staghorn algae too which ive suffered before in Dragons Crypt. Upping feeding to twice daily again, combined with letting the tank go for 8 or 9 days without water change for a couple of weeks and messing with my c02 is not a good combo, so ill do 2x 50% water changes this week, and maybe next week also to get things back on track again.
Ive also noticed some deficiencies in some of the plants, namely small and pale new leaf formation on both anubias and lobelia so ive upped fert dosing of both macro and micro by 5ml/day, ill see how it goes and increase further if needed.
I have added some Proserpinaca palustris 'cuba' from Mattyc mainly to the left rear....its not in the most ideal position as flow here is slightly obstructed by the wood and rock formation so i dont have a lot of belief that it will flourish, and certainly wont show the nice deep red colouration but thought id give it a go.....it is showing some nice new growth which is green....i dont mind really about the colour if it grows healthy but an orangy hue would have suited best to balance the heavy green tones of the lobelia and tenellus in the foreground....
Maybe not the best time to do it, but ive also lowered my lighting unit a couple of inches. Additional stems in the background, and the addition of more moss onto branches a few weeks back resulted in a noticable decrease in lighting intensity in the lower parts of the tank. Will monitor that, but the crypts havnt responded badly yet so fingers crossed it was the right thing to do this time.

Anyway, a few photos :) .
I carried out a water change tonight and did a little tidying up of mainly lobelia and foreground moss as well as thinning slightly the tenellus at the right foreground and some of the moss branches....subtle trimmings but needed to be done.
Before:
feb20122098.jpg


After:
feb20122101.jpg


Id like to fill the gap at the very left rear with PP 'cuba' also, theres some in there, but will have to see if it takes off....then i could maybe practice some trimming techniques....albeit very slowly as nothing happens fast in here :arghh:
I think i need to try a stem tank really, just to see if i can grow them....trouble is a want a go at a proper iwagumi too!.... enough of that talk..... i need to finish this one first :eek:

Anyway, my two boys take an interest in both tanks and its nice to see them peeking...and getting along....

feb20122097.jpg


And a few more just because i never know when to stop with the photos:

feb20122103.jpg


feb20122104.jpg


Cheerio,
Ady.
 
This looks excellent for a non plant scape!

Great layout again, are you entering this into the iaplac?
 
This looks excellent for a non plant scape!

Great layout again, are you entering this into the iaplac?
Ha, yeah i know....what was i thinking??!! :rolleyes:
All being well this will be this years entry into IAPLC.....i couldnt grow another one fast enough even if i wanted too :p ......Id need some of the Holdich, 'finished scape in a day', magic :D
Cheerio.
 
great pictures again mate looking very healthy and love that tank maybe in future ;)

Dean
 
Hi Ady,

Lovely aquascape and smashing plants, and I really like the in-situ shot with your lads. Top notch commentary too, as we all know and love from you. :)

If I may be so bold as to offer a suggestion with regards the layout...

The background planting looks a bit chaotic currently. Nothing wrong with that, but your foreground and midground have a more purposeful design. This causes a slight imbalance in the overall aquascape.

You may already have plans for evolving the background, but if it were me I'd consider a nice curtain of Vallisneria nana or 'Tiger' running the length.

I think this would suit the current layout very well and provide more balance, with just the right amount of harmony and contrast with your current foreground and midground planting.

I hope this provides some food for thought mate. Regardless, it's a great planted tank and lovely aquascape - testament to its creator's skills.

Cheers,
George
 
great pictures again mate looking very healthy and love that tank maybe in future ;)

Dean
Thanks again Dean. Sales must have been poor for the studio tanks as they were discontinued quite quickly.....probably due to relitively high prices....maybe if I hang on to it it will become a collectors item! Lol

Lovely tank Ady. Plants look super healthy.
Thank you, I want them healthier :)


Hi Ady,

Lovely aquascape and smashing plants, and I really like the in-situ shot with your lads. Top notch commentary too, as we all know and love from you. :)

If I may be so bold as to offer a suggestion with regards the layout...

The background planting looks a bit chaotic currently. Nothing wrong with that, but your foreground and midground have a more purposeful design. This causes a slight imbalance in the overall aquascape.

You may already have plans for evolving the background, but if it were me I'd consider a nice curtain of Vallisneria nana or 'Tiger' running the length.

I think this would suit the current layout very well and provide more balance, with just the right amount of harmony and contrast with your current foreground and midground planting.

I hope this provides some food for thought mate. Regardless, it's a great planted tank and lovely aquascape - testament to its creator's skills.

Cheers,
George
Hi George, your comments are always very much appreciated :)
The background has been somewhat of a bug bear for me, I never really knew what I wanted from it to be honest. Because the tank was set up as a hard scape only tank, I never had a vision of what I wanted plant wise so it's kind of evolved much like you say, with a plan for the foreground, but I was always aware something was needed for the background. I fancied trying some stems so stuck some in that I thought would work with the colour schemes, and although they do look a little at odds now, I was hoping to sculpt them more, especially the pp Cuba at the left to more follow the lines created from the lobelia cardinalis at the left foreground. Because the alternathera rosefolia mini has never really thrived in the centre (too little flow and light) my plan has been to increase the plant mass of ludwigia to fill the central space in a height graded effect again to match more closely the slightly regimented lines of the foreground......however this could well take an eternity to achieve with my current growth rates, hence my keenness to increase the lighting intensity to get things moving a little.
I do have some vallis nana at the right rear which you can probably see, and your right this works well with the overall balance of the hardscape, the tennellus and mini hair grass, and gives height.....again though its slow. I have taken a cutting and added it to the left rear to balance the sides, but at the moment it's no more than a couple of blades and needs a while to fill in. I remember your 'harlequins haven' scape with the Vallis wall and your right, something like that would work well in this tank so watch this space :)
My problem really is that I want to try more plants, whilst also having a balanced aquascape and not rescaping every 5minutes....which I'd love to do, but can't afford! lol I never really had a tank just to try and grow plants and see what worked and what didnt so im kind of practicing within my tank all the time....just not with a huge variety of plants....and I still want to do other types of scape too.....if only the mrs would allow me another tank!
Sorry to go on, definitely appreciate your experienced input, I think the Vallis would be an excellent idea, simple and effective and fitting.....but I'm gonna try these stems out for a while and see how they look. Because its quite a slow tank it gives me the option to run it for longer if I want, which means I can change things around at a later date if it doesn't work out .....all whilst waiting for my vallis nana colony to increase sufficiently ;)
Cheerio,
Ady
 
....oh, and i think that crypt wendttii brown or tropica may be a better alternative to the bright green echinodorus aquartica currently in the very left midground too....im loathed to pull anything that grows out though :lol:
 
I noticed they didn't have them at sealers anymore must be discontinued like u say , shame as lovely tanks I think and very modern looking , I do agree they were pricey , the Roma 200 is only 300-400 pounds I should have got a bigger tank for my first but always get one in future

Dean
 
All being well this will be this years entry into IAPLC.....i couldnt grow another one fast enough even if i wanted too :p ......Id need some of the Holdich, 'finished scape in a day', magic :D
Cheerio.

:lol: Don't we all.

Looking seriously good. I think cyperus helferi would look nice as a background. Something a bit different to Vallis.
 
Nice one Ady you've done it again.

How do you and George always find such interesting pieces of wood, is it just a gamble or do you seek it out?

I plan to give a wood scape a go in my 200 once I upgrade the lighting, but thats gonna wait till my current project matures.
 
:lol: Don't we all.

Looking seriously good. I think cyperus helferi would look nice as a background. Something a bit different to Vallis.
Cheers Dan, its funny you should mention Cyperus Halferi, one of my old favourite tanks, which ive mentioned before, was one by an aquascaper called Hunor Orban, titled "forgotten Grove" which used cyperus halferi in much the same way as George suggested, and has used vallis. In fact looking at it, this scape may well have subliminally inspired mine:

aquascape-224-front-8.jpg


Incidentally for those of you who havnt seen Georges "Harlequins Haven" scape, with the vallis 'tiger' curtain, this is what i was talking about:

120cmHarlequinsHaven.jpg


and a link to that journal, although the photos are no longer available:
120cm - Harlequins' Haven | UK Aquatic Plant Society

two truly inspiring aquascapes :wideyed:

Nice one Ady you've done it again.

How do you and George always find such interesting pieces of wood, is it just a gamble or do you seek it out?

I plan to give a wood scape a go in my 200 once I upgrade the lighting, but thats gonna wait till my current project matures.
Ha, well funnily enough the wood im using in this scape used to be Georges......i was lucky enough to buy it as a job lot from him some time ago, i think he may have hand picked the pieces himself so i cant take credit for choosing any of it, its all Mr. Farmers good work :D Sounds good about the Roma, wood is always interesting but I do like the simplicity of your current black lava rock scape, it will look lovely when grown in :) ...i suppose that's the beauty of having multiple tanks, you can now do different scapes simultaneously ;)
Cheerio,
Ady.
 
Cheers Dan, its funny you should mention Cyperus Halferi, one of my old favourite tanks, which ive mentioned before, was one by an aquascaper called Hunor Orban, titled "forgotten Grove" which used cyperus halferi in much the same way as George suggested, and has used vallis. In fact looking at it, this scape may well have subliminally inspired mine: [/quote]

:eek: Must have that tank... This reminds me of Victor Lantos' 'Private Island'

I remember seeing 'Harlequins Haven' maybe in PFK? Also very inspirational. All these amazing tanks are making me itch to rescape. :confused:
 
Ha, well funnily enough the wood im using in this scape used to be Georges......i was lucky enough to buy it as a job lot from him some time ago, i think he may have hand picked the pieces himself so i cant take credit for choosing any of it, its all Mr. Farmers good work :D Sounds good about the Roma, wood is always interesting but I do like the simplicity of your current black lava rock scape, it will look lovely when grown in :) ...i suppose that's the beauty of having multiple tanks, you can now do different scapes simultaneously ;)
Cheerio,
Ady.

That's probably where I made the connection between you and George. Seen loads of his 'scapes, must have recognised it subconsciously or something, lol.

Yeah I'm looking forward to getting the Roma going, but still got alot of working out to do, I won't be doing EI on a 200Ltr tank tho because it's in an awkward position and then theres the lighting to sort etc, but it will happen.

Simplicity is exactly what I was aiming for in the beginning with a view to improving it over time, the Dutch aspect is going to come into play when the tank is more mature, doing it this way as less can go wrong while i'm finding "the balance" and learning about the plants etc.

Still want your Nano tank tho, haha

Will be keeping a close eye on this one as I want something similar for my 200.
 
I won't be doing EI on a 200Ltr tank tho because it's in an awkward position and then theres the lighting to sort etc, but it will happen
it may be glaringly obvious, but i just cant quite make out what this means exactly? the EI bit is confusing me......you dont mean Estimative Index here do you?.....is it a typo or abbreviation for something else....or am i being dumb :banghead:
 
Back
Top