Getting back in the saddle!

[johnski]

Well, it's been a while, but I seem to have regained the urge to plant my tank up again. After running a 40gal "high tech" with T5's, pressurized CO2 and the likes many years back for about a year or so, I eventually gave it up due to an ongoing battle with algae and finding the time to commit to it.

The tank went in the shed, the lights, canister filter, CO2 and other bits all went on ebay and I downgraded to a small tank and gave away a chunk of my livestock and plants. I kept a small amount of plants which are somehow still alive to this day, some 4? years later. Even some of the fish themselves are around 6-7 years old, but are slowly dying off due to what I guess is old age.

So, my plan now is to run a low cost DIY CO2 setup in my smaller tank and pray that all goes well. I have lost all memory of plant names, types, etc, so hopefully you all could suggest some easy going plants for me.

What I'm running with now (pic below) is just a really basic 12gal(UK) setup consisting of a cheap internal filter, a few Iwagumi? rocks, an 18w bulb with reflector, eco-complete substrate which I assume has 0 nutrients left it in at its age, and a lump of bog wood. I unfortunately had to throw away my Redmoor wood as it started to rot.

Really nothing special, but hopefully with your guidance I can turn it into something half decent.

Obviously I need a fair few plants to fill out the tank as its so bare, so if you could recommend me some good, hardy background plants, and some nice mid ground and foreground that would be good for my setup, I'd really appreciate it. I quite like the "jungle" style tanks, but with a relatively open foreground. Also open to suggestions/constructive criticism on layout and pretty much everything.

Anyway, this has ended up way longer than I expected, so Ill cut it here and save you all the boredom of reading even more my drivel lol.

Thanks for taking the time to read, and I will keep updated with my progress.

 

[faizal]

Hi johnski. Welcome back into the hobby. The tank is looking very nice.
Your plant is looking healthy too despite the low maintanence factor. If you don't mind me suggesting,...if time is an issue I woudn't go down the pressurized or diy co2 route. You could still make your tank look really nice, with no co2 at all.

Your maintanence of a non co2 tank would probably be something like this:

1. Daily topping off evaporated water.
2. Just once a week dosing of a couple of nutrients.
3. removal of any dead or dying leaves during the initial phase of your tank (2-3 months) when your plants are settling in.
4. If you wish,...you could do about just 20% water change once a week during lights out period as a weekend activity with the tank,...this is not necessary too. I would suugest doing this weekly small water changes as you can do a light substarte level vacuuming while performing the water changes. ( This means just wave your hand a few inches away from the substarte taking care not to disturb the soil so that the debris come floating up and then hold the phython a few inches away from the substrate to remove these "flying " debris.
5. Keep the fish load low

Here's my humble opinion:
- From what i've read ( i haven't any experience in diy co2 ),...diy co2 can result in fluctuations of co2 concentration in the tank,...this can result in problems. Since you are coming back into the hobby after 4 yrs due to initial time constraints & loss of interest due to the battle with algae,...non co2 might be a nice re-start point.

- Plants that do well in a non co2 setup are:

mini java fern, egeria densa, Vallisnaria nana ( bunched together & planted), all sorts of anubias ( i think anubias lanceolata and anubias petite nana would suit your 12 gallon better) ,..windelov ferns tied to drift wood (these windelov ferns even come in mini windelov fern variety which I think would look good in a 12 gallon tank),..cryptocoryne balansae, cryptocoryne tropica, cryptocoryne wendtii brown ,...well most crypts actually. Oh yeah and Nymphae Rubra mate,...it's really tough to kill . Nice red coloured plant

My experience is extremely limited but these plants are truly hard to kill and would really do nicely in a non co2 tank.


You might also want to put throw in some floating plants like lemna minor or limnobium laevigatum to cover about 20-25% of your water surface.

Stems usually haven't fared well for me but of these I think ceratopteris thalictroides , hygrophila polysperma, hygrophila difformis are worth a try.

There's a guy who sells strictly non co2 plants in the states. he's got a very good number of subscribers on you tube. Just check out dustinfishtanks on youtube and you might be able to order some plants. He claims to grow all his plants in non co2 tanks.

Weekly fertilizing regime that Tom Barr suggests for a non co2 tank is :
1/4 teaspoon of Seachem Equilibrium
1/8th teaspoon of Potassium Nitrate dry powder
1/32th teaspoon of MonoPotassium Phosphate dry powder
______________________________________________________________
I would add about 1ml of Seachem flourish comprehensive once a week to the above regime.

***So you dose as per above regime for 3 weeks straight & then you can leave it for a week (i.e. Not dose on the 4th week) and then continue the 3 straight weekly dosing again.

Important note: Please don't dose the macronutrients (i.e. the dry powders ) on the same day as your micronurtients (Equilibrium & seachem flourish comprehensive) ,...err,...something about these two forming insoluble crystals that your plants cant use if dosed together. I am sure the more experienced members could explain it better.

 

[johnski]

*snip*

Really appreciate the reply.

Time isn't an issue for me now, and no CO2 does seem tempting, especially with the possible fluctuating of the DIY CO2, but planting up without CO2 just feels kind of underwhelming. I will be dosing with TPN, or EI if I can actually find my bags...

Thanks for the list of plants also. This is what I've ordered so far

Background:
Hygrophillia Difformis x5
Heteranthera Zosterfolia x10
Rotala Rotundefolia x10

Mid/Foreground
Cryptocoryne Beckettii x5
Cryptocoryne Lucens x5
Microsorium Pteropus Windelov x5

 

[johnski]

Quick update. 5/6/12 [All pictures taken with an old Nokia, so apologies for the crap quality]

I started by removing the top rim, which was much easier than I expected. The hardest part was getting rid of the leftover silicone on the glass, and rubbing down the rough edges with some wet&dry. I decided to leave the bottom rim on as I'm just not that brave.

Voila

I got out the hammer & chisel and split up my bog wood into 3 bits, as it was pretty much just one big stump. I still don't really like the wood, but it's all I have to work with. I would try and use some I found myself, but I have visions of me poisoning my fish.

Being on a tight budget, I decided to go with the Tesco cat litter over the top of my existing. My thoughts on it.. I wouldn't buy it again I don't think. I washed, and washed, and washed, and washed, and washed, and washed it and the water would just not run clear. I finally just thought "f- it" and stuck it in the tank. Also, It's really light and keeping a few of the plants in has been a bit of a pain. Don't think I'd dare even try any carpet plant.

Mixin it up. Ignore the strange green colour from the crappy cam

Decided I'd go with liquid carbon instead of the DIY/Yeast mix after all. Just waiting on my order being delivered.
The plants turned up a few days back and for the most part seem to be doing ok with EI dosing and no CO2 at the moment. There are a few with deficiencies (pin holes) however, but some of them didn't turn up lookin' the picture of health anyway to be fair.

Doing "ok" but don't think it's going to keep its deep pink colour long

I did a few rough layouts and eventually just settled on what I have now. Still nothing amazing, or even close to the word, but its a good starting block for getting back into it. Because of the rubbish phone cam, I couldn't really get a decent FTS at all. This is the best I could do.

Really want rid of the internal filters

Since the rim is removed, I'm after a cheap external filter to replace the 2 internals I'm currently running, so recommendations would be really appreciated. Once I have an external, I plan on getting some vallis in the left corner where the current internal is, and letting it grow over the top and down the back towards the heater to fill in that spot, as well as the other plants hopefully filling in, it should be alright.

 

[johnski]

Things aren't going too good at the mo. Having an outbreak of diatoms, Rotala is on its last legs, Crypt deficiencies getting worse by the day, Stargrass not looking healthy, and even my H. Difformis is starting to look a bit worse for wear, which was doing really well.

Hygrophila Difformis growing out of water.

I've upped my carbon to 2ml per day and brushing the algae off often as I can. Also keeping my eye on ebay for an external filter, hopefully an Eheim 2213+

 

[Little-AL]

Done a great job of transforming the tank - just need to aim for stability and allow time for the tank to settle. May be worth adding some decent root tabs to replace the nutrients that are no longer in the soil...

 

[johnski]

Got excited to have a move around this morning knowing that my new Eheim 2213 was coming in the post, so I got playin around with the hardscape until the post came. I split my bog wood up again into more bits, and ended up with this.

 

[johnski]

This will be my last update for now.

Internals out, smaller heater in, plants back in. Got some Anubias barteri var. nana & Microsorum pteropus 'Narrow' from freshwatershrimp, which I've added to either side of the layout. Still a bit cloudy but my rubbish camera makes everything look cloudy anyway lol.

On the left I have Stargrass (Heteranthera zosterifolia) behind the wood which you can't really see, it needs to grow out to match the other side and I will trim it so there is a kind of "valley" in the center between the plants.

 

[tim]

looking very nice will fill in nicely mate