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Steve's Shrimp Pile - Planted

Steve Smith

Member
Joined
19 Jul 2007
Messages
4,412
Location
Wellesbourne, UK.
Hey folks. It's been a long time since I started a scape of any kind. I've not even had a tank set up for 12 months. Life has had other ideas lately.

As it stands I have limited space so I'm setting up a little tank which, most likely, will be a shrimp tank. It's an old clearseal 40x20x20 I have kicking about. I have a bunch of different equipment to choose from to put this together, but here's where I think I'll go.

40x20x20cm tank
9w/11w/13w compact light unit (several to choose from)
Filtration will be either a dennerle internal, an Azoo HOB or maybe an eheim 2213.
Colombo Florabase substrate

Hardscape will be manzanita, gravels and pebbles most likely.

Plants, I'm thinking mosses and Hydrocotyle tripartita (unsure how this will go). I want to create an overgrown look, so I'm not going for a traditional scape I don't think. It will be very simple, with the hydrocotyle occupying the top layer of the tank and probably growing both emersed and immerse. This is similar to a tank I had some years back (with a larger Hydrocotyle) and I want to recreate that overgrown jungle look.

Livestock will be cherries and perhaps a small group of micro rasbora.

This is the old tank that I'm harking back too, only this time I'll plan to do it a bit more controlled and thought out (from 2008):

CRW_4781.jpg


CRW_4748.jpg
 
I remember this tank well, your sparkling gouramies bred in this one.
I will have some Nice Hardscape material this week, as bought a Joblot of hardscaping material. And Still have that Lovely Twisted peice of Manzita from A1Matts scaping day. Oh and I will be looking for some of that Hydro as well, for a floating and trailing plant for my plans.
 
Good to see you back Steve :) All the best with your new scape. You might have a bit of trouble getting water to burn though;)
 
Well, after some discussion and advice, I've decided what it is I want to do. Hardware still all the same. Stocking with lower grade Crystal Red Shrimp (on a budget unfortunately). I'll be using Ebi Gold substrate and Salty Shrimp GH/KH+ along with RO. I will be getting an RO unit next week from a friend as a freebie (as long as I can provide him with water for his marine setup - he's on a water metre :lol:)

Hardscape will be the same, but I might not be going down quite the jungle route. We'll see.
 
So I've been playing around with hardscape, on and off. First I had this:

8673264002_61e0cab38c_c.jpg
IMG_7545 by Casa-Steve, on Flickr

Then I figured that wasn't really what I wanted. And so I'm currently pondering this:

8673263610_4eb03cee9b_c.jpg
IMG_7546 by Casa-Steve, on Flickr

8673262900_444f67515b_c.jpg
IMG_7548 by Casa-Steve, on Flickr

Going for a woody pile look...

The plan is for a big bush of hydrocotyle sp "japan" in a dense carpet around the left, spilling over the rocks and around the wood, and then travelling along the rocks line toward the right. Then mosses on branches and between rocks, along with some coral pelia. Maybe some staurogyne or something small (but possibly looking bigger in this small tank) to the rear and to the right.
 
I say lower grade because they're less expensive but will give me a chance to prove I can keep them with good water conditions before moving onto more expensive grades.

I'm going to have another play around with hardscape tonight. Still not quite what I want. I can't quite pin down what I want to achieve as yet.
 
Just an idea, looking at the first scape, have you thought of banking up a slope of rocks and then having a select few pieces of wood come out through this pile, like an old tree that sent out roots through a stony hill? I think the hydrocotyle creeping through some majestic roots would look very natural IMO
 
Thanks Iain. It's been frustrating! I added some gravel the other evening to try it out and it completely didn't work. I spent hours last night trying to get rid of it although it was a sort of mindless task so it was nice to switch the brain into idle while I picked gravel out. It's still not clear but I don't think I can be bothered to sort it now.

Feeling good to get your hands wet again?!

Not there yet!
 
I spent some time yesterday morning, playing with placement of things and pinned down roughly what I wanted. Today I planted/tied moss etc. Almost worked as a hangover cure :lol: It's turned out OK but annoyingly one piece on Manzi has floated (rookie move!), so I'll have to wait for that to get water logged as it's throwing things off a little. Thankfully it's not wrecked everything, and is only one end that's decided to float.

I'll leave photos for a bit as I hope the wood will sink. I'll let everything settle in and take some photos next weekend I expect.

I'm considering whether to dose this at all. Thinking a small amount of TPN+ and EasyCarbo a couple of times a week.
 
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