planted's planted tank

[Planted]

my last planted tank left now, was running 5 planted tanks at one stage but got sick of the hard work maintaining them. now have mainly eartheaters, much easier to maintain and very addictive

tank is 4ft low light "only 2 x 40w T8 tubes"

2 x sponge filters as filtration, no Co2, only minimal ferts.

by weekly water change and bugger all maintenance.

been setup for about a year now.

fish are approx 20 chilli red rasbora

lots of crystal red shrimp and cherry shrimp...

[bbish84]

thats amazing very nice

[Planted]

thanks bbish84

[Ged]

Great setup Planted

What plants have you got in the tank and what substrate are you using?

[Planted]

Thanks Ged.

plants are :

narrow leaf java fern, Philippine java fern, crested java fern, lots of Bolbitus,

anubias nana, some long leaf anubias, flame moss, peacock moss and weeping moss, Subwassertang,

Blyxa Auberti, Cyperus Helferi,

Substrate is :

1st layer is 3-4yr old washed redsea flora base, then a thin layer of laterite then a layer of course black pebble, then topped with fine black gravel.

[CThompson]

Your shrimps must love it I do - great job A pleasure to look at.

[glo]

planted,

absolutely great looking tank! I am trying to achieve something similar with my 4ft low tech planted tank.

can you tell me what type/brand of T8 bulbs you are using (and where you source these) and let me know what your fertlizing/water conditioning regime is. for example, i have recently found that my plant growth improved with less water changes (higher nitrates) and by adding epsom salt and bicarb soda to increase my KH / GH in addition to the fertilizing i was doing with pmdd, excel every 2nd day etc.

also, can you let me know how you keep the surface water clean. i have many more fish in my tank than you do and i develop a thin film of algae unless i have my surface skimmer working. i estimate i turn over my tank 3 times an hour.

thanks

[Planted]

thx CThompson.

the shrimp breed well so i guess they are happy

Hi Glo

i use Sera T8 plant tubes. 1 x sera plant and 1 x sera daylight 40w

i get them from my lfs "Aggies" but i'm sure any good lfs can source them for you.

i only do a water chance once every two weeks in this tank and very minimal ferts, the only fert i use is a micro mix called "Podron trace mix" from simplegrow hydroponics Sydney. but i don't add very often, maybe once or twice "approx 10ml of the mix i make which is 5gms to 500mls of distilled water" in the time between water changes.

water is just aged tap water with Geo liquid added and prime.

not sure about the film on the top, but i only run 2 x sponge filters using a large 4 outlet sera airpump in this tank and find the surface bubbles clear any floating scum on the top of the water.

hth any other question just sing out.

Cheers

Rob...

[CThompson]

planted,

absolutely great looking tank! I am trying to achieve something similar with my 4ft low tech planted tank.

can you tell me what type/brand of T8 bulbs you are using (and where you source these) and let me know what your fertlizing/water conditioning regime is. for example, i have recently found that my plant growth improved with less water changes (higher nitrates) and by adding epsom salt and bicarb soda to increase my KH / GH in addition to the fertilizing i was doing with pmdd, excel every 2nd day etc.

also, can you let me know how you keep the surface water clean. i have many more fish in my tank than you do and i develop a thin film of algae unless i have my surface skimmer working. i estimate i turn over my tank 3 times an hour.

thanks

Eheim have a gadget designed to be a canister filter entrance, which skims the surface (Surface Suction Extractor). Using this will keep your water's surface sparkling and there will be no reason to turn it off.

Not sure if this is the same "skimmer" you are talking about but assume it is different as you turn it off.

[CThompson]

i use Sera T8 plant tubes. 1 x sera plant and 1 x sera daylight 40w

i get them from my lfs "Aggies" but i'm sure any good lfs can source them for you.

You'll probably find that the NEC Tri-phosphor Fluorescents will do as good a job if not better, cost a fraction of the price and last twice as long.

http://www.nelt.co.jp/english/products/fltfd/index.html

Craig

[Planted]

i like the mix of the daylight and plant tubes as it really brings out the colour in the fish and plants where the NEC Tri-phosphor didn't give as good colour when i tried them "especially the fish"

[CThompson]

i like the mix of the daylight and plant tubes as it really brings out the colour in the fish and plants where the NEC Tri-phosphor didn't give as good colour when i tried them "especially the fish"

So you tried them. I find your comments interesting as they differ so much from my experince. I guess it's a subjective call. You had fish in that great tank? I only saw a mess (what do you call a group of shrimps?) of CRS.

If you look at the NEC spectrum, there is a huge spike in green, which is where the plants get their green colour, as I'm sure you know. I don't see how this spike can't make plants look good. With the spike in red (which will help the colour of red plants) and blue the plants have what they need to grow proportionally correct as well. Then there's the tubes cost and longevity which are far better than aquarium tubes produced for the aquarium industry.

I use these tubes on all my tanks as I think the colour they produce is great, and the fish look good too, and it's interesting to me that you don't agree (which is fine)

Craig

EDIT - I just saw that you wrote that there are 20 chilli red rasbora in the tank. If they are "red" the red spike in the NEC tube should really bring out this characteristic.