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'A Twist of Nature'

Gary Nelson

Member
Joined
20 Jan 2011
Messages
1,292
Location
Leicestershire
As some of you read on my last journal 'Eruption' That has now been closed to make way for this scape 'A Twist of Nature'
Hard-scape was set-up 2 weeks ago, flooding and planting completed over the weekend along with some equipment changes and a few extra modifications.

It consists of the below....

TMC signature 600x450x450
Maxspect Razor Lighting
ADA Amazonia Soil
Manzanita wood
Seiryu Stone
Eheim 350T
Injected Co2 via the classic in tank ceramic diffuser

Plants:

Tropica 1-2 Grow Herianthus callitichoides 'Cuba'
Tropica 1-2 Grow Eleocharis sp 'Mini'
Tropica 1-2 Grow Ammania sp 'Bonsai'
Hemianthus micranthemoides
Vesicularia dubyana 'Christmas'
Fontinalis antipyretica 'Willow'
Hygrophila pinnatifida
Bucephanandra "Melawi"

Photos to follow very soon:thumbup:
 
Here we go then, a few photos - All clean and ready to go!

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IMG_0055 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

I decided that I would run the inlet and outlet at the side of this tank this time as opposed to the back - this meant obviously cutting some sort of hole in the unit. Again I wanted this to look as neat as possible, as if it had came from the manufacturers this way and also a hole big enough to put hoses though without struggling. I opted for a 80mm hole, finished off with a grey desk hole tidy and lightly siliconed in place. After a couple of hours work I am pleased with the end result.

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IMG_0056 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

I have found with the Maxspect Razor that it gave off a much better light with the unit raised a bit more from the standard brackets supplied, so I had a simple 'NA style' bracket fabricated to suspend the light from - It now sits about 12" from the water surface... it looks better, but I guess time will tell via the plants.

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IMG_0057 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

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IMG_0058 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

This lump of Manzanita is about 5 bits put together, I was lucky that they pretty much slotted against one another and held firmly.

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IMG_0061 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

Then a bit more wood added with some rock work and Amzonia soil.

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IMG_0063 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

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IMG_0067 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

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IMG_0065 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

Tying some moss on, very fiddly but I am VERY lucky in that my Mrs has more patients than me and is a dab hand with the cotton.

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IMG_0074 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

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IMG_0075 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

And Planted up - I still have a bit more to do this week, but I am not far off now.

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IMG_0078 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr

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IMG_0080 by DigitalDream3, on Flickr
 
Looks great gary, you really do have a great eye, as always I will be following this one :) just one thing though.... dont leave us hanging we all demand more regular updates ;)
 
Looking great!!
Thanks Andy :)

Looks great gary, you really do have a great eye, as always I will be following this one :) just one thing though.... dont leave us hanging we all demand more regular updates ;)

Cheers Mark... I will try my best to keep this one updated, I'm looking forward to seeing this develop as I've nearly always filled my other scapes with larger plants.

Nice wood.. did you get rid of your other tank, or is it in another part of the house?

Thanks Sanj, yes I sold my Juwel Trigon a while back... This ones nice to work and I don't need a foot stool ;)
 
looking good mate lovely rock and wood work been looking forward to this as I will be looking forward to updates ;)

cheers
 
looking good mate lovely rock and wood work been looking forward to this as I will be looking forward to updates ;)

cheers
Thanks Dean :) I'll keep the updates coming.

Love it mate, really well executed again.

Cheers mate, the hard-scape did not seem to take too long this time, it was the planting that seemed to take ages! I started at 10am Saturday and finished at 4pm! I'll never win a competition ;) slow but sure... That my motto :)
 
I have just resized all the photos I uploaded yesterday - on the original size they seemed to be taking forever to load on the page.... unless its my slow broadband... they seem better now anyway.
 
One of the better Signatures I've seen! Looks really good and will look impressive when the plants fill out :)

What are your fish plans?

Thanks Little Al, yes I'm looking forward to when they fill out more - fish wise I am going to adding my Honey Gourami's, Otto's and looking at adding 6 of something small, so ideas welcome :thumbup: I quite like chili rasboras and not had them before.
I plan to not have as many fish as I normally go for in this scape. The rest of the fish I have in my holding tank (mainly green neons) will be re-homed. I am hopping to move some fish over this weekend
 
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