# AmazÃ³nia Dream



## William Fetue (22 May 2009)

Hello everyone 

My name is William and I'm from Portugal. 

I have been registered for some time in your forum but had not yet created any topic, encouraged by my friend LondonDragon I put here the step by step for my aquarium.
Is was setup at 3rd February 2009

Setup

*Aquarium and furniture:*
Aquarium Natural AquÃ¡rio 180 x 62.5 x 62.5 cm, 703l 
Cabinet Natural AquÃ¡rio    180 x 90 x 62.5 cm, glossy black

*Filtration:*
2 x Eheim 2180 Thermo 

*Lighting:*
2 x 150w HQI + 4 x 54w T5 + 3 x Moonlight

*Technical equipment:*
2kg co2 bottle with external Aquamedic 1000 on the output of the filter. 
UV DeBary 15W 
Gembird Silver Shield usb timer


*Substrate:*
Natural Aqua Soil Bottom 
ADA AmazÃ³nia
Basalt gravel
White sand
Vulcanic gravel

*Fauna:*

Tetra cardinal x 100
SAES x 5
Macrobrachium Jelskii x 20

*Flora:*
Anubias Barteri Nana x 10 
Anubias Barteri Var. Coffefolia x 10 
Bolbitis heudelotii - 10 
Juncus Repens - 10 
Microsorium Pteropus Narrow x 15 
Cryptocoryne Balansae x 10 
Blixa JapÃ³nica x 20 
Blixa Auberti x 1
Cyperus Helferi x 10

*Hardscape:*
160kg basalt stone
10kg de Red Moor Wood



*Photos:*

Aquarium and cabinet arrived in October 2008.














The lumminaire









The stack of material





Testing the aquarium and the filtration





The holes for the sump if I would want to use in a future






The two Eheim 2180 Thermo





The Aquamedic 1000 CO2 external reactor





This with the De Bary UV





The Lilly Pipes









Now the layout step by step

157kg of basalt stone




The gravel









Placing the Red Moor Wood





Ada AmazÃ³nia 









White sand





Some basalt gravel





















Filling it with water




The plant box









































Final result





All the layout is from my friend Filipe Oliveira (FAOO)

After 24h





After 3 days
















After 2 weeks



[youtube]3Y2ggYnBmao[/youtube]

After 1 month with 3 Altuns Orinoco




















































3 months later












The altuns where swapped out and I change the white sand for Ada AmazÃ³nia 

I also planted some Utricularia graminifolia

Chears

William


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## Mark Evans (22 May 2009)

nice looking tank.

 wise choice removing the sand, unless you have barriers to stop them mixing  it's a nightmare to keep tidy


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## LondonDragon (22 May 2009)

With a little bit of persuazion we got there in the end hehehe has I told your William the setup is amazing both in terms of equipment and also the final scape, I love this tank and thanks for posting it here too.

Looking forward to that carpet filling in and for you to get some nice looking fish for this layout. Great work and good luck 

Abraco
Paulo


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## Garuf (22 May 2009)

I can second that, I loved the look of the sand but it was hellish to keep clean and tidy.
Brilliant tank, I wish I had the funds to do one as big!


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## Nick16 (22 May 2009)

saintly said:
			
		

> nice looking tank.
> 
> wise choice removing the sand, unless you have barriers to stop them mixing  it's a nightmare to keep tidy


yeah tell me about it.   

i love the journal, lots of pictures and a detailed setup. love it, aquarium looks stunning. Has ADA written all over it.


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## marwil (22 May 2009)

Gorgeous


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## Stu Worrall (22 May 2009)

thats one nice tank and setup, love how the plants on the redmoor creep over.

I noticed that youve taken the lily pipes out on the last pictures, did you have problems with them?


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## John Starkey (22 May 2009)

hi William,welcome to Ukaps I love the style of your layout it's well suited to such a large setup,I like the wood braking the surface very natural.
Thanks for shareing it with us
Regards john


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## rawr (22 May 2009)

I'm sure I don't need to say again, but I will anyway :loL: this is an amazing tank. Thanks for providing the detailed step-by step with images, it was a great read.


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## samc (22 May 2009)

awsome tank mate bet it felt an age until you got it done 

its looking really natural now i just bought one from natural aquario it should be here any day  8)


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## JamesM (22 May 2009)

Simply stunning


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## Goodygumdrops (22 May 2009)

Wow,very,very nice,(not just what's inside it),tank and stand are pretty nice,have to check this natural aquario out.
The angels are stunning.


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## Dave Spencer (22 May 2009)

It`s a first class tank in every respect, William. Portugal seems to have quite a lot of aquascapers. Is it a popular hobby over there?

dave.


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## dsandson (22 May 2009)

I have to join in with the chorus of applause and say its truely amazing! Well done. It really must've have been a nightmare to plant and tie on all those plants... lucky it was a labour of love I'm sure.

i really loved the sand, but I guess thats just personal preference. Really gave the front of the tank a dash of light. Loved the Atlums too, but they made the tank look small... quite an acheivement. Is that the reason you took them out?

Dave


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## LondonDragon (22 May 2009)

Dave Spencer said:
			
		

> It`s a first class tank in every respect, William. Portugal seems to have quite a lot of aquascapers. Is it a popular hobby over there?
> dave.


Very popular indeed Dave and plenty of good scapes from that side, there is a portuguese forum that its up to its 6th Anniversary soon that has about 35,000 members and there are always about 1000 online at the same time. Mr Amano has been a guest at one of their parties and so has Mr Barr last year 
Their 6th anniversary might coincide with my visit to Portugal later this year so I might just visit it also.


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## TDI-line (22 May 2009)

Brilliant design and overall simply stunning.

I personally think those rocks are lovely.


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## Dave Spencer (22 May 2009)

LondonDragon said:
			
		

> Their 6th anniversary might coincide with my visit to Portugal later this year so I might just visit it also.



Does your missus know about this amazing coincidence, Paulo?

Dave.


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## LondonDragon (22 May 2009)

Dave Spencer said:
			
		

> Does your missus know about this amazing coincidence, Paulo?
> Dave.


I will be taking her along with me


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## William Fetue (23 May 2009)

saintly said:
			
		

> nice looking tank.
> wise choice removing the sand, unless you have barriers to stop them mixing  it's a nightmare to keep tidy



Yes that was one of the main reasons



			
				LondonDragon said:
			
		

> Looking forward to that carpet filling in and for you to get some nice looking fish for this layout. Great work and good



Hi Paulo!
I can hardly wait for the carpet close too, as the fish I am waiting for some discus 



			
				stuworrall said:
			
		

> I noticed that youve taken the lily pipes out on the last pictures, did you have problems with them?



I've taked the lily pipes out because I could not get a good water circulation in all the aquarium, the lily pipes can be beautiful but in practice they do not work 



			
				samc said:
			
		

> awsome tank mate bet it felt an age until you got it done
> its looking really natural now i just bought one from natural aquario it should be here any day  8)



Looking forward to see your aquarium! Natural AquÃ¡rio seels great material in a great price! 




			
				Dave Spencer said:
			
		

> It`s a first class tank in every respect, William. Portugal seems to have quite a lot of aquascapers. Is it a popular hobby over there?
> dave.



Hi Dave,

Yes in Portugal we have some good aquascapers, one of them is FAAO, a major source of inspiration and also a good friend .
The aquariofilia.net is online for 6 years now; we have almost 35.000 users registered



			
				dsandson said:
			
		

> I have to join in with the chorus of applause and say its truely amazing! Well done. It really must've have been a nightmare to plant and tie on all those plants... lucky it was a labour of love I'm sure.
> i really loved the sand, but I guess thats just personal preference. Really gave the front of the tank a dash of light. Loved the Atlums too, but they made the tank look small... quite an acheivement. Is that the reason you took them out?
> Dave



Hi Dave, yes plant and tie the plants took a few hours,
I tooked the altuns out because could not buy some more, theyâ€™re sold out, so I preferred selling these 3.

Thank you all for the complements


Regards


William


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## bazz (26 May 2009)

simply stunning!!!


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## Steve Smith (26 May 2009)

It's an amazing setup, and a beautiful scape William.  I'm sure it's very nice to come home to and just gaze at


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## sari (9 Jun 2009)

Wow!


This is one beautiful tank! Looking forward to seeing the discus in there with the cardinals. Are you going for one of the  wild strains?


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## LondonDragon (9 Jun 2009)

Any updates William??? And btw Happy Birthday


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## nry (9 Jun 2009)

Simple but very very effective!  I'd love a tank that size, I always loved angel fish


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## samc (9 Jun 2009)

id like to see some updates on this one too


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## JohnC (10 Jun 2009)

wow.

amazing tank. 

best regards,
john


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## aaronnorth (10 Jun 2009)

Excellent tank, i am glad you decided to post a journal  
It could've been a great imwagumi too as your rock positioning was amazing!
Thanks.


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## Enano_1 (9 Dec 2017)

Thanks for sharing your Step by Step 

Very beautiful aquascape and the Altum Orinoco angel fishes are impressive

Obrigado 

Aarón from Toledo


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## Costa (10 Dec 2017)

Amazing tank!


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