# Unnamed



## sciencefiction (15 Apr 2013)

I know you guys are very helpful and knowledgeable about plants and I am getting no response elsewhere so I thought I'd post a quick summary of my recent disaster.

I setup a 5f(around 100G tank), 2nd hand cheap tank. It's supposed to be low tech, no injected CO2 for sure, not sure about other options depending on how it goes.
I ordered custom made LEDs which were going to take a while and in fact I don't have them yet two months after.
In the mean time I fishless cycled the filters using bottled ammonia, that was finished ages ago, so I just dosed more ammonia whenever I thought of it.
I mineralized 2x25kg bags of topsoil, two different types-B&Q and Homebase versions
I bought Unipac fiji fine sand for a cap.
And I got red clay to mix with the soil at about 10% of the total amount
Also dolomite and potassium chloride for sprinkling the bottom.
The equipment is:
Eheim Professional 2-1000L/H
APS filter-2000 L/H
V2 TMC Sand bed filter with Eheim 1250L/H external powerhead.
At the moment, the outlets are 3 spraybars along the bag covering the entire lenght.

Plants:
Echinodorus Parviflorus
Echinodorus Rosé
Echinodorus gabrielii
Echinodorus cordifolius (E. radicans)
Vallisneria spiralis(straight vallis)
Cryptocoryne wendtii 'Mi Oya'
Cryptocoryne beckettii "Pink"
Hygrophila pinnatifida
Nuphar japonica
Nymphaea lotus var. rubra
Bacopa australis
Aponogeton crispus
Shinnersia rivularis(Mexican Oak Leaf)
Ludwigia palustris x repens (L. mullertii)
Wood:
Taxiphyllum species "Spiky"
Anubias barteri var. barteri
Microsorum pteropus ''Narrow''
Floaters:
Pistia stratiotes(waterlettuce)
Trapa Natans
Salvinia Minima


Because of the huge delay in receiving the lights, I ended up receiving the plant order earlier. It also got stuck in the post and then spent some time in a bucket hoping I'd receive the lights any day, but I didn't.
So I had to use my last option, which was to use a crappy one 36W bulb over the 100G tank for a week until I receive the LEDs this week sometime hopefully.

I setup the tank this Friday. I made a few mistakes along the way, almost forgot to sprinkle the dolomite and potassium. Then it took so long to be putting the soil, washing the sand, that I ended up with plants spread on a bin bag for ages. I did sprinkle water on them but possibly they spent too long out of the water. So I didn't do much aquascaping, just stuck the plants in so I can fill the tank faster. I couldn't even distinguish between the echinodorus species too, because they weren't tagged. They are all different, two small species and two large, so wasn't sure which one at the back, which at the front, so I just spread them around to see once they grow. At the end, when filling up the tank, I forgot to check the tap water temperature, so ended up bringing down the temperature of the tank a lot.
Today, a few days later, my plants are melting a lot, even hard plants like anubias. I think I may lose a few plants. I am not sure whether it was all the problems with the plants, or the light is just not enough to keep them alive for a few more days, as it's only like 0.3W per Gallon.

Here are a few pictures from start to finish.

The tank cycled with the filters only, soaked the wood too.






Mineralizing the soil:















The paw prints of my helper




















About 3/4" of soil





Capped with about 1"(2.5cm), maybe a bit more Unipac fiji fine sand

























And finally I put the crappy temporary 36W light(only one bulb works) and the ugly cover(the tank will be open top, but the cover holds the current light





The bad state of my melting plants:


























As you can see, several plants are completely melting, including the anubias. The others are the the roots and bottoms of the stem plants: Bacopa australis, Ludwiga and the Mexican Oak Leaf. At the moment there are some stems floating because the base near the root melted.
The Red lotus has no leaves anymore, The Nuphar Japonica has melted all the big leaves but has one small one still healthy.
The rest are still hanging on for now, but then I haven't looked today as I don't want to see really.


I measured ammonia and nitrIte, both 0, so even if the soil is releasing ammonia, the filters are clearing that up so not detectable on the test.
The water parameters after the addition of the soil are pretty much the same as my tap and other tanks besides the Gh being 2dGh higher which could be because of the dolomite. The stats are as follows, measured yesterday I think.

Ammonia-0
NitrIte-0
NitrAte-not tested, but 100% water change prior to planting with less than 1ppm nitrAte in tap water(according to the water company)
Gh-14
Kh-8
Ph-7.4
TDS-291ppm(higher than my tap so the soil does leach nutritients into the water column I suppose).

There are no fish in the tank yet.

Is there anything I can do to stop them melt away completely? Is it the shock they experienced prior to planting or possibly the light is too low to keep them alive for a few more days?
I have kind of given up at this stage. I planned for so long, did everything to have all ready on time and not deal with ammonia spikes, but the delay in the LEDs kind of mixed up my plans altogehter.
Thanks for reading.


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## NanoJames (15 Apr 2013)

Maybe they're just settling in? I wouldn't be surprised if they were grown emersed and are acclimatising to submerged life! They may also be concentrating on putting new roots down and once that happens you might see some new, healthy growth!
Cheers


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## Steve Smith (15 Apr 2013)

You could drop the water level to help with the light levels if you're concerned that there's not enough light.  In reality, things are probably melting as they are probably emerse growth.


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## sciencefiction (15 Apr 2013)

I hope you are right James. That crossed my mind too, but I've never seen anubias go like this. I bought all my other anubias from the same place and none melted. They have the leaves from over a year ago when I got some for another tank.


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## sciencefiction (15 Apr 2013)

Ok, I can drop the light level, that's an easy idea. Thanks Steve.


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## sciencefiction (15 Apr 2013)

I just went to drain some water down to the spraybar level, and the surface now is full of bubbles 
What a bugger, I need to try changing the direction of the flow I guess? Point the spraybars further downwards...The plants are so nicely waving the way it is now. I can see even the bottom leaves of each plant(or whatever's left from them) moving 
I just don't want to drive the little CO2 out of the water either.
Does anyone think these plants will last another 2-3 days with this much light?


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## sciencefiction (16 Apr 2013)

I did a tiny bit replanting yesterday. The ludwiga, mexican oak leaf and the bacopa all have melted the bottom of the stems, getting lose and floating.  I cut the bottom of the ludwiga and mexican oak leaf and replanted them. The bacopa is impossible to mess with because it's falling apart totally. If one survives I'll be happy.  The anubias has melted all it's leaves. I left a couple that aren't completely gone.
On a positive note the nuphar japonica has a couple of new leaves growing and I saw new leaves on some of the echinodorus and aponogeton crispus.
The good part is there's 0 mess with the soil at the bottom. I am yet to experience any clouding when replanting. It's almost like it isn't there.


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## sciencefiction (29 Apr 2013)

The plants are still poor, most of the stem plants died but there are a few pieces surviving and growing. I did kill a floating plant, replaced all the anubias as it melted and the  bacopa and ludwiga are questionable. At least I've got the LEDs on and from today they are officially suspended.  I also received my hanging planters today so I'll get a few emmersed plants going to try out. One peace lilly is already in, but just hanging in the water at the moment.

I've got a question about how much light to give the tank. The lights are 45x3W=135W of LEDs. According to the guy that made the lights, compared to normal fluorescent they are 30% stronger, so about 180W light. The tank is 100G. I am not going to inject CO2 and you can see the distance the lights are from the tank at the moment. They are set on 7.5hrs a day.
Should I decrease the light amount? There's still no algae but I ran only two thirds of the lights on 7hrs closer to the water surface(more than halfway down from where they are now) until today.


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## NanoJames (29 Apr 2013)

Are you dosing CO2 at all? If you are I don't think you would need to worry too much about algae. If not then you would probably be fine anyway with the amount. You could always add a few shrimp or catfish if you are worried about anything!


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## sciencefiction (29 Apr 2013)

Thanks NJ.
Nope, no CO2 at all. I am hoping of some sort of Diana Wastad tank effect, hopefully the soil and fish waste will work as intended. I am glad the light isn't too much. I'll know in a week I guess. I need to keep it high too because of the emmersed plants I am going to add.
Corys and shrimp will be the main addition once I get off my lazy bum and transfer them from my other tanks. And I've got ottos and some snails(nerites and red ramshorns) to go in too but I'll wait a while for these to make sure they've got something to eat in there naturally, at least for the zebra ottos.
At the moment there're are just a few platies, and the pond snails that seem to have flown over from my other tanks


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## flygja (30 Apr 2013)

I would suggest to leave it as is and tweak later if necessary. For instance if you start getting high-lighting released algae such as BGA or severe GDA/GSA. The floating plants you have should help to diffuse some of the light intensity too.


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## sciencefiction (30 Apr 2013)

Thanks all. I'll leave the lights this way then.
The floating plants are doing great as they are the only plant I transfered from my own tanks and hasn't suffered a transport/lack of light damage but they have confined themselves to one side only where I've lowered one of the spraybars. I can't decide how much surface movement would be ok. I was thinking at least in the beginning I need enough until the tank is more stable, then start lowering it to preserve the little CO2. It's still just gently waving, nothing much at all.

Some pics of my salvinia minima:


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## sciencefiction (30 Apr 2013)

And another happy plant that went from this:






To this in the space of 8 days and this picture was taken 5-6 days ago so it's even better now.


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## faizal (30 Apr 2013)

Hi & welcome to the forum . They do look like they are perking up now.
Well i think you could always break the water surface with bubbles coming from an airstone (or 2 in the case of your big tank) for about 3-4 hrs when the lights are off. The extra O2 might even  be beneficial for the plants during the lights out period. 

 I would lower the other spraybars a little & add more floating plants to cover up about 50 % or so of the water surface. How long are you running the LEDs for? My previous non co2 tank seemed to tick along nicely with just 3 hrs of photoperiod a day.
This would also be a good time to add more plants. From what i've learned,...in a non co2 tank, it's always better as a beginner to plant heavily from the get go even though your tank is fully cycled. The ones that i found easy were various types of Crypts and anubias. Vallis should work well too. Nymphae rubra is also cool.

 What is the name of that plant in the last pic that you have posted? is it nuphar japonica? If it seems to be doing well,..why not pick up more of those & just start planting more of them around the tank? Later once the tank & plants have truly settled you could remove them as you please & add other varieties that you might want to try out. The problem that i faced with my non co2 tank was not all the plants that i fancied worked for me.. Lots of people have great success with ferns ,..but mine just bombed. So i think,...the thing to do is stick with easy low light plants & stick in as much varieties of them as possible & see which of them do well in our tank & work from there. Once we know the kinds of plants that work for us (in our non co2 tanks) we can then focus on the aquascaping part of it


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## faizal (30 Apr 2013)

Echinodorus amazonicus is also a nice plant that seems to do well in many non co2 tanks with soil substrate. i never had tremendous success with this but it's worth a try too.


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## sciencefiction (30 Apr 2013)

Thanks Faizal. The lights are on for 7hrs. I was going to increase yesterday to 7.5, but set the timer back.
I actually started the tank with 20 varieties of plants to see what will grow and what not and besides the front part of the tank I actually planted all other areas to the point that they were almost on top of each other and had no place to grow but the plants are so bashed up and melted so much that one can't see it on the pictures. Besides the front of the tank which I was hoping to keep a bit clear, there actually isn't room for other plants. I tried squeezing a bit of hydrophila as fast grower and at the moment it's behind the log in between some echonodoruses, literally squeezed and overshadowing them so I am a bit afraid I'd sacrifice some plants for others if I start putting more.
I've got echinodorus amazonicus planted in my other tanks but I've got several echinodorus species already in this tank so it seemed like too many of them. If they all decide to grow big, I'll have no room for anything else.



> What is the name of that plant in the last pic that you have posted? is it nuphar japonica?


Yes it is. I can't pickup anymore unfortunately because they don't sell them around here and it was a bit expensive to order online.



> The ones that i found easy were various types of Crypts and anubias. Vallis should work well too. Nymphae rubra is also cool.


 
All of these are planted in the tank. Hard to see, I know  The valis is at the back first line half melted. The anubias I purchased melted too and I replaced it with cuttings from my other tanks. The nyphae rubra bulb melted and is refusing to grow.  I've got also several bulbs of aponogeton crispus that seems to be growing after melting completely, but they are still small. And there are two types of crypts spread around the tank, the Mi Oya has melted down to almost nothing and just has some very frail new leaves.

At the moment I am hoping that my well cycled filters will keep the balance right. There's no ammonia or nitrItes at all and no algae so besides the plants, the tank is doing fine and the fish are happy.
I can transfer some plants from my other tanks and plant the front temporary. I really wanted to avoid that as I am sick at looking at the same type of plants. I've got tons of hydrophila, echinodorus amazonicus and dwarf sagittaria but two of these are quite invasive. I've got a lot more of salvinia minima too.
I'll be adding more emmersed house plants in the next week or so too.

I've got 3 low tech tanks with inert substrate that are doing fine with periods from 6-8hrs a day, but the variety of plants are limited to very easy ones.


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## sciencefiction (12 May 2013)

Just a small update. The tank is slowly picking up.
The problem is that I have the plants all over the place and it will need some sort of redoing. Especially that I realized I had the small echonodorus species at the back and the large ones at the front  Next time I'll request the plants to be labelled for fools like me  I managed to move some but have to wait for the rest to figure what I want to do.

At the moment, I am not certain if it's an issue or not but the top leaves of the plants are growing kind of reddish including new leafs on amazon swords I moved just a few days ago. They've got so many red veins on them they look reddish. The hydrophila pinnatifida and corymbosa too, so is the aponogeton crispus green which looks a brown variety at the moment but I ordered the green one. I'll see what happens as it's early to tell, maybe they'll recover the colours.

Here is a video with my corys moved in and having a party:


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## sciencefiction (12 May 2013)

I was also wondering if my red lotus bulb does have any chance of recovering. The leaves fell off and it hasn't grown anything in weeks. I check it from time to time and feels hard on the touch so it isn't rotting yet but maybe I lost it?
My big anubias melted completely including the rhizome and all anubias in the tank now are cuttings from other tanks I have. Also one of the aponogeton crispus bulbs melted the leaves after I moved it a second time,stopped growing and the bulb fell apart literally so it's possible my lotus will follow its fate but I am still hoping as I can't purchase one here.


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## sciencefiction (16 Jun 2013)

Just an update on the tank. It's been a slow progress since planting 3 months ago.
Please ignore the aquascaping as I was more concentrated in making those damaged plants grow, rather than anything else. I haven't had issues with algae thankfully except for a tiny amount of diatoms that appeared at some stage when I transferred too many fish at once. These were cleaned by my ottos, snails and bristlenose pleco pretty quickly.
The tank is a breeze to keep. I've done a few water changes only and have not have to clean the glass or anything. The fish seem happy and my adult sterbai corys are breeding regularly.
It has a long way to go yet, but I am happy that I was able to save and multiply most of the plants. I was nearly left with nothing after the initial mass melting.

This is a picture from the 29th April 2013




And this is from today 16th June 2013, less than two months apart:






And a quick video. It's showing my recently planted glosso bits at the front at some stage, which surprisingly are growing horizontally(no ferts no CO2) I hope they keep it that way


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## sciencefiction (29 Jun 2013)

Some pictures from today below. I have a problem now that the middle plants have grown faster than the background plants. There's vallis at the back, some echinodorus species that are supposed to grow tall, aponogeton crispus(which has flowered by the way),etc..but they are still small where some other plants which I foolishly put in the middle, have grown way too fast and grow too tall. I can of course trim until I see how it looks once the rest grow. Patience 

Anyway, a couple of pics:

The glosso is still growing horizontal but the malaysian trumpet snails have dug up some of it in places:


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## Alastair (30 Jun 2013)

I missed this journal somehow. I love the emmersed planting on either side. Very nice..
I know someone else who is using the round leaved calathea too but new leaves are browning so not sure if it appreciates being submersed like others species.  
Will keep watching this one


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## sciencefiction (30 Jun 2013)

Thanks Al.
The round leaves calathea(forgot its name) is actually growing and has two new leaves and several out of the planter ready to open. The leaves are smaller than the original ones so far but it's seems to have adapted. It's planted only in hydroton pebbles because I think it's like the piece lilies and likes more flow/oxygen around the roots.
It's out of place there but I haven't decided where to put it as it can grow big.


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## sciencefiction (30 Jun 2013)

A closer picture of the the calathea here. The left small leaf and the right shiny one visible on the picture are new ones and there's a few ready to open also visible on the pic:


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## sciencefiction (30 Jun 2013)

And a few pics of the plants from closer veiw:

This corner needs redoing when I get the inspiration for it but it has a couple of large specimens that need time to grow to potential.


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## ~firefly~ (30 Jun 2013)

I'm really enjoying this journal. Very nice, simple set-up. I'm always interested in low-tech set ups like this.

Wagtail platies are so under-rated! They look great.


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## sciencefiction (30 Jun 2013)

Thanks firefly.


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## faizal (3 Jul 2013)

Nice !!! Wow it has really picked up. So happy for you mate. Well done !!!


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## sciencefiction (3 Jul 2013)

Thansk Faizal. It did look like a lost cause in the beginning. I am surprised myself that something came out of it but that soil substrate turned out to be a great thing.


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## oldbloke (3 Jul 2013)

All that panicking and despair, and now look at it!!!

Great job.


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## sciencefiction (3 Jul 2013)

Ha,ha, yes it was frustrating and I was totally ashamed of the tank but I couldn't help it. I am glad now I didn't hide behind the computer and took some pictures of the tank before and after. It serves to say one should have great patience with planted tanks. 

Even the red Nymphaea lotus bulb that I thought was a gonner has just recently decided to grow a couple of leaves, still small but at least it didn't die as I thought. It's strange that it took so many months for it. I presume they have some sort of dormant period.


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## Francis (3 Jul 2013)

nice idea that. very nice


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## faizal (4 Jul 2013)

sciencefiction said:


> Even the red Nymphaea lotus bulb that I thought was a gonner has just recently decided to grow a couple of leaves, still small but at least it didn't die as I thought. It's strange that it took so many months for it. I presume they have some sort of dormant period.


Yeah,...the same thing happened to mine. I had completely forgotten about it when suddenly one day about 2 months later there were many new shoots. Then it just went crazy!!!


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## sciencefiction (5 Aug 2013)

The tank hasn't changed much. I was battling very high temperatures for the last month so the scaping was left until further notice. It seems the more I delay it the more it isn't going to happen. I can't help my lazy bum  I totally dislike some areas, especially the left side but due to the emersed plants overshadowing, the plants below grow slower.
But I've been cutting tons of stem plants which seem to be on steroids and I have been reluctuntly throwing them in the bin, which is a shame. The moss is overgrown and that's a PITA to trim. I tried one time and it flew everywhere. I have to try Tom Barrs approach with the scissors and the hose, but boys, those platies are so nosy they gather all around my scissors and the cories get buzzing around too when they sniff my hands inside the tank for some reason.

Anyway, some pics.

First some emersed plants. The calathea seems to be doing well, but it's grown so many leaves I don't think that small planter will cut it in long term. I had to trim it a bit, left just two of the bigger leaves.






And on the other side the palm, peace lily and forgot the name of the third one to the left. Their roots are finding the way out from the planters and started growing straight in the water a bit, need a trim.










The tank as of today. I should have waited for the stems to bush up again as I trimmed only recently.





And some individual plant pictures I've taken:













And the lotus growing and growing  It's a bit overshadowed there poor thing.


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## ~firefly~ (5 Aug 2013)

Looks superb!


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## tim (5 Aug 2013)

You'll have to rename the journal soon, the comeback or such like certainly isn't a disaster anymore


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## Tim Harrison (5 Aug 2013)

Well done for persevering, you've certainly turned disaster in to success.


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## sciencefiction (5 Aug 2013)

Thanks everyone for the nice comments.
I feel I haven't done much to deserve them 

All I've been doing is playing with the light timer and light distance when I think it's too much/too little light. The light at the moment is on for 9hrs, but the first 2 hours just one strip of light is running which is about 45W of LEDs, then all three come up for another 6.5hrs(135W), then last 30min again just one strip 45W. I've been twisting the spraybars up and down often because of the high summer temperatures to increase oxygen or if water evaporates much without me topping up I twist them down so they don't splash. And of course I've been removing ugly leaves or trimming plants. Despite it being a low tech tank the plants grow quite fast.  I did manage to cloud the water once a bit when pulling out all the hydrophila from behind the wood to replace with other stems and since then I've been just lifting the plants and cutting as low down into the roots as I can without removing them fully from the substrate.

I am still trying to figure out a routine. So far water changes are irregular and mostly depend on evaporation and whether the TDS has risen or not, something like one every 2-3 weeks of about 30-50% depending on what I have time for. I haven't siphoned the tank at all. And I haven't needed to clean the glass or scrub anything. At the early stages there were minor diatoms after I moved in a big group of fish all at once which probably caused a sudden overload but that took care of itself.  I've got a bristlenose pleco in there and I saw him dancing on the glass happily and the diatoms became history in a matter of days. 
I've only cleaned the filters once for the entire period and that I did last week, not because I had a flow drop but just out of curiousity to check how bad they were. The filters have coarse sponges mainly and some bio rings on the bottom and they were almost clean. I have prefilter sponges on all and they've been cleaned every few weeks so I presume that helps. One of the 3 externals is a sand bed filter so it doesn't need any cleaning at all besides the prefilter.
.

I tested at some stage the Gh and Kh and that was stil about the same as my tap, 12 and 8 respectively so the soil I used did not alter any of my tap water stats.  I happened to test the nitrAtes just once when I tested all my tanks and it was just about 5ppm and this was done long after I did the last water change.
I've put oak leaves and alder cones in there for the fish so that's making the water a bit yellow but I like tannins a lot. And I feed the fish daily quite a lot. There's about 40+ fish in there and about 20 cherry/rili shrimp which only got moved in 2-3 weeks ago. They seem to be doing well. I saw some of the females berried and they are now becoming braver and muching happily without hiding as much as in the beginning. They are used of corys because they grew up with them but the platies are a lot more predatory and would eat small ones if they catch them so I don't blame them 

Thanks for reading guys. That's it summed up.


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## sciencefiction (9 Aug 2013)

And just to add the glossostigma pictures I took the other day too. It's still spreading horizontally but very slow and the fish and snails uproot certain portions of it which if I don't replant, just suffer and die.
I figured also that the bacopa australis will grow horizontal if I cut the stem down to the bottom. I am not sure I've got room for it now because it has to grow over the glosso if I let it, but I will just try a small section to see how it goes and think about aesthetics some other time  Here are a couple of pics. My camera is sheer crap so I couldn't get a good quality ones:


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## sciencefiction (10 Aug 2013)

And for those of you that have patience to watch videos, I took a spontaneous one. This is a short clip of my baby fish eating mashed garlic with peas. I call them babies because the one's you'll see below are all generations bred and raised by me. The platies as you can guess are more of a nuisance because they just breed by themselves. The corys in this tank are kids of my initially purchased albino and gold laser corys which decided hybridizing is a greath thing. ...The parents are still at it all the time(in another tank 7 albinos and 6 gold laser corys) But my heart doesn't let them get separated because racism is not one of their flaws and they behave like a real love buch.
However, instead of swapping home bred corys for fish food or extra credit, I ended up having this extra tank for the duration of their life time at my own bloody cost , since hybrids are a no go to sell  I love them to bits though. And no offence but they are really healthy fish.


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## sciencefiction (10 Aug 2013)

And uprooted glosso example:


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## Ady34 (10 Aug 2013)

Tank looking fantastic, and the fish are clearly very happy. I'm hoping to get some corys for my tank, great character 



sciencefiction said:


> And uprooted glosso example:


I can just imagine that cory whistling, fins in pockets whilst slowly meandering away from the scene of the crime 

Cheerio
Ady


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## sciencefiction (10 Aug 2013)

He, he, yes, Ady, I hear whistles all the time. My ears are ringing


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## Ady34 (10 Aug 2013)

Saw some lovely corydoras duplicareus today, locally bred. I'm fancying some of those


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## Spartacus (10 Aug 2013)

Thanks for sharing your experiences with the tank.

I also recommend updating the title - if this is a disaster then... 

Those platies look very happy and the whole tank looks very nice.

Well done - Very happy for you!

Thanks again,

Murray


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## sciencefiction (10 Aug 2013)

Ady34 said:


> Saw some lovely corydoras duplicareus today, locally bred. I'm fancying some of those


 
These are one of my favourites. Beautiful fish and they are one of the species that accept wide temperature variations according to Ian Fuller's articles.



> Thanks for sharing your experiences with the tank.
> 
> I also recommend updating the title - if this is a disaster then...
> 
> ...


 
Thanks Murray. I normally don't name my tanks  but this one truly deserved one 
Yes, the fish, snails and shrimp seem happy which is great. The tank is in the corridor and when I walk out I can see from the side of the tank a bunch of platies running towards me and a bunch of corys running away from me at the same time.  I guess I can't have it all


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## sciencefiction (25 Aug 2013)

I'll just share a couple of pics from today. Not much has happened besides me cutting tons of stems a week ago, mostly behind the the driftwood and behind the amazon swords in the middle but they have almost regrown. I removed some altogether as it gets really crowdy and believe it or not there are a few echinodorus species behind those big bushes of plants. I either need to move them somewhere or they need to grow big. But at least you can also see the vallis at the back now.
 And I also added another 9 corys which were in another tank with my shrimp and were due a move long time. One of my led bulbs got detached the other day but I put it back somehow, I hope it doesn't get overheated and bust due to my limited skills.


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## sciencefiction (25 Aug 2013)

Someone else wanted a video too so I took two short clips just a some minutes ago. Lights are on till 1.30 am which is handy


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## Wallace (25 Aug 2013)

Wow!

I also missed this journal, and have just read it all and watched the videos now. Very impressive. 

This definitely needs a new name, it's certainly no disaster. You did the right thing and stuck with it, and now you can sit back and enjoy the rewards. 

The corys look great, such and active and attractive fish with bags of character. I've recently added 6 Peppered (my favorites) to my 60cm.

Looking forward to future updates.


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## sciencefiction (25 Aug 2013)

Thanks Wallace. I am a cory lover too, one of the best fish around and I can never have enough of them


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## sciencefiction (26 Aug 2013)

And a few of the inhabitants

A cherry shrimp:






Another one, but my shrimp are a cross between red rilis and cherries so some turn out all variations of rilis.





The cory got camera shy 





And another cory





Platies.., it's hard taking a picture without them blocking the view:





And a pair of angry faces because the camera won't feed them 






Mr snail:


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## sciencefiction (8 Jan 2014)

Just popping for an update. The tank was really a disaster because it developed a leak last year. I managed to fix it without tearing the tank down and it's been stable since but I've been running it since with decreased water level and have quite neglected the tank so it got overgrown quite a few times, took out buckets of plants on which I couldn't even see where the roots are from but besides aesthetics, at least it has never had any form of algae at all.


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## darren636 (8 Jan 2014)

Its a very nice tank.  How did you mineralise the soil?


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## sciencefiction (8 Jan 2014)

Thanks Darren.
The soil was soaked for a day, skimming the surface from floating bits, then drained the water then spread it on plastic bin bags to dry, this repeated 4-5 times. I then used a sifter to take the wooden chips and big pieces out and what was left was very fine powder like stuff.


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## darren636 (8 Jan 2014)

sciencefiction said:


> Thanks Darren.
> The soil was soaked for a day, skimming the surface from floating bits, then drained the water then spread it on plastic bin bags to dry, this repeated 4-5 times. I then used a sifter to take the wooden chips and big pieces out and what was left was very fine powder like stuff.


 ah, thought so. Never heard of anyone actually doing this in a journal/ real life.


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## sciencefiction (8 Jan 2014)

It's a daunting task to mineralise it like that but it's well worth the effort, at least in my experience, never any problems with cloudy water or any algae and I think that's because the soil is mineralised. And the plants go crazy in there too with no additional ferts for now.


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## O'Neil (8 Jan 2014)

I have to admit when I started reading the journal I didn't expect to see such an impressive recovery.

I love this tank.


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## Brian Murphy (8 Jan 2014)

Very nice .... I too thought it was doomed when I seen you mention the melting but glad you got it back on track!


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## sciencefiction (9 Jan 2014)

Thanks guys.


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## LondonDragon (26 Jan 2014)

sciencefiction said:


>


 
Looking great, what is this plants name? thanks


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## Alastair (26 Jan 2014)

LondonDragon said:


> Looking great, what is this plants name? thanks


Antherium lily paulo


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## LondonDragon (26 Jan 2014)

Alastair said:


> Antherium lily paulo


 
Many thanks, one more to add to my list for the nanos!


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## sciencefiction (27 Apr 2014)

Started to get superstitious about the previous name of the thread "The Disaster"  so I have renamed it just in case 

What I've been dealing with:
The tank leaked to the point it wouldn't hold water, one of the seams literally opened up, splashing all over the place. I had arranged with the LFS to give them all the fish because I could not afford another tank but I managed to fix the problem in the final moment and it's been stable since last year so hopes are up it will stay this way.
A few months after the V2 TMC sand bed filter leaked half the tank on the floor (developed tiny pin hole at the bottom of the plastic!! and is now binned).
All the lights failed one by one. They were custom made by a fraud member(he was administrator) of another forum. He used super cheap drivers.  I was in a financial hole couldn't replace/repair, tank ran on 1/2 then 1/3 lights, plants suffered massively with lower light, many just melted and disappeared and I couldn't do anything about it. Obviously the anubias and java fern were unaffected but that's about it what's left. The moss suffered too the lack of light, started to grow thin and browned at places.

I was very down about it, neglected the tank and could not look at it for a while. It was doing so well before all this happened...

Positives:
I've never dealt with algae issues in this tank.  Fish lived through and seem fine even though they had to deal with lower water levels for a good while. The tropical plants above the water are doing great and have exploded. I think they saved my fish and the tank balance.

It needs a makeover when I get brave enough to feel confident again.

Well, I can take just one decent picture of healthy anubias:


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## sciencefiction (28 Apr 2014)

Now you can see on the video below what's happened to the tank, there's barely plants surviving but I took it to show you my home bred 40-ish corys getting excited when sat next to the tank thinking it's food time.
The tank is still on just one light strip out of three so redoing it has to wait.


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## Ady34 (28 Apr 2014)

Shame about all the issues, im sure you can get the tank looking great again, and at least youve got those curious little corys to keep you entertained


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## sciencefiction (28 Apr 2014)

Thanks Ady.


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## sciencefiction (1 May 2014)

Today I received a second driver for the LED so 2 strips running now!!! I just need to fix the third strip as soon as I can afford it and I'll be back in business.

The Peace Lilly started flowering too. I'll take a picture when the flowers are fully open. It's a bit obstructed by the light fixture but I can't raise it any higher because the underwater plants will find themselves with almost no light.


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## sciencefiction (1 May 2014)

Just a few pics of the tropical plants further down below.
The antherium lily was flowering up to a week ago. I had to chop it a bit because it has taller stems coming out of the pot and it started tilting, nearly falling forward.
The Peace Lily started flowering now. Wish they both did it at the same time as I would have had cooler pictures 
I potted a spider plant just recently but it's still tiny not worthy of pictures.
These plants are blocking a lot of light and I am afraid even if I fix the third light strip I won't have enough going into the tank below. Many of my plants already died during the no light crisis.  Symptoms were browning, melting and eventually dying or reducing to a stump in the substrate.

This is a list what survived and what not but almost all survivors are just a few dwarfed leaves.
Plants:
Echinodorus Parviflorus- almost unaffected
Echinodorus Rosé- a few thin dwarfed leaves still there
Echinodorus amazonicus- I had 3 massive ones, they melted almost completely but are still hanging on to live with a few leaves on.
Echinodorus gabrielii- not sure it's there. There's a stump of something that looks like sword but no leaves
Echinodorus cordifolius (E. radicans)- same as the previous, might be there but no leaves
Vallisneria spiralis(straight vallis)- most of it melted and died. I had lots overtaking the tank and some is hanging in there although in extremely bad shape.
Cryptocoryne beckettii "Pink"- suffered a few yellow leaves and stopped growing but it's almost fine.
Hygrophila pinnatifida-
Nuphar japonica-
Nymphaea lotus var. rubra-
Bacopa australis(a couple of extremely suffering stems left maybe but I have it in another tank)
Aponogeton crispus-(one bulb with a couple of leaves still living but in extremely bad shape melting all the time, this one needs a lot of light to grow nice and big leaves as I noticed even before because I had two bulbs, the shaded one never did well)
Aponogeton 2nd type (can't remember it's name but it's the one with very narrow hard leaves that no fish can eat) living with a couple of leaves
Shinnersia rivularis(Mexican Oak Leaf)-
Ludwigia palustris x repens (L. mullertii) one stem left!
Taxiphyllum species "Spiky"-living but suffered a lot
Anubias barteri var. barteri-living unaffected
Microsorum pteropus ''Narrow''- almost unaffected

Tropicals:



 

Peace lily flower, still closed...


 

Palm plant, can't remember the proper name.


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## sciencefiction (1 May 2014)

A mutated blue cherry




Not sure if these two are the same as I have seen two blue males at the same time




Another interesting pattern cherry




A blanched garlic and peas frenzy


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## sciencefiction (7 May 2014)

Although the light is still not enough some of the listless swords starting growing new leaves. The problem is the bristlenose pleco has developed a taste for them and every morning I see eaten leaves, proper damage from rasping. My common plec in another tank never eats the plants.
The bristlenose is well fed. I put wafers near his cave each evening and I see him eating them each time. I probably haven't put veggies much recently though.
Is there anything I can do to stop him? He didn't eat them before. Do they develop a taste and never stop afterwards?   Very annoying and I don't have a proper tank in which to move him.


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## sciencefiction (12 May 2014)

Well, with my stupid camera that's the best picture I could take of the flowering peace lily. The flowers are outside the light range so they struggled to open for a while I think but I can't help it as there's no indirect light where the tank is and I can't lift the lights anymore.


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## Greenfinger2 (17 May 2014)

Hi Sciencefiction , Superb


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## sciencefiction (22 Jul 2014)

Well, I don't know what happened to imageshack taking off my pictures at some stage,  but it seems my pictures are back lol so I might as well update. There's still nothing to be proud about, starting from scratch really.

This is the tank currently below.  Because I still haven't fixed all 3 strips of light it initially had,  I've been trying to "fix" the tank just 2 but it's not really happening.  Right side is dead side, no plants bar the anubias and java fern survive, it's way too little light there.  It's not normally as dark as on the picture but I put rooibos tea in the tank yesterday just for experiment, hence the black water look.

Left side wasn't doing well either but started finally regrowing after I bumped the photoperiod(currently 11hrs) Even some hydrocolyte tripartita reappeared out of nowhere and I hadn't seen it in months. But the tank has a long way to go. It won't happen if I don't fix the lights though.



 

And I've been trying to grow a bacopa carpet again(the bright green stuff below)  It's not as good as it was, it hasn't fully grown and is not as compact but I'll see how it goes as I've nothing better to do with the tank right now anyway.


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## ADA (22 Jul 2014)

Just read through your thread, I got a set of lights from the same guy I believe, he was on aquarist classifieds when I bought mine, I've had a few LEDs die so far but now I'm thinking I might bin them and get a new unit.  Hope the recovery goes smoothly.


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## sciencefiction (23 Jul 2014)

Thanks ADA.
If they look like mine, then you probably had the misfortune to run into the same problems  I sent him an email, obviously no reply. He was a moderator on another forum until all his scam broke out...He said he used Cree's but apparently I have some cheap china fun instead. Also, he didn't ground them either.

All 3 led drivers failed within weeks of each other.  I fixed two strips by buying drivers that with delivery cost a 100 euro. I am refusing to fix the third strip now which has a blown out led, needs a new driver, soldering iron, thermal stickers/paste, etc,etc..., so not in the mood to spend that on the last strip....I can easily cost me nearly a 100 to fix that alone with the little bits I need because its all expensive here in Ireland.
So yes, I am in the look for new lights and to be honest whole new tank altogether maybe one day, hopefully bigger.


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## ADA (23 Jul 2014)

Yeah sounds like a plan, I'm looking at beamworks for one and aps for the other ATM.


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## sciencefiction (23 Jul 2014)

Plenty of choices out there to be honest.
With the negative aside, the leds do work well for the plants if working.

I also had a look at an American website that gets very good reviews and apparently can deliver worldwide. But probably one wants something that's at least repairable easily under manufacturers warranty at least.
But its worth a look.

http://www.buildmyled.com/freshwater-products/


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## sciencefiction (22 Aug 2014)

My bacopa australis carpet is picking up. I don't know why I don't see people keeping bacopa as a carpet around here. That blurry yellow guppy/endler hybrid in the picture is ancient and is 3 yrs + old. I raised it myself from a little spec. She's got a half brother who's in another tank and still kicking though with cataracts in one eye for the last 6 months.






And a rare picture of my albino bristlenose who really hates me. He was as tiny as a small otto when I got him a couple of years ago and he will probably go on annoying me for quite a few years to come. I put the veg for the 2 ottos specifically, placed it on the opposite side of the tank so the skittish yellow thing doesn't come out but naah...He won't miss on stuff like that and he kicks away any other fish that dare approach.


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## sciencefiction (22 Aug 2014)

And just a cute picture of some of my corys



 

And the tank without the rooibos tea


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## sciencefiction (22 Aug 2014)

Thanks guys.


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## Andy D (22 Aug 2014)

Awesome!


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## sciencefiction (22 Aug 2014)

Thanks Andy.


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## george dicker (25 Feb 2015)

u seem to be growing glosso well, you should add some more demanding, attractive plants, the fun is in the challenge


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## Greenfinger2 (26 Feb 2015)

Hi Sciencfiction, Wonderful I love the carpet plant  Bacopa Australis


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## sciencefiction (28 Feb 2015)

Thanks guys.

The glosso died after my lights failed. This was probably at least a year and a half ago when I ended up rinning the tank on  1/3rd light of what it was. I never tried it again, but it grew superbly well for the time being.   It appeared it loved the full blast of 45x3W LEDs over the tank without the emersed plants shadowing so I think the glosso loves its light.

The bacopa too loves a bit of light in order to be carpet like and spread, but not as much as the glosso so it survived the harsh period I endured, and it grew a carpet even at a reduced  30x3W LEDs and overhanging emersed plants but it did better with higher light. However, one day I had enough,  I pulled it all out , because it's such a weed, it grew really fast honestly, and I couldn't cope trimming it. It's a lovely plant for a low tech tank as long as the light is not too low, otherwise it grows, but it doesn't look healthy, it grows leggy instead if shadowed over. But it will hang on to life and spread really fast once it gets its conditions so it's a really handy plant to monitor a tank.


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## Greenfinger2 (9 Mar 2015)

Ih Sciencefiction That looks Stunning Congratulations


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## alto (30 Mar 2015)

I completely missed this journal - it's a great tribute to obdurance in the face of adversity  (that may no longer be an accepted word ... anywhere )

Is this tank still running?


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## sciencefiction (31 Mar 2015)

Yes, it's running alto but it's a jungle mess, neglected


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## DianeC (22 Jan 2019)

Just picked up this journal and found it really fascinating especially the plant survival with lighting issues over the period.
Have to ask, is the tank still running and did you ever manage to replace your lights?


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## sciencefiction (22 Jan 2019)

Hi Diane, thank you for your interest. I never replaced the lights to the original intensity due to lack of funds at the time. The tank subsequently developed a leak and was taken down in 2016.


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