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Bit of advice.

LocustDemon

LocustDemon

Member
Joined
26 Dec 2013
Messages
113
Location
Sheffield
Morning all. Hope your all well!
So im wanting to plant my tank now that I've got rid of my lawnmowers(silver dollars)

My budget is £50 and i want to get liquid carbon+plant food with that aswell.
My tank is about 190 litres and i have a fluval 205 external filter.
The light is a t8 arcadia fo30.
Substrate is about 5-10% crushed coral and the rest is a black micro sort of thing...
My ph in the tank is 6.8, ammonia nitrite and nitrate are all 0.
Ph from the tap is 7 and the ph of tap water stood for 24hours is 6.6
And the tank temperature is 26/78f.

I have a bogwood structure at one side of the tank that I would love to be covered in moss of some description. The back of the tank is now black and i want I wall of plants along the back with some in the mid to.
Am I aiming too high or can a beginner achieve this haha.

Thanks in advance.
Matt.

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Hi, my friend has lawn mowers in his tank. I give hI'm cuttings now and again and have stopped asking how the plants are doing as they just get destroyed😀 for your budget you should be able to go macro micro( fert and trace elements) which you can get from one of the sponsors on here. and liquid carbon. Any pics of your tank/ set up? Cheers Kirk.🙂
 
Haha yeah they eat and eat and eat. I want to get rid of all the ornaments apart from the wood and put some stones in or rock and make it look as natural as can! So Appologies for it looking rather tacky at the moment.

20131228_194028_1_zpspxnujiue.jpg

I'll take one with the light on when I get back in.

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That was it before the black background and the external filter.

20131007_062631_zpsfba02b86.jpg

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I think youll be pushing the budget with plant food and liquid carbon
Tnc carbon is the cheapest, without getting into diy, and can be bought from fluidsensoronline. they also sell various ferts. i use tnc complete in my nano but it wont last long in your tank.
Ei kits cost more but last much longer than liquid feeds
 
Well I'll obviously need food and liquid carbon so there a must. And I guess the budget is for this month basically. Just something to start off. So some moss and background plants. And a plant that will grow bug but I can take cutting off to replant if you know what I mean. Do you think the light will cope? It's 850 lumens I've read but opposite the tank are some patio doors that let Sunlight through for a few hours a day.
Cheers for the reply.
Matt.

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Yeah it's the light that I got with the setup, not thought anything of it until now. Got to grips with the other concepts of it so wanting to move into live plants. ah right sounds good, basically trying to play it safe and not throw money away.
Cheers.


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Yeah got 5 baby clown loach. 4 baby bristlenose catfish. 1 bristlenose plec. 1 black ghost knife. 1 black red fin shark. 6 red cardinal tetra. 2 glass catfish. 2male1female sword tail. 3zebra danio 1albino. And I think that's it ha.

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Just read that. Would have never thought that at all the little buggers!! Well that's stumped me, there my favourite fish up to now haha. Guess I'll have to think about swapping them, what other fish are colourful and have the same sort of personality? I think at this rate I'll be changing the lot as a planted natural tank is what i really want.
Thanks a lot mate, saved me a lot of potential trouble in the long run. Very interesting.

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With the tank and light set-up you have you would be better off going for the slow-grow, low-tech approach IMHO. It's a less intensive approach and you will need patience but it's far less (maintenance) work and a lot cheaper (less ferts and liquid CO2). You can still have an amazing, lush green tank for half the effort! I'd look in the Journal section for low tech set-ups and read, read, read. Good luck.
 
Id go for the low tech too. No liquid carbon just ferts and paitence. Have you seen botia striata?
 
Shall have a good old read now. Yeah I have ollie and they look amazing! Would they be a problem for outgrowing my tank or eating plants?

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Ooo I shall have to find a seller for them then 🙂
Yeah I have read that but I don't know how I'd get soil in my tank as I don't have anywhere else. For My fish to go while I do it, I assume it will have to cycle before you can add them again?
I see most of the tanks don't have any glass covers. I have two perspex sliding sheets on mine. Won't matter if I take them off will it? Would Deffinately let more of the light in as I can attach it to the two supports that run across the tank from front to back.

20131230_185613_zpssqp29iue.jpg
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