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Capping soils

dean

dean

Member
Joined
6 Apr 2012
Messages
1,524
Location
Warrington, Cheshire
Hi all about to do my first soil tank
Going with 50:50 mix Irish moss peat & Westland aquatic compost

A few questions
1 max depth of soil 25 mm ?

I read some people put a mesh over the soil before topping it, what's your thoughts

How deep should the cap be minimum & maximum ?

What grain size makes the best cap ?

Finally what's your favourite cap and why


As you may of guessed I've not got my capping yet




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Tutorial's sub forum here may give you an idea.(soil based tank)
My soil based tank's 80 U.S. gal,and 55 gal average 2 to 3 cm soil depth capped with sand or fine gravel.
I have mixed soil with peat and cat litter and worked well.
Cat litter has fairly good CEC.
My current cap over soil is product safe-T-sorb which is clay like same as cat litter,just more earthy color that I like.
Have also made soil as deep as 4 cm with cap at 4 or 5 cm without issues for larger Echinodorus.
Don't advise soil for those who frequently move plant's about.
Tried the mesh over soil, but the root's of plant's grew through the mesh, making it near impossible to remove a plant without also lifting the mesh material.
Advise shutting filtration off when and if plant's in soil are to be moved (rarely),and move plant's out in front of largish water change afterwards.
 
Just as experiment i lately setup a little 50 litre aqaurium and used Lily pond soil.. I choose this because it contains 30% blue clay next to the peat and compost. This stuff is darn sticky and compact when damp it is like a doug consistancy and the clay adds some weight to it.. So i even banked it up a little and pressed it fermly into the corners. Than i capped it with 1 cm sand and 1 cm silica gravel on top of the sand again. I didn't use any cloth and thought it would become a huge mess and that all the sand and gravel would sink in to the clay soil and turn over. But actualy i'm very surpised how good it holds and stayes in shape. It running now for 2 months and still no sign of substrate sliding.

It's a little outdoor aquarium in the garden, so i wait till the summer is over and see how it holds up.. But as is now and if it stays like that i definitevely try this again in a little more serious indoor setup. 🙂
 
I don't really have anything to add...I've said my piece😉 Except that there are no hard and fast rules.
Once you've grasped the basics experimentation is the name of the game (obviously within reason) so have fun.

That said, I wouldn't use garden fleece, I think it'll prove too an efficient barrier to water flow, nutrient transference, gas exchange and root penetration.
But Like Marcel has said a mesh barrier isn't really necessary; capped soil is pretty good at staying put.
I like to use one since it helps to keep the layers separate during scaping (something I don't think Diana Walstad was that bothered about), and during maintenance and the occasional re-scape.
 
I guess, replanting is what makes mesh or cloth essential.. Pulling rooted plants up without it will definitively ruin it.. No cloth is a one way ticket to the blues, scape it never tough it again or only add.. 🙂

I still have a few square metres of Fly mesh in the shed, the one used to cover open windows.. I used some pieces as filter inlet cover.. It is made from some kind of nylon thread it doesn't desolve, has a larger grit and less thick than garden root cloth. It think it'll do perfectly as devider. 🙂 I'll will give it a try one day..
 
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