Hello Tom,
I have to say I really really adore this tank and it really makes me want to have such a colorful plant growth in mine as well.
Is there anywhere where I can find the overall stats of this tank? Like what its measurements are (all I know is that 120 gallons must be somewhere near 440 liters), the lighting, other technical equipment and most of all I'm interested in what levels of the pH, NO3, PO4, Fe, K, etc. you're aiming at.
Also, is there some kind of masterlist of what plants you keep in this tank? I do recognise many of them, but there are also quite a few that are not generally sold in Europe (at least that's what I think is the case).
I hope I'm not asking too many questions, but I'm greedy for details. 😀
Regards, Franziska
The tank is 120 cm by about 75 cm x 45 cm basically.
Light is 120cm 54W T5 bulbs, a mix of mostly red and a couple of white blue.
Filter, CPR 1000 wet/dry filter, herbie style overflow.
Ferts are just eI, dosed 2x a week, I dose tracves more, and more frequently, 5-6x a week.
Water changes, generally 2x a week, about 60%.
I do not measure ferts, I do not need to with EI.
I'm not going to list every species, if you point something out, I' can tell you what the species is.
Too stunning for words!
What sorted flow through rate is there? Do you have the plants swaying and a current the fish swim against?
Generally about 700 gph, there's a slight sway in some locations, current for the fish, a little bit.
I have more current in my 180, less in my 70 gallon, and a lot more in the Reef.
Franziska you need to buy yourself a latest version of Adobe Lightroom to achieve that kind of colours and all the plants are available in Europe. If you need a shop list - PM me.
Not likely, as L sphaerocarpa is only available thus far through hobbyists and mostly in the USA. I have sent some to some hobbyists overseas, but it's not in commercial production as far as I know yet.
Same with Erio compressum.
In time, most of the aquatic plants end up wolrdwide within the hobby, but it just takes a few years for them to to be grown and then widely available locally.
I think we had 10 species when I started in the hobby, then in the early 1990's, maybe 30. Now it's maybe 400.
FYI, there's no photoshopping used. I use auto settings on a Canon G12, then resize or crop. The image processing sometimes changes the true colors that's in the Canon camera depending on the lighting.
I've shown how light colors impact the photo's and colors of the plants themselves.
Example here is with mostly blue and a little white, without the deeper red of the URI Red sun:
right under the red lights in the same tank just 2-3 weeks prior:
The Canon MKII 5D has different colors for the same picture, no post processing is done there.
You can tell a lot if the images are dark, or the red plants or colors have a magenta hue.
Darker pictures remove some of the haze in the water, but they also make the reds much deeper blood red.
I try to keep what I see and what is actually in the tank true. If you embellish, then the people that come over and see my tanks will know I am lying.
I've seen this done a great deal on line and people insist they did not post process the colors.
I took their image and then lightened it up and it looks just like everyone else's plants.
the other plants next to them also looked like they should have also.
You cannot have a bright strong light, then a deep dark picture with little light and awesome red colors.
Bright light generally washes out red color.
Video is a good solution for people seeking to view what the tanks are really like.