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First Low Tech Planted Tank... Now High Tech!

Thanks for the reply. Just curious whether the plants were using the bicarbonates from the elevated KH levels as a co2 assuming you had lots of bicarbonate users. When I did my Walstad tank the jungle val went nuts but pretty much everything else died.
 
Vallis can synthesis carbon from bicarbonate so it will usually do very well in hard water. So will crypts, Bucephalandra and anubias species and very probably a variety of mosses.
I'm not sure about H. tripartita...I haven't had the same low-energy success as it appears MrHidley has had, despite very hard water, but my low-energy tanks have always been relatively low light so that may have more to do with it.
 
Good point. I was using 2xt8 tubes at about 20 inches. What was always interesting to me what that the dwarf hairgrass (wrong plant for that setup) would still throw up healthy green shoots then they would whither away.
 
Thinking of swapping the t5s out for an LED floodlight, want to get that shimmer. Any ideas on cheap hanging brackets that will work, I only want to do this if it won't cost a lot. I'm sure cheap arms/brackets that can be bolted to the wall exist but i don't know what to search for, any tips would be helpful.
 
Most of the LED Floodlights that I've seen while looking for inspiration have decent mounting brackets already fitted to them. These could easily be fixed to a wall or wooden fitting.
 
BarryH said:
Most of the LED Floodlights that I've seen while looking for inspiration have decent mounting brackets already fitted to them. These could easily be fixed to a wall or wooden fitting.
Click to expand...

Thanks, but i don't think the arm/bracket that comes preattached is long enough to hang the light at 90 degrees above the tank.
 
As promised, here the 'rescape' still very much a work in progress. Yesterday i upgraded to a 20W 6000k floodlight as i wasn't getting the growth i wanted from my (very old) T5s. Also, moved to an inline diffuser. Hoping to get the rotala very thick, i grew this from only a couple of stems so it's taking some time.

33571934434_6f63e01891_b.jpg
 
Hi,

don't worry about the rotala (still rotundifolia?) growing to a thick bush. In my tank (54l) I started with about 15 to 20 stems and today i have an area of about 20 cm x 10 cm with at least 50 stems in it. All nice and healthy. Took me about three to four months to get there, since any rotala does not respond well to trimming in my tanks.
 
The Eheim filter i was running was knackered, I think the impeller was damaged. Rather than get it fixed i purchased a Allpondsolutions EF-150 and I am so impressed. For £30 it's a superb little filter running at 400lph, pipe work that comes with it is also really nice, highly recommended.
 
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