Re: Fluval Studio 900... 'Dragons Crypt' Trim time.
faizal said:
Ady34 said:
..... it almost looks too bright now, a little cold and too green compared with the overgrown plant mass that gave areas of shadow and contrast and a sense of cosyness.
I know what you mean.
🙂 Don't worry mate,...it'll be back to its usual coziness in no time.
😀 Looking forward to a picture.
ianho said:
i'm sure you'll do well Ady!
Cheers, it was a jungle but its a tank with plants and itll hopefully up the uk numbers.
Timms2011 said:
Any chance of a pic after the trim? Would be great to follow the progression from there 🙂
On it.
Mark Evans said:
Good luck Ad with IAPLC
Your Arcuata looks really nice. As it should look. Well done mate.
Thanks Mark.
Right, heres the progress of chopping it back, it may not look like a lot but beleive me the right rear was rammed with a tangle of hygrophilas, bolbitis, eleocharis ecicularis and ludwigia so i ripped it all out to improve circulation.
Some of the larger balansae has been removed, the crypts thinned, the arcuata trimmed, eleocharis trimmed, hygrophila corymbosa and pinnatifida given a serious chop and thinning and a general tidy up. Theres still a lot of balansae that probably needs the largest leaves removing, and the microsorum pteropus petite could do with a thinning, but ill probably wait to do that when/if the pinnatifida recovers.
Ive given the sand bed a mini recovery and removed the staurogyne 'stumps'. The parvula right foreground was decidedly yellow and browning probably due to c02 and light starvation from the plant mass, so this has been trimmed and thinned and will hopefully recover.
It looks much brighter and as previously said the circulation/distribution is much improved. It looks a little green in colour after the trim but im hoping the arcuata and the pinnatifida will come back to add some contrasting shades.
Anyway i had to do it in 2 stages so heres the before, during and after:
Before, a jungle and similar to the iaplc shot:
During, hygrophilas and crypts trimmed/thinned:
After, eleocharis trimmed and tidied, further crypt thinning and sand bed tidy. Its a little murky as id just finished the tidying and refilling. I dont particularly like the sandy area but ill try to make the best of it while its there:
Just need to see how things grow back in now. Hopefully some of the plants that started to deteriorate will pick up again, a few more months for this tank to go yet!
Thanks for looking,
Ady.