Hello from Stratford upon Avon

[Welearn]

Hi all,
I am a Newbie to this wonderful forum.
I am mainly a salty guy, owning a custom made reef set up.
I am here due to my 4yr old granddaughter who is so fascinated with my marine setup that she would like to have her own little setup, so we have opted to go for a little freshwater set up, unbeknown to me my daughter bought the tetra cascade globe which is 2gallon in capacity. I wasn't to keen but... hey let's see what I can do as I have never aquascaped a 2g bowl!! A challenge me thinks. So... it's a project to see how we get on.
Cheers simon.

 

[sparkyweasel]

Welcome!

 

[alto]

Welcome

Any chance to convince everyone of an upgrade to the Flex 34 (an excellent All In One Kit at a very decent price) which also features a complete rainbow light (4yr old irresistible ) and is a much easier tank to maintain with outstanding filter capacity

(I’m attempting to say nothing of my opinion of that Tetra Cascade )

If the Tetra Cascade, choose very low light plants as the stock LED is really for fish viewing ... moss balls, maybe an Anubias, you might try a Microsorum species but these tend to be much larger plants, some tall wood with attached moss etc (bringing plants closer to the light)
I’d not try and do a substrate in this tank, instead allow the 4yr old to choose fun coloured gravel etc that’s easy to clean - debris (uneaten food etc) seems to collect on the bottom

 

[Welearn]

Alto, thank you for your comments and the warm welcome
We have set up the tetra cascade roughly 3 months ago actually, I was just a little late in signing up to this forum site.
Yes I agree the cascade would not have been my choice as the filtration carbon/filterfloss cartridge is not the best!! We have gone with two plants for the set up Anubias Nanna, and the crypt green Wenditii a slight melt but now flourishing.
We are still cycling the fishless way, the led lights are nine box standard bulbs so it would be low tec! The substrate is black gravel( fine) with a few tetra sticks here and there! We added a hydor 7.5 watt slim oval disc heater covered by the gravel, I found that the plants have flourished well maybe due to the heated substrate, I maybe wrong! On a whole the parameters are in check except the Nitrates are reading between 18ppm to 25ppm. No co2, No ferts added either. The lighting we started off on 5hours, and now slowly ramped up to 7/8hours per day. Co2 reading is 8 mgl I assume that's sufficient. KH is 10dh GH is 6dh. So nothing special in the set up, nothing special in the scape, low maintenance and see how it goes, would 3 shrimp be ok? Or two mountain minnows to start off with? Eventually we will upgrade for her a bigger tank with her choice of coloured gravel etc when she reaches her next Birthday next year. Find attached two photos.
Cheers simon

 

[Welearn]

P.s. The one showing good growth the anubias