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My 89 Litre project.

maverick786us

Member
Joined
6 Nov 2024
Messages
354
Location
Columbus, GA
1. Size of tank in litres. - 89 L Tank size + 3L Fluval 207 canister filter
2. Age of the set - up. - 45 days 3 weeks dry start, 2 weeks with Eheim Classic 250 + 2 weeks with fluvial 207
3. Filtration + Media/Sponges. - Fluval 207, with filter media that comes shipped with the filter + a 7 inch coarse sponge on the filter intake
4. Lighting and duration. - 8 hours photo period with CO2 injection
5. Substrate. - Platinum soil
6. Co2 dosing or Non-dosing. - 8 hours
7. Fertilizers used & Ratios. - Fertilizer + Micro nutrients + Macro nutrients twice a week
8. Water change regime and type.- 20-25% water change every 36-48 hours
9. Plant list + When planted. - Dwarf hair grass, Giant hair grass, Anubias, Java fern, Christmas moss, Rotala, Rein Ki Mini, Hydrocort Japan
10. Drop Checker. - Blueish green
11. Inhabitants. - Cherry Shrimps, snails, cherry barb
12. Full tank image & Surface image.

Tomorrow I am going to buy the hard scape material for my next aquascape it’s a medium sized tank with dimensions 24 x 18 x 18 inches.

The hardscape will be 2 land masses on both sides of the tank. In the foreground, there will be a river that will keep narrowing down as it passes between these land masses. Something similar to what you see in this video



But I don’t have that bonsai so I will try to create something like this using rocks and spider wood. When it comes to planting the hard scape it’s always going to be Anubias, Java fern, trident fern and Bucephalendra though Bucephelandra I will not use until the tank matures.

Coming to foreground and background plants I want to cover the entire land masses with grasses and maybe use some sort of giant hair grass on the background I need suggestion on giant hair grass. If possible dwarf Amazon sword which might match with giant hair grass.

For the foreground, I was thinking of going for Glossostigma and dwarf hair grass.

This time, I decided to try the Dry Start Method to see if it would work with these grasses. I have always had a hard time with grasses in a newly set-up tank.

Any advice and suggestions will be greatly appreciated
 
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To add more clarification my aquascape will similar to this



The difference will be…

1. Instead of bonsai I will use rocks and spiderwood on both sides of the river. The combination of rock, driftwood and plants will be something similar to what MD Fishtank does while making an island in the river.

2. The river that you see in the above video will go all the way to right side of the tank.

The landmass I want to cover with the grasses just like the way you see in this video.
 
It’s a good plant. Thanks. What will you recommend for long grass? I’ve seen MD Fish tank using long leave plants in some of his nano tanks I didn’t remember the names
 
He has been recently using Vallisneria.
It’s not a plant I have used before but I believe it gets very long so would likely lay on the waters surface in a tank of your size.
Someone with more knowledge than I can probably suggest something more size appropriate. Potentially a Crypocoryne Spriralis or suchlike.
 
For a classic iwagumi style where you trim the grass to keep it very dense and flat, I believe so.
If you plan to let it grow to its maximum height and leave it, then I think it’s much easier.

I only have experience of letting it run wild and then thinning it out now and again.

I would expect that getting smaller and slower growing varieties would make maintenance much easier. Someone else more experienced may weigh in.
 
OK guys I am almost done with the hard scape. How does it looks? Does the main wood looks too tilted? I can fix it in 2 ways.
1. By Glueing patches of drift wood on the left of it
2. Break it and escape.
Whats your opinion on the plants that I am gonna use here?



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Moving forward...

1. Added some tentacles to that spiderwood by gluing patches of woods. I added some more rocks. Though it will look more natural
2. I applied soil, and sand. The sand is mixture of natural sand and cosmetic sand. I used ADA Start kit under the sand and soil.
3. I used ADA root tab capsules on both soil and sand before planting. Now I am not using powered sand so I hope toot tabs will provide essential nutrients to some plants that are growing on sand?

This is my first time I am using Dry Start Method. I will not flood it for 30 days and before flooding I will have some Anubias and Java Ferns.
I will mist it twice a day to keep the plants moist. Do I need to mix littlest of liquid fertilizer with the water I am going to mist? How do I ensure that moulds don't start developing? What all other things do I need to take care in DSM?

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OK so I realized that I wasted a lot of foreground space for the river. So I decided to plant slow growing crypts and Hydrocotyle which doesn't have dense leaves. I planted these plants sparsely so that it doesn't look like a dense jungle or a carpet. I want it to look like grassland on shallow water of river.

Now I am not using ADA power sand. its. a mix of natural river gravel sand and cosmetic sand. So I doubt if I will contain the nutrients that Aqua soil contains. I took few capsules ADA Root Tab and buried it under the sand. I hope it should be suffiecient for the plants to get their nutrients?

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I love the layout and think you're off to a good start, but you are going to need to be really thoughtful at managing the light in this tank. You have a lot of slow growers out in the open (not in shade), so too much light is going to cause an algae issue, but you can't dim it too much or the hair grass will get sad. You might consider floating plants for the start up period to give you some cover. It wouldn't have to be forever, but it will help in the beginning. You are smart to hold off on the buce. 👍
 
Thank you. Yes floating plants and some Anubias and Java ferns I will glue them to the hard scape to provide some extra shade to these plants. In fact the light is temporary. In a couple of months I will buy premium lights from twin star whose intensity, color can be controlled using smartphone. That whole setup is expensive and gonna hurt my wallet thats why I will upgrade everything step by step.

1. After flooding I can only spend $$ on pressurized CO2 kit and some more plants.
2. I won't be able to afford an expensive filter setup (Fluval 207 with steel Lily Pipes) so I have inexpensive Sunsun XBL 600 which I will use temporarily and once I get my next paycheck I will buy Fluval 207 and steel lily pipes

With pressurized CO2 I expect better plant growth and reduced algae. And yes from my past experience with Buce Phalandra I will hold it off for 2 months or maybe more after flooding.
 
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By Sunday it will be 2 weeks. I will not flood it for another 4 weeks. How much time does it take for these grass to form runners and expand throughout the soil? This is my second tank in which I will use pressurized CO2. So this isn't a low tech tank. But it's small ( 24 X 16 X 16) inch so I won't call it a high tech setup. In the past I always had hard time with grass. So this is the first time I am using DSM.

I will soon share my previous tank setups in which I tried carpet grass and it turned out to be a big big failure
 
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OK it's been 17 days now. The grass is growing tall instead of expanding horizontally. Will trimming make those grasses for runner and expand horizontally?

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It's been 3 weeks now. I was planning to keep it dry for another 3 weeks, and let the grass spread. But because of mold I had to flood it.

In the latest picture you can see a small gap on the left and if you compare it with the previous pictures, I had Reineckii mini red that was consumed by mold in 12 hours and in next 12 hours the mold was on the grass and small portion of the glass on the left. On the right side I still have Reineckii mini red which is healthy. I used mouthwash (mouthwash contains hydrogen peroxide) and mixed it with bit of liquid carbon, to kill the mold. I don't no what affect that solution might caused in future and how its going to affect aqua soil. For next 48 hours I kept it open (without the cling film on the top) and mist it whenever I felt the plants were dry and today I decided its bit early but right to flood it.

I wanted to use Fluval 207 Canister filter. But because of lack of immediate availability and price factor. I ended up buying Ehem Classic 250 with Steel Lily Pipes from MuFan. This filter has thin pipes so only lily pipes with diameter 12MM would fit. I initially had a hard time. The filter was running but there was no flow. It took me 2-3 hours to make it work, Maybe the problem was with air pressure lock, which I still couldn't figure out how I made it work lol.

I am happy with this filter, its flow is amazing, and it has all the filter media inside, mechanical, bio, sponge that came with the product. So I don't have to spend additional $ on filter media. The only thing that I need is a pre-filter sponge on the lily pipes.

I will not have live stock for next 4 week. However if mould resurface under the water, Ammano shrimps will be the best cleaner crew. But they might not survive in this new tank, which isn't cycled. So whats your suggestion?

I will change 50% water in next 24 hours and then will keep changing 30-40% water every 48 hours for a week.

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Day 2 post flooding. I changed 40% water and readjusted the lily pipes. Now the pressure from outlet is directly over CO2 diffuser. I also readjusted the height of the lily pipes. Is it Ok to have the outtake of lily pipes littlest submerged.

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