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New Decade, New Decadence...
- Thread starter Geoffrey Rea
- Start date
Jayefc1
Member
That was always an option mate buy I think.you choose the right one lol
Onoma1
Member
Just finished a strawberry tower and 'kegged' the first barrel of home brew ...the delights of having university students home in comparison with younger ones! I am still in awe of your raised beds!
Love it @Onoma1 and the flip side of being at home is you can keep an eye on things. Cheers to you!
They’re just cheap pallet collars. Not quite middle class enough to fork out on railway sleepers and the collars do the job and have no treatments on them. For the last five years the garden has been basic because kids will unfortunately trample/hit/fall on/run over anything you plant. Also their friends come around frequently for play dates so place is like a school some days
Older now so they’re a bit more reliably thoughtful.We did have a few bushes and climbers but a new landlord took over a property to rent behind us. Decided to shower the walkway behind our house with Round Up to impress potential tenants with the remarkably weed free path that grants access to the rear of his rentable abode - to the extent it sterilised the beds and murdered our roses along with all the bushes/climbers through the roots tail end of last summer. Strong words were given and all’s forgiven. Besides, gave a fresh start this year so sometimes an agent of change is needed for something better to happen. There’s plenty more to come yet.
Veg underway and propagation done...
Tank watertight...
Manzanita at the ready...
Jayefc1
Member
Wow you are going to scape it at last stop teasing I bet that Manzi is already in there
Gonna be a salvage planted tank this one. Will be leaving the lights off for a bit and just performing water changes until all the plants are ready to go in together.
The 10l shrimp tank has the tiniest bits of rhizome of bolbitis, some bucephalandra, anubias and water sprite. There’s a selection of crypts and some fissidens moss in there too for the taking. The AS600 has just had a trim but that thing over grows in the space of two weeks so won’t be waiting long. Mixture of background stems to be had from that tank.
Glassware has become nigh impossible to source at the moment. So it’s spraybar running the length of the tank with a skimmer shooting flow under the flow of the spraybar. Have to say, despite the look it’s by far the best distribution pattern I’ve personally seen.
Overall this setup is to showcase the Green Neons that are currently in the AS600. Will move them on in eventually. There are plenty of caves, overhangs and opportunities to plant epiphytes and moss that should bring out the best of their behaviour.
Planting out and foreground next...
Cheers @CooKieS only have a small garden but getting stuck in this summer. Just need a season or two for the perennials to grow in. In the meantime... veg!
Andrew Butler
Member
Is there sand/gravel going in front of the stone or do you have something different planned?
Sand and some crushed Frodo stone is the plan @Andrew Butler probably with mosses attached here and there.
I was considering a carpet but to be honest it will ruin the fun. Would much rather use that maintenance time creating more detail on the scape than mowing more carpet.
Also, could tell the batch of soil I had was going to float last night so left the sand for now. Don’t know what it is but you can tell by the colour. Sure enough... floating soil when filling up. Goes everywhere if you don’t pat the air off it quickly
I was considering a carpet but to be honest it will ruin the fun. Would much rather use that maintenance time creating more detail on the scape than mowing more carpet.
Also, could tell the batch of soil I had was going to float last night so left the sand for now. Don’t know what it is but you can tell by the colour. Sure enough... floating soil when filling up. Goes everywhere if you don’t pat the air off it quickly
Andrew Butler
Member
I thought it likely would be but know you like 'something different' - almost a bit plain for you!
What sand are you going with? - I'm trying to work out quite how La Plata will work in an open area for an everyday tank and not one a display or showroom type scenario.
Hmmm............Amano + Soil + Sand =
Only two criteria were maintenance had to be easy as possible (mainly access) and enough regions to grow different species in different ways. Reckon I can honour the scape through the planting though. Pressure is on now that it’s lit by Solar RGB’s.
Seen enough scapes to know that the hardscape can look immense only for the result once planted to be a let down.... Shadows, inappropriate positioning etc. Haven’t banked the soil up as well aware of what the long term issues will be and honestly need the love for this hobby reviving. It’s interesting having the restrictions we have recently because of how few species of plant are available. Never really tried growing MC on hardscape for example so will give that a go and see how it looks.
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10l cube crammed with some of the old plants from the four foot dismantled end of December:
Amazing how much life you can support in such a small space. Anyway, with everything stripped out this translated to:
Not a bad start. Four species of crypts, couple of sections of bolbitis heudelotii, a nymphaea lotus bulb, few species of buce, anubias petite and a big bouquet of water sprite to help with start up. Ignore the hang on back filter on the right, temporary bag of purigen and seeded sponge in there, will remove later.
The AS600 has been heavily trimmed back so not able to poach much yet. Have taken some bacopa, hottania and ludwigia super red though. Still the back section to fill up with stems, then MC and fissidens moss on the rocks and can have a look see at how it’s coming together. Leaving the sand and foreground detail for a later date, as draining and refilling during water changes these first few weeks is a lot easy without sand blowing about.
Amazing how much life you can support in such a small space. Anyway, with everything stripped out this translated to:
Not a bad start. Four species of crypts, couple of sections of bolbitis heudelotii, a nymphaea lotus bulb, few species of buce, anubias petite and a big bouquet of water sprite to help with start up. Ignore the hang on back filter on the right, temporary bag of purigen and seeded sponge in there, will remove later.
The AS600 has been heavily trimmed back so not able to poach much yet. Have taken some bacopa, hottania and ludwigia super red though. Still the back section to fill up with stems, then MC and fissidens moss on the rocks and can have a look see at how it’s coming together. Leaving the sand and foreground detail for a later date, as draining and refilling during water changes these first few weeks is a lot easy without sand blowing about.
Jayefc1
Member
It's a good start mate I like the no cosmetic approach it does get in the way when doing frequent water changes and not as much need to replace when tank has matured a bit
Really tempting the devil with this start up @Jayefc1
Low plant mass, rich Amazonia soil.... Debated whether the additional surface area of the sand would help the maturation period but as ever with Amazonia the stuff just keeps leaching ammonia. Easy water changes wins the day on this one until everything finds its equilibrium. Hopefully stuffing a load of fast growing stems in soon might help but it’s still low plant mass proportionately to the size of tank.
Low plant mass, rich Amazonia soil....
Debated whether the additional surface area of the sand would help the maturation period but as ever with Amazonia the stuff just keeps leaching ammonia. Easy water changes wins the day on this one until everything finds its equilibrium. Hopefully stuffing a load of fast growing stems in soon might help but it’s still low plant mass proportionately to the size of tank.
Jayefc1
Member
Very low plant mass really but the water changes should help a lot and the easier they are the quicker they are and a lot less stressful the lights will be the issue I think they are so strong
