My new 20L Community

[Coyne]

I finished setting up a 20L community last night and am anxious to share it, as well as get suggestions and advice.

After Im sure its cycled, I'll be moving the inhabitants of my 45 gallon into it so that I can tear down and re-do the larger tank.
2 Female mollys
6 Serpae tetras
9 Harlequin rasboras
4 Assassin snails

I used a 2" layer of black blasting sand (bottom) and a 1" layer of FloraMax for the substrate. I had both of these laying around the apartment, so I decided to put them to use. Since Im not planning on having many demanding plants, Im hoping this will be OK.

Its being filtered by a Eheim Ecco 2232. Ive placed a small bag of peat in the filter in hopes that it will help with the high pH that comes out of my tap. Ive left the carbon pad out for now, but may add it in (more on that later).

Lighting is Current Satellite Freshwater LED. Not intended for plant growth, but Im hoping it will suffice for a few low-light plants. It also comes with a nifty remote that I will likely rarely use.

And finally, Im using a 75w Cobalt Neo-Therm heater. The black, low profile design makes it stand out less, so Im pretty happy with that. Plus the display is the easiest to read when compared to other heaters Im using.

Here're some pics:

 

[Coyne]

So, this is my first time using drift wood. I think I boiled out most, if not all, of the tannin. I do have a question about the smell though. There is a somewhat strong earthy smell coming from the tank. Is this normal? Will it go away on its own, or should I use the carbon filter pad that came with the Eheim filter?

 

[BLUEaquarium06]

That looks beautiful. Don't worry about tannins, even if you didn't boil them all out they don't hurt your fish at all. As for the smell, mine went away in a couple days. It was super strong when I was boiling it though Haha stunk up my whole house

 

[Coyne]

Picked up some plants today. Hopefully I planted them correctly.

Compacta Sword
Pennywort
Anubias barteri (var caladiifolia, I think) and
Water Sprite.

 

[cgthebeast]

Looks fantastic, great work. Following along for the ride

 

[brennae]

very nice tank!

 

[GodFan]

Looks so great! I love the uneven look of the substrate! That plant in the front left will overtake the whole tank!

 

[Coyne]

Thanks for the kind words everybody.

So, I thought I had done a decent job of soaking/boiling the driftwood to get the tannin out, but apparently this was not the case. I came home from work today and, even with the lights out, I could tell that the water is brown.
Oh well.
Im doing a Fish-less cycle, so it will be a while before I add fish anyways (I know it wont hurt them). However, I am concerned that the darker water may affect the plants' ability to photosynthesize properly. The lights are probably barely good enough for low-light plants as it is.
Ive been looking for an excuse to hop on the Purigen wagon... I guess I just got one.

 

[Rivercats]

The tannins in peat and DW is actually what helps to lower ph. Most people don't like the color it puts in the water and use carbon or Purgen to remove it. It actually has anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties along with helping to soften water and lower ph.

 

[Coyne]

What about its effect on the light?

 

[Mattyfelts]

WOW! That is sucha great tank, I'm jealous!

 

[Coyne]

Thanks. Hopefully I can keep it looking good. Still time for plenty of things to go wrong.

Does anybody happen to know if Pennywort will attach to driftwood? It looks like it could, so I planted it pretty close to the driftwood and went as far as to loosely tether it with fishing line. It would be pretty sweet if I could get it to creep across it.

 

[Oscarr19]

Great looking tank! Good work

 

[Rivercats]

What about its effect on the light?

The darker the tannin in the water is the less light can penetrate especially deep in the tank.

 

[Khuligirl93]

Wow that's probably the coolest piece of driftwood I've ever seen! Lots of hiding places

 

[callylynn]

Nice tank! You DW kinda looks like a sunken ship. So cool! Union the process of setting up a 20L. I ordered a few small pieces of DW and I'm going to create a few slate rock caves. Keep us updated when you add fish. Would love to see it completed

 

[Coyne]

Wow that's probably the coolest piece of driftwood I've ever seen! Lots of hiding places

Haha... thanks! Its actually two pieces that had the same coloring and grain markings. Who knows.. maybe they were originally part of the same tree and I have now reunited them.
My good LFS has a large (and a tad expensive ) selection of driftwood. I probably spent an hour putting different pieces next to each other in all sorts of combinations until I found what you see.
All the positive feedback means it was time well spent.

 

[Coyne]

A week and a half later and not a whole lot of change. The tannin effect seems to have maxed out. I dont feel the need to go through any hoops to get rid of it. Im sure over time it will resolve itself anyways.
The Pennywort seems to be slowly digging roots into the drift wood, but its leaves at the base of the plant seemed to have died off. Not sure if its because there's not enough light reaching down there or if its some of the "melting" I was told to expect.
The Water Sprite has also experienced some die off at the base and is also showing some yellowing/browning at the top. Some of the tips that break the waters surface actually look a bit singed and Im wondering if they could be TOO close to the light.
Otherwise, not a whole lot of growth, which is to be expected from a low-light/low-tech tank.
As far as cycling goes, it's able to process 4ppm ammonia inside of 24hrs, but not so much on the nitrite yet. I'm going to reduce dosing to 2ppm until I start seeing nitrites reducing and then bump it back up to 4ppm. Hopefully this will keep nitrites from running rampant.

 

[Coyne]

Oh.. thought Id add a pic of this guy as well. While it's currently in a 10 gallon QT and not technically part of the 20 gallon yet, the 20 will be its ultimate destination so I thought Id snap a pic and share.
I present my Long Finned Albino Bristlenose Pleco! Just to get a sense of scale, that's normal/average sized aquarium gravel. Its just tiny.

I also picked up 7 Pygmy Corys that will end up in the 20 long. While they are super active in the QT... I think they are a bit camera shy as they would instantly wiggle over to the opposite side of the tank when I tried to get a picture. They are also super tiny (smaller than the pleco).

 

[Coyne]

opps... forgot to post the picture.