Brian's ADA 60p - Revival v3 Journal

[Brian_Nano12g]

Welcome back! Love a good Ada tank![emoji106] looks great and definitely following along to see how it all end up. Great choice of plants and even better choice of tank [emoji6]

Thanks, Bert. I noticed you have an ADA tank build too. I need to subscribe and follow

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Flooding - Post DSM

(Edit: my hotlinked Flickr photos sometimes don't load the thumbnails and appear to be broken links. Only happens on the mobile app for some reason. FYI: you can still tap them to open)

It's about that time, time for the flood!

Trimmed the ultra tall S. Repens down. Trimmed some AR Mini and replanted the stems.

Used my floating breeder box to help disperse water to not disturb the substrate:

FTS... I'm eventually going to remove some S. Repens as I like that plant to be more compact as a midground. Thinking of throwing some tall grassy plant in the back like blyxa aubertii, Hygrophilia angustifolia, Eleocharis montevidensis, or cyperus helferi. I'm also thinking to add some extra small pieces of ohko stone I have and tie some mini fissidens for dark green breaks between the HC and maybe add more small stones tied with Riccia fluitans. I just hope my HC and other plants handle the transition from emergent growth to immersed.

Right now I'm using my Fluval C2 HOB filter. But given that I took the extra time to make the DIY conduit light hanger, I'm thinking I'm not doing this re-build justice by still going with that. So I dug out my old and first-ever canister, the fluval 106 from the garage. Cleaned her up. I just need to test it to make sure it's still working and the seals are still good. Also, still have my old lily piples from Cal Aqua Labs... geez, they need some elbow grease too! I'll see when I can muster-up the energy and time to setup the lily pipes. For now, the C2 will have to do.

 

[Brookster123]

I'm coming down those stairs and standing at the landing for way to long... good traffic

 

[Bert2oo1]

Looks great [emoji106] loving the plant selection aswell. Canister with a co2 reactor is the way to go [emoji106]

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Looks great [emoji106] loving the plant selection aswell. Canister with a co2 reactor is the way to go [emoji106]

Thanks.. You have a recommendation on a good reactor?

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

I'm coming down those stairs and standing at the landing for way to long... good traffic

Thanks, I think? Haha.. I'm confused. Please elaborate, brook.

 

[Bert2oo1]

Thanks.. You have a recommendation on a good reactor?

I've built both a Griggs and cerges DIY reactor and both work great! Griggs is more compact but I like the cerges design better.

Here's the links:

Cerges:

https://glassboxgardeners.com/threads/how-to-build-a-cerges-co2-reactor.346/

Griggs:

http://rotalabutterfly.com/rex-grigg/diy-reactor.htm

Both really easy to make and a great DIY project [emoji106][emoji16]

 

[Autumnsky]

Denture cleaning tablets are nice to get out grime stuff off of glass, like lily pipes. Dollar store has cheap ones, otherwise generic works just fine. Then rinse off a few times and clean as usual.

Really like the tank of course. Glad you are getting going on setting up a tank again.

 

[Brookster123]

Thanks, I think? Haha.. I'm confused. Please elaborate, brook.

I didn't want to sound to creepy.. That's gotta be a nice top down view... Top downs are the best

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Denture cleaning tablets are nice to get out grime stuff off of glass, like lily pipes. Dollar store has cheap ones, otherwise generic works just fine. Then rinse off a few times and clean as usual.

Really like the tank of course. Glad you are getting going on setting up a tank again.

Thanks, Autumn! Great suggestion on the dollar store denture tablets. Are they effective at hardwater deposits? My first thought was a vinegar soak.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

I didn't want to sound to creepy.. That's gotta be a nice top down view... Top downs are the best

Oooh, gotcha.. Yeah it's actually really cool from the stair view. Now I'm thinking of removing the black background when I install the lilly pipes to get a decent backside view too.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

I've built both a Griggs and cerges DIY reactor and both work great! Griggs is more compact but I like the cerges design better.

Here's the links:

Cerges:

https://glassboxgardeners.com/threads/how-to-build-a-cerges-co2-reactor.346/

Griggs:

http://rotalabutterfly.com/rex-grigg/diy-reactor.htm

Both really easy to make and a great DIY project [emoji106][emoji16]

Thanks for the links. I'll take a look. For now I'm using an ADA-clone glass diffuser.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Looks like the HC is liking the CO2 and light output from the E-Series. ?

Oh the pearling is all so great and pleasing to the eyes

 

[Fresh2o]

Nice bubbles. Those lily pipes could use a soak in vinegar or bleach. Have not seen THOSE in years.
How well does HC hold onto the ADA aquasoil? The issue I had with HC Cuba is that the mat would become uprooted in areas where top growth got too thick (from lack of trimming). I was using EC.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Thanks, Fresh. It's sort of weird busting out my old equipment. Sort of nostalgic, at the same time, strange thinking about how long ago THOSE pipes seen action. Time flies. Kinda miss getting new toys likes it's Xmas morning! Haha.. Anyways, so far the HC is staying put. I do see some stems trying to float, hopefully the main portions got rooted well and will anchor the rest. I've had better experience with HC in a substrate like aquasoil, and other aquasoil-like brands. Not much experience with EC. I think I tried growing it on floramax once and I recall it didn't root well for me. Kinda miss UG though. I think that was my favorite high light carpeting plant.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Update Time...

Did a PWC and pulled some S. Repens out to make room for some plants I managed to scrape up out of a friend's neglected tank... so I'm not sure if these will stay, but behind the main Ohko stone, I added in Hygrophila Corymbosa Angustifolia for the tall thin leaves, but I'm still thinking of something else there like a tall dwarf hairgrass or something. But this was free so I went with it (for now). In the right corner was some hardly-alive Rotala Macrandra. I'm hoping it'll acclimate and start growing and bounce back from near death. I give it a 50/50 at this point.

I also have a little jar of tissue cultured Riccia Fluitans I acquired a while back. It also looks barely alive because I had it in the jar for a couple of months and tried to remember turning on a little desk LED lamp to keep it going (yeah, lazy to use a timer). There is some green left, so there's hope. On the plus side, I do have some Mini Fissidens that look in great shape!

Anyways, here's my Friday night project... took some small river rocks and used a bath loofah's netting to wrap the rocks with the Riccia attached. Twisted the bottoms and used zip ties to hold them. Cut the extra loofah and zip tie off... voilà, Riccia stones! Hope they grow in to make nice bushes!

Lastly, took the Mini Fissidens and used 2lbs test fishingline to tie them to some small pieces of Ohko. These should grow in nicely to add dark green breaks to the light green in the HC and Riccia.

FTS:

 

[Autumnsky]

Thanks, Autumn! Great suggestion on the dollar store denture tablets. Are they effective at hardwater deposits? My first thought was a vinegar soak.

Yes, even if it takes a few runs with a couple tablets each time using nice hot water.

Tank is looking really beautiful.

 

[TMaier]

Very pretty!

 

[fishenthusiast]

Very nice! It's going to look fantastic once grown in!

 

[Barliman]

Update Time...
Anyways, here's my Friday night project... took some small river rocks and used a bath loofah's netting to wrap the rocks with the Riccia attached. Twisted the bottoms and used zip ties to hold them. Cut the extra loofah and zip tie off... voilà, Riccia stones! Hope they grow in to make nice bushes!

Very clever! I can't wait to see the results.