Converting 37 gallon high to planted

[stoneydee]

I'm responsible for maintaining a 37 gallon (high) freshwater tank at my office. (For any who might have it, this is one of Marineland's Eclipse show tanks, and while it is very streamlined and tidy looking, it is an absolute nightmare to do any equipment add-ons without making it look tacky.)

The tank is 3+ years old, has two female adult angels (this tank is super for fish who are taller than they are long) and 5 black-skirted tetra. Because it only has the standard two 24" flourescent tubes, I've aquascaped with silk plants and a couple of pieces of artificial driftwood (the pH is on the low side of okay in this tank anyway, and I didn't want to drop it further).

So, as we used to say in grade school - whooper-do. It's boring. I want live plants - I've had a couple of planted tanks, a 20g and a 30g, at home, and I loved them. I stayed with lower light plants and started my 20g off with a silent cycle - it was so cool.

I do not have the option of upgrading lighting in the tank. What I am thinking of is building up the back right corner of the tank (about 25% of the available real estate) with rock work that would support a couple of small pots of low light live plants, and I would hide the pots with substrate - kind of a small mountain in the tank. I could tie some java fern to the "driftwood" I already have in there, and re-position it so the plants were raised closer to the lights.

Have I lost what was left of my mind? Would creating this little mountain cause any weight or pressure issues on the tank that I am not considering? (It's on a very sturdy commerical stand, sitting on a concrete floor.)

Any thoughts?

 

[Purrbox]

It think that you have lots of options with this tank. You'll just need to stick to the lower light plants as you have with your other tanks. I personally wouldn't bother with the pots, just use the rocks to shore up the substrate. As long as you've got a nice sturdy stand and everything is level, you shouldn't run into any problems with the additional weight. Anubias, Java Ferns, Crypts, and a few others could be used to create a very nice scape that is easy to maintain.

 

[MyCatsDrool]

FWIW, they do make retro kits for fitting eclipse hoods with PC and t5 lighting....

But with that aside, you can look into floating plants with long root systems (sprite, guppy grass, duckweed) and anubias will grow anywhere. I honestly have a tough time with java fern in any light (get this, i grow myrio like it is going out of style, but can't grow a stinking java fern) and crypts (like the lady above said).

Also, you could glue pieces of rocks together to make your mountain, and make it hollow...or build it on to a plastic mold, so that it is not as heavy.

good luck. take pictures =)