maxwell1295
Aquarium Advice FINatic
Finally! This thing is up and running. After moving at home and moving my office at work, it took me a while to get everything situated. This tank was originally a 30gal long (see my 30G thread) and was set up that way until I lucked up and found this 46gal bowfront w/stand, light, and a glass top on Craigslist for $100. 
I moved everything (lighting, plants, fish, driftwood) over from the 30gal but with a little bit of a twist. I liked the 3M ColorQuartz substrate so much that I decided to scrap the PFS I had in the 30gal and use the 3M stuff here too. I think this move really compliments the colors of the fish and the plants as well. Believe it or not, there are fish in this tank.....they just weren't in the mood for pics last night.
While I moved everything over from the 30gal tank, I also need to thank Jchillin (hygro) and rich311K (stargrass, christmas moss) for sending me some additional plants to work with. It really helped in filling out the height of this tank. Thanks guys!
I also have to give at least 75% of the credit to my GF. She did ALL of the aquascaping by herself with very little interference from me. My only contribution was insisting that she used the driftwood cave in the left front of the tank. I had to invoke my "Man of the House" rules to get that done. She originally wanted to leave it out because she didn't want the driftwood to overpower the tank, but the fish love it.....especially the plecos.
My job is to do the maintenance and keep the ferts in order, something I haven't quite mastered yet. I'm getting some algae that I think is BBA, but I'm not sure. Hopefully somebody could help me out here. I'm using Flourish, Flourish Trace, Nu-Salt for K, a KNO3 solution, and DIY CO2. No need to dose phosphate since I have 2ppm in my tap. I try to keep NO3 in the 20ppm range. I used to never have to dose NO3, but adding all these plants and more lighting really sucks it up quickly. I have been dosing about 2-3 times a week to keep up.
I feel kinda stupid in that I have no idea what most of these species are. Hopefully someone here can help me out with that. The Hygro, Stargrass, Anubias, Water Sprite, Crypts, and Wisteria are the obvious ones. I also have some Alternera reinickii (sp?) in there somewhere too.
Here are the specs:
Tank: 46 Gallon AGA Bowfront tank w/matching black stand
Lighting: Odyssea 96W PC 12,000K bulb, AGA 50W Dual Fluorescent (2x25W)
Filtration: Rena XP2 canister, Penguin 350B HOB
CO2 Injection: DIY yeast mix with 2-1gal juice bottles
Heater: 200W VisiTherm Stealth
Substrate: 3M ColorQuartz Black (S-grade)
Decorations: 3 pieces of Malaysian Driftwood
Plants: See above
Stock list: 2 Bolivian Rams, 6 Neon Tetras, 6 Bloodfin Tetras, 4 Corydoras trilineatus, 3 Clown Plecos, 6 Otos
The tank actually looked better before pruning, but I need to fill things out a bit. Once it grows back in, it'll be nice and bushy. The height of this tank (as opposed to the 30g) requires a lot more high growth before it has that full look to it. Once I set up the pressurized CO2 system, and upgrade the lighting, I should see even better growth than I'm getting now. As for the lighting, my plan is to replace the current setup with 2x96W (192W total) of PC lighting. I should be able to grow just about anything I want with 4wpg.
Sorry to be so longwinded with the description...here are the pics:
Full tank shot
Left side (What are those large leaf plants on the far left?)
Right side
Some close-ups
Driftwood cave with algae that has recently sprung up.....BBA?
My favorite pic....I call it my "poster shot"
I moved everything (lighting, plants, fish, driftwood) over from the 30gal but with a little bit of a twist. I liked the 3M ColorQuartz substrate so much that I decided to scrap the PFS I had in the 30gal and use the 3M stuff here too. I think this move really compliments the colors of the fish and the plants as well. Believe it or not, there are fish in this tank.....they just weren't in the mood for pics last night.
While I moved everything over from the 30gal tank, I also need to thank Jchillin (hygro) and rich311K (stargrass, christmas moss) for sending me some additional plants to work with. It really helped in filling out the height of this tank. Thanks guys!
I also have to give at least 75% of the credit to my GF. She did ALL of the aquascaping by herself with very little interference from me. My only contribution was insisting that she used the driftwood cave in the left front of the tank. I had to invoke my "Man of the House" rules to get that done.
She originally wanted to leave it out because she didn't want the driftwood to overpower the tank, but the fish love it.....especially the plecos. My job is to do the maintenance and keep the ferts in order, something I haven't quite mastered yet. I'm getting some algae that I think is BBA, but I'm not sure. Hopefully somebody could help me out here. I'm using Flourish, Flourish Trace, Nu-Salt for K, a KNO3 solution, and DIY CO2. No need to dose phosphate since I have 2ppm in my tap. I try to keep NO3 in the 20ppm range. I used to never have to dose NO3, but adding all these plants and more lighting really sucks it up quickly. I have been dosing about 2-3 times a week to keep up.
I feel kinda stupid in that I have no idea what most of these species are. Hopefully someone here can help me out with that. The Hygro, Stargrass, Anubias, Water Sprite, Crypts, and Wisteria are the obvious ones. I also have some Alternera reinickii (sp?) in there somewhere too.
Here are the specs:
Tank: 46 Gallon AGA Bowfront tank w/matching black stand
Lighting: Odyssea 96W PC 12,000K bulb, AGA 50W Dual Fluorescent (2x25W)
Filtration: Rena XP2 canister, Penguin 350B HOB
CO2 Injection: DIY yeast mix with 2-1gal juice bottles
Heater: 200W VisiTherm Stealth
Substrate: 3M ColorQuartz Black (S-grade)
Decorations: 3 pieces of Malaysian Driftwood
Plants: See above
Stock list: 2 Bolivian Rams, 6 Neon Tetras, 6 Bloodfin Tetras, 4 Corydoras trilineatus, 3 Clown Plecos, 6 Otos
The tank actually looked better before pruning, but I need to fill things out a bit. Once it grows back in, it'll be nice and bushy. The height of this tank (as opposed to the 30g) requires a lot more high growth before it has that full look to it. Once I set up the pressurized CO2 system, and upgrade the lighting, I should see even better growth than I'm getting now. As for the lighting, my plan is to replace the current setup with 2x96W (192W total) of PC lighting. I should be able to grow just about anything I want with 4wpg.
Sorry to be so longwinded with the description...here are the pics:
Full tank shot
Left side (What are those large leaf plants on the far left?)
Right side
Some close-ups
Driftwood cave with algae that has recently sprung up.....BBA?
My favorite pic....I call it my "poster shot"
