Guppy Grass

[thumper_65590]

Been a long time since I posted. Its been hectic this past 6-8 mo. Anyway, I have am taking my goldfish tank a new direction since my last fancy tail died a few days ago (5 years after getting him). I have aquired 2 male and 4 female guppies for the tank. It is an Oceanic 50 Gal octogon tank. It has a footprint of about 2 foot, but is about 3 foot tall. I was wondering if I could get guppy grass to grow in this tank? I would like it to be a lightly planted tank. It sets in our dining room and is exposed to indirect sunlight, and I also have just a basic single bulb flourecent hood on the top of it, so it would definately be a low light tank. What would be some good plants to have in it if guppy grass wouldn't be for the fry to hide in? Thanks for the help.

 

[wildroseofky]

Guppy grass might grow. I have problems with it in my highlight tank but found some growing in the corner of my tank among some other plants. Seems it likes the lower light. Anubias or Java fern would grow in low light. for floating plants you could try water lettuce or duckweed. They will stay small but would still grow. I have grown them in a bucket set in front of a window. I have also had good luck with Riccia Fluitans floating in a lower light tank.

 

[thumper_65590]

I wish I had a better idea of how much light my tank actually gets. I do know that it gets enough that i get some algae growth. My pleco does a good job of keeping it under control, so I'm not getting an absurd amount of light, but I should get sufficient light for low light plants. I would like something that I could plant in the substrate and let it grow up towards the top of the tank instead of floating, as that would I believe choke off the light from the top of the tank. I will try to post a picture of the tank later so everyone can get an idea of it and the placement of it in the house.

 

[wildroseofky]

You could rewire the hood and change the light to at least three bulbs. That would get you to low light. Lots of instructions online on how to modify the hood if you think that might be something you could do. You could also buy a small T8 or T5 fixture and attach it to the inside of the hood with silicone or glue. Another option is to remove the hood and use some metal clamp lights you can buy at Walmart for around $8 with CFL bulbs in daylight range (6500k). You can get the bulbs in different wattage so you could use lower watt bulbs and get low light giving you more plant options. Good way to start getting a feel for how much you want to put into plants. I have seen single bulb T5HO fixtures on Amazon for around $30. They were in the garden section not the aquarium section. Lighting doesn't have to be expensive if you just want a few low light plants.

 

[thumper_65590]

how do I add a picture of the tank to my post?

 

[thumper_65590]

nm, figured it out. HEre are pics of the tank as it sits right now

 

[thumper_65590]

try this again.

 

[wildroseofky]

I like the tall tanks. They let the stem plants stretch their legs. LOL I would just buy one of the dome lights like this Bayco 10.5'' Brooder Clamp Light - Walmart.com and a spiral CFL bulb with a 6500k daylight bulb in say 23 watt bulb. Hang it over the tank and see if you enjoy plants. Then if you decide to get more into it you just buy higher watt bulbs. Then you can branch out into more expensive lights. LOL It gets to be addictive. I started cheap a couple of years ago and have slowly added. I have a couple of heavily planted tanks and still use those lights linked above. I grow high light plants in them. Even red plants which can be a pain. You just get lower wattage bulbs for lower light plants and higher wattage bulbs for higher light. You should be able to grow anubias, moss, java fern, bolbitus, bacopia, and ludwigia. There are a lot of low light plants that would work. Here is a link to a list of low light plants. Low Light Plant List | AquaScaping World Forum

If you have a higher budget and want to go with something better I would look at the Ray II brand of lights. I keep seeing them mentioned and they seem to have great reviews. I do not know much about the higher cost brands because I am cheap and on a low income so I tend to go the lowest cost way. I use the Oddysea light from Aquatraders and have had great luck with them. They are the lowest cost tank specific lights I could find and they have worked great for me. I plan on upgrading my other tanks to their T5 because I like the lower profile. They take up less room above the tank than the clamp lights. Hopefully others will chime in who use other brands and have more experience.

 

[thumper_65590]

ok, couple of other questions. Right now I have glass over the top. Should I remove that, and also, how high above the water level should I set the light? I have a canister filter running in the tank and have a very good turnover rate, around 8 times an hour according to the specs of the filter (it is rated for a 150 gal tank if I remember correctly). I did remove the spray bar and it is free flowing out of the return close to the top of the tank. I also have the intake close to the bottom of the tank, about 4 inches or so from the bottom. Is this good placement, or should I get the return a little lower?

 

[thumper_65590]

I also have a large bubble wand in the tank. should I remove it once I plant the tank?

 

[wildroseofky]

You can leave the glass top on or take it off. It is a personal choice. It will not affect the light much if you keep it clean. Mine built up a lot of lime deposit so I took it off. Got tired of cleaning it. You can set the metal dome light directly on the glass if you use a low watt bulb. I had mine like that when I used 13 watt bulbs and then 23 watt ones. It did increase the tank temp though. When I switched to 26 watt bulbs I hung them above the tank. I had mine 4 inches above the water. With low watt bulbs in that deep of a tank, I would do around 6 to 8 inches above. Keeps the effect on temperature down and since you want low light plants it should work fine. The nice thing about hanging them is you can raise them up and down to increase the light getting into the tank. I had mine on a pull system so I could raise them when I cleaned the tank. On my 5 and 10 gallon tanks I just drove a couple of screws into the wall and clamped the lights to them. I have one at 4 inches above water level and the other at 10 inches. You can leave the bubble want or take it out. The extra water flow does not affect most plants. I had a power head in mine to disperse CO2 and the plants did fine.

 

[thumper_65590]

Will I need to add CO2 to my tank with the plants, or should they do ok? I don't have the funds to do a co2 system right now.

 

[Mebbid]

For low light you shouldn't need any carbon source. If you wanted one you could use excel instead. It's a good stand in for carbon since its quite cheap.

 

[thumper_65590]

What about a DIY CO2 system How hard would it be to implement a basic DIY CO2 system into the tank?

 

[wildroseofky]

It isn't hard at all to do DIY CO2. I do on all my tanks. All you need is a juice jug or large plastic container, a small bottle, airline tubing, check valve, and the yeast, water, and sugar solution. I use a power head in one tank to diffuse the CO2. You can buy a cheap internal filter and run the CO2 line into it to diffuse. Or you can stick the tubing into the intake of your filter and let the impeller chop it up and mix it with water. That is what I am doing in my other tanks. Youtube has a lot of good video on different ways to do diy CO2. Change the solution every two weeks and you are good to go. It works so well I haven't been able to justify buying a pressurized system.

 

[thumper_65590]

It isn't hard at all to do DIY CO2. I do on all my tanks. All you need is a juice jug or large plastic container, a small bottle, airline tubing, check valve, and the yeast, water, and sugar solution. I use a power head in one tank to diffuse the CO2. You can buy a cheap internal filter and run the CO2 line into it to diffuse. Or you can stick the tubing into the intake of your filter and let the impeller chop it up and mix it with water. That is what I am doing in my other tanks. Youtube has a lot of good video on different ways to do diy CO2. Change the solution every two weeks and you are good to go. It works so well I haven't been able to justify buying a pressurized system.

How hard would it be to use this on a canister filter system?

 

[wildroseofky]

A lot of forum members feed the CO2 directly into their canister filters. They say it does a nice job of getting it into the water. I have a small one canister filter on one of my tanks and I just drilled a hole into the intake line and glued the end of the tubing into that hole. So far it is working. At first the water started to back siphon into the CO2 line but once the pressure built up in the bottle it started flowing into the filter. Seems to be working great.

 

[thumper_65590]

A lot of forum members feed the CO2 directly into their canister filters. They say it does a nice job of getting it into the water. I have a small one canister filter on one of my tanks and I just drilled a hole into the intake line and glued the end of the tubing into that hole. So far it is working. At first the water started to back siphon into the CO2 line but once the pressure built up in the bottle it started flowing into the filter. Seems to be working great.

Could you post a picture of your setup?

 

[thumper_65590]

Could I have a few of you post some pics of the DIY CO setups? I have been looking at some of the other forums, but they really don't show them in action. Thanks everyone.

 

[wildroseofky]

Sorry about the delay in posting photos. I lost the thread and was waiting form someone to post to find it. Here are a few photos of my diffusion method and the bottles I use. The first one is the connection between my 29 gallon tank and bottles. http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/29gCO2_zps857a000b.jpg

The bottles I am using http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/IMAG0160_zps31f1ea90.jpg In my 10 gallon I just put the CO2 line directly into the intake pipe. http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/IMAG0158_zpsf27dbd63.jpg

In my 5 gallon I added a T connector and tied the CO2 line into the air flow going to my sponge filter. http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/3waysplitter_zps76f28ece.jpg

In my 20 gallon long I spliced the CO2 line into the intake line of my canister filter. I used an insulin syringe to make the connection. http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/20lco2_zpsa0120198.jpg
http://i1282.photobucket.com/albums/a530/Cyndie47/CO2setup20l_zps77c9aa8a.jpg

I am constantly looking for more ways to improve my setup and have changed my CO2 setup many times. So far this has worked out better than any I have tried.