I wanted to let everyone see what i have been upto with my tanks. I have been into aquatics for over 3 years. It all started when my wife brought home 2 gold fish in a 2 1/2
gal hex. soon after they went into a 10
gal because I couldn't stand seeing them in that little tank. She then got a 28
gal bowfront from her sister for free and we put those gold fish in that tank. The Wife decided to add some more goldfish to the tank from walmart one day and introduced Ick into the tank aswell. After all the fish had died, I found this site. I learned a lot since then.
The Wife no longer wanted anything to do with fish so the tank became mine.
the 28
gal bowfront had 15 watts of t-8, so I started with some Anacharis. That kept me happy for some time, but looking at all of those great looking tanks started to get to me. I was chomping at the bit to buy a bigger tank with more lighting to really jump into the planted realm. so i finally talked the wife into letting me buy a 75
gal tank with stand. I also talked the petsmart manager into upgrading the light to a two bulb t-10 instead of the single bulb that was standard. So now I am at 1
wpg not to shabby for a newcomer. Started off with some more anacharis and then added some java moss, java ferns, and some lace java ferns. That did it for awhile. You know how it goes, the more you read the more you want to spend.
I was reading someones post about ODNO lighting and thought that would be a cheaper way of getting some more light out of my setup. so I went ahead and did that. I added another ballast to my two T-10 light so I have them running at 2 x ODNO approx 140 watts. that puts me in the 2
wpg ballpark. no
CO2 yet
now onto the 28
gal. reading LWB post with the walmart
CF bulbs on his 10
gal tank, I thought that would be a great way to save some money and get a fairly decent amount of light into my 28
gal tank. so i ordered a 24" strip and bought two 25 watt
CF 6500
K bulbs. Combine those bulbs with the original t-8 and that puts the 28
gal at approx 2.5
WPG.
now comes all the
CO2 fun. of coarse now that I have the lighting I need the
CO2. I knew what I needed to do after reading post after post about
CO2, but pressurized is out of the question atm due to christmas being so close. I read a post about the best method of
CO2 defussion in which Tom Barr suggested using a PH and a viewtainer and thats what I did. I went to petsmart and picked up some PH's and made some reactors, not quite what Tom had made, but simular. one
CO2 bottle for the 28
gal and 2 for the 75
gal. the levels where 30
PPM CO2 in the 28
gal and 25
PPM in the 75
gal. not to bad if you ask me. I got pearling in the 28
gal right away put not in the 75
gal. I was peeved. I WANT PEARLING. LOL. I rushed to homedepot and picked up a shoplight (LOL) and two t-8's at 6700K (approx 3
wpg) and it sits perfect behind my duel strip. Now I have pearling!!!!
The
CO2 has remained constant for over a week. I am pretty happy about that. The plants are growing like crazy. I owe many thanks to everyone who posts in the planted section of this site and that is why I am posting this. I mostly troll. IE I have learned a lot from everyone. Again Thanks, Randy.
PS here are some recent pics (work in progress)
current plants:
Egeria densa
asian ambulia
Bacopa caroliniana
ludwigia repens
Bacopa monnieri
ROTALA rotundifolia
Microsorum pteropus
Vesicularia dubyana
Microsorum pteropus 'Windeløv'
Hygrophila difformis
Heteranthera zosterifolia
CRYPTOCORYNE wendtii
Najas guadalupensis
Aponogeton crispus
Vallisneria americana
PSS. Special thanks to evercl92, shawnryan1977, and Hara for the plants.
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