Recent content by Tparkening

Sometimes when I find road kill on my trips out of town, upon return I cut it up and feed it to my cichlids. They love it and are so happy- I swear they smile. No hate from my direction brother.

Crypt would like an enriched substrate throw some roots ferts underneath your crypts.

The aquatek systems on amazon are pretty good bang for the buck. If you want a dual stage I would shop the plantedtank and barrreport forums.

It all looks really healthy bud nothing to worry about. The java fern looks really nice.

Patience is necessary for the planted hobby. Do not worry about it so much. Ask questions when your plant leaves are yellow or something does not seem like it is going "right" and we will help steer you to a solution.

The sword will send out runner plants. They will basically grow around the main plant. You can trim them out and replant if you desire. Good luck Tony! Have fun propagating those babies.

Good info Scales. Crypt parva is a great small species and I think undulata is also smaller and similar looking to wendtii.

Even a 10 gallons is very small for a standard amazon sword. If babies is what you are concerned with- you will enjoy seeing the baby plants forming on the leaves of java fern. I don't see you enjoying the amazon sword all that much and once it's leaves spread you may have trouble growing...

The idea of amazon sword in a 3 gallon is awesome- these plants gets huge. Crypts and more java variants are a great idea for this tank.

Looks nice and healthy. It's funny seeing the fluval u filter, that was the filter I used in one of my first planted tanks.

You could switch over to dry ferts and look into EI or PPS pro dosing. This will save you money but it does require mixing of your own ferts. GLA has a nice PPS pro package on their website as well as all of the components needed for EI dosing. Based on the plants that you have now CO2 is not...

Yeah trial and error, better to undershoot than over shoot if you have fish in the tank. Just realize the output is kinda parabolic that's why people run two bottles feeding into one bubble counter then to tank. Change one bottle every week, leaving the older bottle alone, and vice verse for the...

I have a gla inline diffuser which is identical to the up aqua and I still have visual bubbles in my tank. The insta mix looks like a better option to me.

A reactor is what you are going to want to shoot for to cut down on visible CO2 in the water column. There are a few DIY plans online you can follow if you do not want to buy something premade. An inline diffuser may help a little but without a large chamber to mix in bubbles will still be visible.

Why even say this? Osmocote plus has become a staple in the planted tank hobby for enriching poor or depleted substrates. Why don't you head over to the dirt tank section and harp on them for using commercial garden soils in their tanks? There are so many commercial products that are cheaper and...