hahaha. Yeah I am always tempted to disregard the 30 sec shake thing while I am doing it, thinking man, there is no way you have to shake this stuff for this long... I guess now I can shake with peace of mind, knowing that particular step is, in fact, value added.
Sticks & Stones - Journal
- Thread starter elwaine
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The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Not to get off topic, but where do you find drift wood like that? I live in Tampa and have been to half a dozen LFS store. I always check for good drift wood and have never seen anything like that. OTOH everytime I look at a truly amazing tank (which yours is shaping out to be) They have similar thin windy "finger" like drift wood. Is there a decent website to order it from?
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elwaine
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I was in a similar situation. I got tired of the same fat pieces of expensive wood from Africa - or where ever the LFS gets it from. So I went to a local garden center and bought the wood from them. However, what you see is not exactly what I bought in the sense that the pieces I purchased were just gangly, unattractive pieces. I had a picture in my mind's eye of what I was looking for... saw want I wanted in those pieces, and then cut the original branches to size. I then played around arranging them... intertwining them... re-cutting, etc., until I had exactly what I wanted.
BTW, it's Georgia bog wood and should be available in your area. (I live about 2 hrs south of you.)
Hope that helps.
Awesome!! Thanks, I'm still working on my first planted tank and its kinda sparatic and unplanned right now but in a few weeks I would like to re-do it like actually planned out. Is there a large chain garden center? I can only think of like home depot and wal-mart and they don't seem like they would have a huge selection.
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elwaine
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No... it's just a local store
marchmaxima
Aquarium Advice Addict
This is an awesome log and you've created a lovely tank.
Obvously the secret is the beer
Obvously the secret is the beer
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elwaine
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8 week follow up
It's time for a follow up, even though my background plants (the Potamogeton gayi on both sides) have not grown at all. The good news with the Potamogeton gayi is that they are putting down new roots. I read that the plant is quite slow to get going, but once it does, it will grow like the weed it is.
The HC should have covered the bottom by now - and it would have, except that I keep pulling it up trying to get rid of the d@mn cladophora algae. It's an easy algae to remove from most plants, but the small roots of the HC do not grab hold of the substrate I'm using (ADA's Amazonia) and nearly every time I try to remove the tangles of cladophora from HC, I uproot several plants. Then I toss out about 1/2 of those that I've uprooted because I can't remove all of the algae from the HC. What a PITA.
Nearly full view"
From a different angle:
Hidden cave:
Close up of cave... sometimes the Oto's hide in there. Sometimes I hide in there.
It's time for a follow up, even though my background plants (the Potamogeton gayi on both sides) have not grown at all. The good news with the Potamogeton gayi is that they are putting down new roots. I read that the plant is quite slow to get going, but once it does, it will grow like the weed it is.
The HC should have covered the bottom by now - and it would have, except that I keep pulling it up trying to get rid of the d@mn cladophora algae. It's an easy algae to remove from most plants, but the small roots of the HC do not grab hold of the substrate I'm using (ADA's Amazonia) and nearly every time I try to remove the tangles of cladophora from HC, I uproot several plants. Then I toss out about 1/2 of those that I've uprooted because I can't remove all of the algae from the HC. What a PITA.
Nearly full view"
From a different angle:
Hidden cave:
Close up of cave... sometimes the Oto's hide in there. Sometimes I hide in there.
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elwaine
Aquarium Advice Activist
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- Nov 11, 2008
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8 week followup - continued
Just another view:
The obligatory Oto shot. BTW, the dwarf hairgrass reaches a height of nearly 10 inches.
The shrimp are reproducing like mad. Note the little guy in the Fissendens at top right:
This is it for now:
Just another view:
The obligatory Oto shot. BTW, the dwarf hairgrass reaches a height of nearly 10 inches.
The shrimp are reproducing like mad. Note the little guy in the Fissendens at top right:
This is it for now:
FishCrazyBenBOMB
Aquarium Advice Addict
Everything is growing in great Larry, looks very natural looking. Love it. Keep it up man.
mimmim7
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
I've been looking at a lot of planted tank pictures lately to try to work up the guts to try it, and I really think this is one of my favorites! I can't think of another one this early in that looked this good. Keeping updating the pictures, please!
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elwaine
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Thank you for the comments. I have to post new pictures... hopefully later this week.
The HC hasn't covered the bottom because I'm still fighting Cladophora and I keep up-rooting the HC when trying to remove the algae. I'm getting frustrated. Maybe I should look for some other low ground cover to use up front.
The moss is looking terrific as it covers some of the driftwood branches.
The dwarf hair grass shows an interesting growth pattern: in high flow areas, it stays short ~ 6 inches long. In low flow areas it reaches 10 - 11 inches tall. That is just the opposite of what I would have expected from my reading. Plants are supposed to grow better in good flow areas. The theory is that the flow will distribute the ferts better and result in improved plant growth. Shows you what the experts know.
The Potamogeton gayi is hardly growing. It needs more light than I'm allowing, but if I up the light, the algae will grow faster, so the Potamogeton gayi might not work out in the dark back corner of the tank. However, the dwarf hair grass is growing there rather nicely. So I may just let things grow the way they want to. I prefer a "natural" look to a groomed look anyway.
I've added a dozen Gertrude's Blue Eyes rainbow fish... very cool little critters. The RCS are multiplying like... well, like shrimp. There are dozens of them. I've also added daphnia. The very small daphnia are eaten by the rainbow fish. The larger adults aren't eaten and might breed in the tank - providing a steady source of live food for the fish.
Ill post new pictures in a few days.
Good luck with your new project!!!
______________________
BTW, it's too early to tell, but I'm beginning to think that harder water slows down algae growth. Here's the saga for those interested:
I was keeping the aquarium water at a GH of 5-6. Then I got some rainbow fish. All of them died within a week. I never checked the GH of the water they were shipped in. The info on the internet is split vis-a-vis the best GH for the Gertrude's rainbow fish. The pro's say they prefer soft water. Some ignoramuses - like me - who actually have them in captivity, said they prefer hard water. So I measured the GH in the water that the next batch arrived in. The GH was 16. I slowly increased the GH in the tank to 10, and lowered the GH in the water with the fish to 10. It took about 8-10 hours to do that... although I should have done that over several days - not hours. Anyway, I got away with it. All tank inhabitants survived and all the rainbow fish survived and everyone is happy now some 3 weeks later. Anyway, since raising the GH in my tank to 10, it seems to me that the growth rate of the Cladophora has slowed a little.
The HC hasn't covered the bottom because I'm still fighting Cladophora and I keep up-rooting the HC when trying to remove the algae. I'm getting frustrated. Maybe I should look for some other low ground cover to use up front.
The moss is looking terrific as it covers some of the driftwood branches.
The dwarf hair grass shows an interesting growth pattern: in high flow areas, it stays short ~ 6 inches long. In low flow areas it reaches 10 - 11 inches tall. That is just the opposite of what I would have expected from my reading. Plants are supposed to grow better in good flow areas. The theory is that the flow will distribute the ferts better and result in improved plant growth. Shows you what the experts know.
The Potamogeton gayi is hardly growing. It needs more light than I'm allowing, but if I up the light, the algae will grow faster, so the Potamogeton gayi might not work out in the dark back corner of the tank. However, the dwarf hair grass is growing there rather nicely. So I may just let things grow the way they want to. I prefer a "natural" look to a groomed look anyway.
I've added a dozen Gertrude's Blue Eyes rainbow fish... very cool little critters. The RCS are multiplying like... well, like shrimp. There are dozens of them. I've also added daphnia. The very small daphnia are eaten by the rainbow fish. The larger adults aren't eaten and might breed in the tank - providing a steady source of live food for the fish.
Ill post new pictures in a few days.
Good luck with your new project!!!
______________________
BTW, it's too early to tell, but I'm beginning to think that harder water slows down algae growth. Here's the saga for those interested:
I was keeping the aquarium water at a GH of 5-6. Then I got some rainbow fish. All of them died within a week. I never checked the GH of the water they were shipped in. The info on the internet is split vis-a-vis the best GH for the Gertrude's rainbow fish. The pro's say they prefer soft water. Some ignoramuses - like me - who actually have them in captivity, said they prefer hard water. So I measured the GH in the water that the next batch arrived in. The GH was 16. I slowly increased the GH in the tank to 10, and lowered the GH in the water with the fish to 10. It took about 8-10 hours to do that... although I should have done that over several days - not hours. Anyway, I got away with it. All tank inhabitants survived and all the rainbow fish survived and everyone is happy now some 3 weeks later. Anyway, since raising the GH in my tank to 10, it seems to me that the growth rate of the Cladophora has slowed a little.
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elwaine
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Hi Fort,
The plants are growing just fine. See for yourself - it's a virtual underwater jungle (except that I'm still waiting for the plants in the back on the far right and left to fill in). I'm using Seachem's Equilibrium to raise the GH. My tap water is soft ~ 4 - 5 GH, so I add 3/4 tsp to each 2 gallons of water and that elevates the GH to about 9.
There is so much depth to the tank and that doesn't show on these flat images. I'm not trying to boast, but the tank looks sooooooo much better than it appears in these photos because of the depth and layering of the plants and moss-covered driftwood. Also, the two caves don't photograph well as they appear very dark in the photos. One of these days, when I'm ambitious, I'll shoot HDR (high dynamic range) photos and process them in Photoshop so you can see how great they look.
Notice how tall the dwarf hair grass is on the left side - where it gets very little residual current, as opposed to the shorter high flow grass at the right.
In this one you can glimpse the dominant male Gretrude's Blue Eye Rainbow at the mouth of his lair.
The plants are growing just fine. See for yourself - it's a virtual underwater jungle (except that I'm still waiting for the plants in the back on the far right and left to fill in). I'm using Seachem's Equilibrium to raise the GH. My tap water is soft ~ 4 - 5 GH, so I add 3/4 tsp to each 2 gallons of water and that elevates the GH to about 9.
There is so much depth to the tank and that doesn't show on these flat images. I'm not trying to boast, but the tank looks sooooooo much better than it appears in these photos because of the depth and layering of the plants and moss-covered driftwood. Also, the two caves don't photograph well as they appear very dark in the photos. One of these days, when I'm ambitious, I'll shoot HDR (high dynamic range) photos and process them in Photoshop so you can see how great they look.
Notice how tall the dwarf hair grass is on the left side - where it gets very little residual current, as opposed to the shorter high flow grass at the right.
In this one you can glimpse the dominant male Gretrude's Blue Eye Rainbow at the mouth of his lair.
FishCrazyBenBOMB
Aquarium Advice Addict
Tank has grown in so much omg haha. Wish my hairgrass grew aswell as yours .
What kind of moss do you have on your dw, looks really cool.
.What kind of moss do you have on your dw, looks really cool.
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elwaine
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New haircut - New lens
I pulled out 13.7 tons of HM and discovered that the plants actually did not eat my driftwood... as I had thought. Then, to get the feeling of depth in the photos, I used my new ultra-wide angle Nikon lens on a full format digital camera.
I pulled out 13.7 tons of HM and discovered that the plants actually did not eat my driftwood... as I had thought. Then, to get the feeling of depth in the photos, I used my new ultra-wide angle Nikon lens on a full format digital camera.
FishCrazyBenBOMB
Aquarium Advice Addict
Still didn't answer my question what time of Moss your have on that dw of yours
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elwaine
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Still didn't answer my question what time of Moss your have on that dw of yours
Sorry, Ben. It's Fissindens fontanus. It took a couple of months for it to really get nice and full. For driftwood covering, I prefer the Fissindens fontanus to java moss.
