Finally tearing down ugly 57g, building new 36g to replace it!

Wills said:

Great news that you are ready to go Just remember to enjoy it and you don't have to get it right first time its a process. But make sure you get some music on or TV, snacks to hand etc make it a bit of an event!

Do you have the list of plants you are going to be putting in? Would be interesting to see

Wills

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These are the new plants that just arrived;
red root floaters! Have wanted these for the longest time.
Hyrophilia pinnatifida
Myriophyllum mattogrossense
Lobelia cardinalis (tried this once before and failed, but giving it a second go)
Lilaaeopsis novea-zealandia
Bolbitis heudelotii
Echinodorus horemanii Green

Then there's a bunch of plants I'll transfer from my current tanks, including a large sword, some crypts, maybe vallis, some hydrocotyle tripartita "Japan", some buces, more crypts. I have a load of plants that I don't know the name of, or at least the variety, so I'll post some pics of those and see if someone can ID them for me.

Looks amazing! You did really good picking out a piece if wood for in your setup!

Rocky998 said:

Looks amazing! You did really good picking out a piece if wood for in your setup!

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Thank you Rocky

@Wills In a different thread, you introduced me to the idea of using zippered nylon media bags filled with gravel in order to add height underneath the substrate, so I ordered some that arrived today! Have half-filled some and tried them under the sand, and I think it's gonna work brilliantly! I'm not making a huge height difference, just want the back to have a bit of height to add depth to the view, and a bit higher on the left side where the wood arrangement will be at it's highest. Still fiddling around with it, since the sand is already in the tank.

The weird part is that I had MD Fishtanks playing in the background while I worked, and you recommended him too, and he just happened to be doing the same thing with the nylon bags while I was doing it! Funny coincidence He also mentioned that the gravel helps give the plant roots space to grow, and since the back and left will have my larger plants like the swords, that's perfect.

I've temporary put the plants (besides the two that are in in-vitro tubs) in the pygmy tank since they looked like they needed some water. Buys me some time to fiddle with the substrate and hardscape.

Feeling a lot more enthused and positive about it, thank you @Wills and @mbsqw1d !

AdoraBelle Dearheart said:

These are the new plants that just arrived;
red root floaters! Have wanted these for the longest time.
Hyrophilia pinnatifida
Myriophyllum mattogrossense
Lobelia cardinalis (tried this once before and failed, but giving it a second go)
Lilaaeopsis novea-zealandia
Bolbitis heudelotii
Echinodorus horemanii Green

Then there's a bunch of plants I'll transfer from my current tanks, including a large sword, some crypts, maybe vallis, some hydrocotyle tripartita "Japan", some buces, more crypts. I have a load of plants that I don't know the name of, or at least the variety, so I'll post some pics of those and see if someone can ID them for me.

Click to expand...

Thats cool I did say I got the bag idea from MD haha!

Your plant list looks really good, few tricky ones on there like the Pinnatifida and Bolbitis but good chances with them. The Myriophyllum could be ok - does best in lower temperatures, if this does not work go for a Limnophilla species, they look similar just not as fine leaves.

Chuck up any pictures of the plants you need ID'ing and make sure you get some progress pictures too!

Wills

Okay, nylon bags in place under the sand, have been playing with the hardscape.

Previous attempt:



Another try:


Third attempt:



Current attempt! I quite like this, the dragonstone is holding up the stick like wood piece (I don't want cories crashing into it if it's too low down) but I also feel like it's just way too much wood.
Thoughts and opinions and criticisms very welcome! Looking at the photos on the screen now is helping me get some perspective. Gonna try it now with the sticky-stick piece removed.

Looking really good! But can you take a step back and show us the full tank so we can see the full box of the tank?

Wills

I very much agree with the latest scape being the better of the previous attempts. The placement/angle/rotation of the first piece on the left is at its best, most natural look and feel, and that too for the branch looking one to the right of it Just take your time, even sleep on it if need be, unless you're in a rush to get some fish/plants moved in that is! I love the colour at the back, that blue/green contrast to that of the wood is perfect.
What's that spiky wood stuff? I'm not sure about it personally but then you'll likely be envisioning something else with the plants in place. Plus it'll all take on another feel once submerged.

Importantly, you have the stuff placed in a way that feels natural, which is the most challenging aspect. It looks like those pieces could have fallen into place if you know what I mean. They don't look like that in the earlier pics, so you definitely have the eye for it. It really is an art form. Getting random bits of wood to look natural inside of a glass box!

Tried it without the sticks, and with less pieces of wood overall.

It's hard to get a good pic of it when it's not underwater, but this base wood piece has a really cave-like curve to it that I don't want to hide (and I suspect the plecos will love!)


Attempt with less wood:


Hmm, now I think the wood pieces look too "placed", thank you @mbsqw1d for the compliment! But I really am just moving stuff around and hoping for the best! Decided against the spiderwood stick wood (I think it's spiderwood, but not sure what it is) I think sticking with the one type of bogwood will look better and more natural. But it's several smaller pieces, so pretty endless variety of ways to arrange it!

I'm not in a massive rush to move fish and plants, so can fiddle around it with it until I'm happy with it! The background colour is just the wall colour, a duckegg blue, but I have a black background sheet on the way!

@Wills I'll definitely try to get full tank shots, thank you!

Thinking on it, the wood pieces might become pretty invisible against a black background, which could look good, or really spoil the look. But I can try it each way once it's planted and filled, and see which looks better.

I really appreciate the thoughts and feedback! You guys are the best. Especially when I know how beautiful your own tanks are.

I'm still gonna be playing around with it and boring folks with tons of photos But I like having the photos, since it helps give me perspective, which is easy to lose when your head in inside the tank or right up against it. And if I decide a previous arrangement is what I want, I can re-create it! Too easy to forget how you'd done it before when you're changing it up a lot.

Tried again, and found an arrangement that I like the look of, was quite taken with it. But now that I'm sitting back and looking at the photos of it, and I think there's not enough clear space on the right hand side. There's a bit of a gap on the right, and room at the front, but given the amount of cories I have, I want them to have a decent amount of room to play. Plus it won't have the visual impact without more clear space on the right, I think?

Tried this first there's a smaller wood piece almost submerged between the rocks and the main wood, didn't like that, so removed that wood and moved the rocks closer - I like it better with the rock almost mixed into the wood arrangement. (2nd and 3rd pics)





Yeah... I like the arrangement, but you can see how close it reaches to the right tank wall. Not so happy with that.

Now I'm wondering if a centre island built on that large curved wood piece might work better.

The more I mess with it, the worse it looks... but it's late, so I'm gonna leave it alone now and work on it tomorrow. Will also look different in daylight. I also have a really hard time picturing how it'll look with plants, especially since I have no experience with some of these new plants.

Here's more of my messed up attempts though, just to prove to myself I tried it out a bunch of different ways!

I would get rid of the large solid piece and then work with the others. I have just pulled three large solid pieces out of my tank to make way for plants. They look fine to start with, but as your plants grow you will need more floor space.

I really like the twiggy bit of wood looks really natural and nice contrast to the other bits of wood, without it though I like the last picture, I think it flows nicely, you can imagine the current of a stream making the wood fit that way.

Wills