125 L. / 33 Gal. Low Light, Low Maintenance

[George Farmer]

Full working shot

 

[joecoral]

Full working shot

Very tidy looking! nothing like my tank..... lol

 

[DarkEntity]

Tank looks great, pity mine looks nothing like that tidy inside either lol..

 

[RadaR]

Really jealous mate. It looks excellent. Your best yet IMO.
Im loving low-tech at the moment. I had to make my 125L low-tech when I went away to Italy. It's never looked better!

 

[reggieschuey]

ENvy envy !, haha, geroge whats the thing next to your red co2 cylinder? is that your co2 reactor ? ,

 

[George Farmer]

Thanks.

geroge whats the thing next to your red co2 cylinder? is that your co2 reactor ?

It's a bubble counter attached to the CO2 cylinder. You can just see my glass/ceramic diffuser inside the tank on the right, the white line.

 

[mlawson]

I really like this tank, personally I prefer it to your previous high-tech layout, even though you don't have to do half the work for it!

Ferns and Crypts are some of my favourite plants, and you have created a great effect there.

How about a group of Otos? They are great little characters and clean up some algae too (not that you need have any).

 

[George Farmer]

Thanks mate.

Otos, schmotos!

Only kidding. Great little fish but I'm keeping the Asian theme going (except the A. nana).

I do get a few pest snails so I'm considering a group of Botia striata, or the more expensive Yasuhikotakia sidthimunki (dwarf chain loach).

The shrimp are keeping any algae in check except some minor black spots on the C. parva and Anubias. I've learnt to live with that.

 

[john starkey]

Hi George, i must say it looks really nice it gives me inspiration for my next set once i get to grips with my present one, i would like to try a low light set up in a tank of about 60x45x45, regards john

 

[George Farmer]

Latest shot -

I'm considering swapping the Crypt balanse for Cyperus helferi.

The balansae is well over 3 foot long now and blocking a lot of light (it's only 1wpg to start with), and the lower crypts are showing signs of light deprivation.

I've always like Cyperus, but I may have to add some more light to have success.

I'll see if I can blag some anyway. Worth a try...

 

[mlawson]

My C. Balansae is about 3 inches!

Still looks great, I think Cyperus helferi would look very nice in there.

 

[Castellop123]

I'm very fond of the C. Balansae, maybe reove the Balansae on the right and replace it with Cyperus helferi...

 

[RadaR]

Tank looks beautiful, George.
I can't make my mind up about the Cyperus helferi. As you say, it may require more light. However I have come to learn that sometimes low light tanks can be quite suprising and so it may be fine. But also because the leaf structure may be too thin on the Cyperus, and therefore look out of place in a tank filled with java fern, crypts and anubias, which compose of mainly broad leaves. Just my thoughts

 

[Liam]

The tank does look great still, the balanse does look a bit too overpowering even if it weren’t blocking the light. It is a beautiful plant, you could just keep cutting the oversized leaves off at the base, if you do decide to remove them they have very big root systems so I would just cut all the leaves off and then cut the top off the crown (well where the leaves come out), I don’t think the rotting roots cause any problems, removing them would be very messy, I have tried it with other crypts I wanted to keep. I never grew Cyperus but it looks a great plant in pics and I expect it would work very well in this beautiful tank.

 

[DevUK]

This tank will be featured in a forthcoming issue of PFK magazine, with professional photo shoot. I will describe step-by-step how I created it.

Which issue was this featured in guys? I'm considering a back issue purchase Might finally sort a subscription out too