Well, my finger tips look like prunes, but I've done it!!!
The day didn't quite go as planned (my 20 month old daughter has a habit of wreaking havoc with the best laid ones
) so I finished a little later than I had hoped, but stage one is well and truly complete!
The day started off with an early morning dash to Maidenhead Aquatics at Harlestone...I must have been early as they were still doing the feeding rounds
I picked up a decent sized bag of fine gravel and then straight back home (well, not quite straight, I did have a quick look at all the fishes first!).
First job was then to start to clean up the Laterite...when you said it might take a bit of cleaning, you weren't wrong were you!!!!! After what seemed like 300 buckets of coffee coloured water, I finally got to the 'that's clean enough' stage...next to the gravel (which seemed like a joy to clean after the laterite!).
I had unpacked all of the plants from Greenline yesterday, and they had been sitting in a bucket overnight. I took them all out, one by one and took off any dead leaves and gave them a good rinse. I was amazed at quite how many there were in the 30" pack!
Lot's of them were not quite what I had expected, and seemed more like cuttings than actual plants, but I guess they'll do their thing after a while anyway. It was during this job that I realised I had made my first minor mistake...I think in hindsight I would have bought the labelled collection so that I knew what the hell it was going into my (oops...daughters) tank!
Next, I trapsed upstairs with the Laterite, Gravel and plants. I spread a black bin liner onto the floor and laid all of the plants out. Where obvious I put like plants together, and similar looking plants into groups...(height/colour).
I removed all of the existing plants from the tank and was happy to see that some of them had already started to put out some quite long roots. These were the plants that had sent out the vertical runners with new leaves/roots appearing every 1.5-2". I'm not entirely sure what they are (I'll have to do some research) but they have a mid green long leaf (smooth edged). Anyway, I cut these runners to make new plants and added them to my collection on the bin liner.
I removed 50% of the water and started to add the Laterite to the tank. I then gave it a good mix...to be honest, I think the most muck came from stirring up the gravel, so my cleaning job on the Laterite must have done the trick. I then added the extra gravel and gave it a gentle slope from front to back...I also added a gentler slope at the two sides, not quite an amphitheatre (sp?) but you get the idea
I then stared blankly at the plants - crunch time...and all of a sudden I felt a bit lost! Realising that it was a little bit to late to turn back I decided I just had to get on with it. Even though I didn't like the look of some of the plants, I decided to just plant the lot. I figured that I will see how they all react to the conditions and pull them out as necessary. As far as aquascaping goes...PAH! All I could even hope to do was plant the taller plants at the back and the shorter ones at the front. I figured I would then spend some time living with the tank and make adjustments over the coming weeks.
So, 30 minutes later, everything is sitting pretty ( well, sitting at least). I topped the tank back up and stared into a pea souper
I pulled out the original Juwel tubes and swapped them with my fancy pants Dennerle ones...(easy!). (The light from these is actually really pleasing on the eye)
Had a quick tidy up and then went downstairs to make a start with the CO2. Followed the instructions and plonked them in the tank! I have also adjusted the output of the filter to reduce surface agitation.
Fist impressions aren't bad! Not quite a masterpeice yet, but if all goes to plan, one in the making
I will try and get some pictures soon (and I'll have no sniggering when I do
)...thanks to everyone for their help...lets see where it takes me!
). I think I will need to invest in a hardness test too?
So far, I just have one piece of bogwood, quite a sturdy branch mid section...I also wanted some smooth pebbles, and after laughing at the prices the LFS's were charging, I ended up at a local stone merchants. They were selling some nice stones by the tonne...I explained I only wanted a few bit's for the daughters aquarium and they just told me to take what I wanted...no charge! 
