Low Tech Rio 180

[ATK!!!]

After being very patient, I am finally setting up my Juwel Rio 180 that I got for Christmas! The general plan is to end up with a very heavily planted low tech tank that I can leave for months between water changes. This weekend we added in the substrate (Tetra Plant complete capped with fine black gravel for plants) and then decided how to arrange the Sumatra wood we bought earlier in the month, as you can see in these pics:

The contrast in sandy substrate and fine gravel

A vague outline of where the wood will be (in real life it will be buried slightly in the substrate)

Adding in water, for some reason some of the gravel floated until we prodded it with a ruler!

Well since then we have been to our local fish shop, only to find he had run out of most of his fast growing stem plants, leaving us with a relatively small range of plants. In the end we bought:

3 Large pots of Crypt Wendtii tropica
2 pots of Crypt Beckettii petchii
1 pot of Crypt Willsii
2 Large pots of Hygrophila polysperma
1 Anubias barteri coffeefolia
1 Large unspecified Anubias

I know this isn't ideal, however he will be restocking on Wednesday and I am hoping to get a lot more varying stem plants and some Xmas moss to cover the wood along with some Dwarf hairgrass to cover up the empty patches on the bottom!

Here are some pictures so far, there has recently been a bacterial bloom so I apologise if its hard to make out what everything looks like:

FTS

A closer view of the wood with attached anubias

A rather bizzare weight for holding the wood down!

The rather beautiful unidentified Anubias (any ideas!)

If anyone has any ideas for plants or layout feel free to say! Thanks for looking

 

[ZoddyZod]

very nice start! Shall be following this....

 

[Biulu]

Nice! Do I see some mexican 10 peso coins in that bottle? . Your anubia could be a coffeefolia...

 

[ATK!!!]

Thanks for the compliments! They're actually all £2 coins but mostly strange ones with the pics on them Are you sure it's a coffeefolia? It doesn't look anything like the other one that's in there which is definately a coffeefolia... It's got relatively light coloured leaves that are much smaller than the other Anubis in there if that helps!

 

[Biulu]

The colour doesn't say much, as this depends also upon light plus the availability of nutrients. How big is the plant/leaf? If it is small, like leaves around 3-4 cm, it could be the barteri var. nana.

 

[Malawi MaD]

Tank is looking nice already, ive had that gravel before, it always use to float.

 

[ATK!!!]

Well yesterday I bought some more plants to fill the gaps I had left behind last time! I bought some Christmas moss that, after a lot of effort is now tied to the main piece of wood. I also added in the smaller piece of what I believe to be Manzanita wood (any suggestions as to what it is would be welcome!). Sadly both pieces will not fit so I have added one, hoping that the shop will take the other back for credit...

The new plants added include:
Two pots of Alternantherea reineckii 'Pink'
One pot of Nymphoides sp. "Taiwan"
One pot of Hygrophila corymbosa 'Siamens 53B'
One pot of Echinodorus 'Ozelot Green' (Ozelot Sword)
And of course, two bunches of Christmas moss

I am hoping that the Alternantherea will stay red, but in this Low tech set up I doubt that will happen. Also, I am hoping that the Sword will be manageable and not take over half of the tank, in which case it'll have to go . On a lighter note, the bacterial bloom seems almost over and there are only a few particles left in the water. I will be leaving the tank in this state for now to see how everything grows out and then I will choose what to do next in a few weeks.

Here are some pics to show the progress :

Another FTS:

The right of the tank with the new wood:

The left of the tank, with the sword (it's meant to have spots btw ):

A close up of the moss and the tips of the Alternantherea poking through the Crypts:

So that's it for a week or so, as always any tips or suggestions are more than welcome!

 

[BETTY BOO]

Well yesterday I bought some more plants to fill the gaps I had left behind last time! I bought some Christmas moss that, after a lot of effort is now tied to the main piece of wood. I also added in the smaller piece of what I believe to be Manzanita wood (any suggestions as to what it is would be welcome!). Sadly both pieces will not fit so I have added one, hoping that the shop will take the other back for credit...

The new plants added include:
Two pots of Alternantherea reineckii 'Pink'
One pot of Nymphoides sp. "Taiwan"
One pot of Hygrophila corymbosa 'Siamens 53B'
One pot of Echinodorus 'Ozelot Green' (Ozelot Sword)
And of course, two bunches of Christmas moss

I am hoping that the Alternantherea will stay red, but in this Low tech set up I doubt that will happen. Also, I am hoping that the Sword will be manageable and not take over half of the tank, in which case it'll have to go . On a lighter note, the bacterial bloom seems almost over and there are only a few particles left in the water. I will be leaving the tank in this state for now to see how everything grows out and then I will choose what to do next in a few weeks.

Here are some pics to show the progress :

Another FTS:

The right of the tank with the new wood:

The left of the tank, with the sword (it's meant to have spots btw ):

A close up of the moss and the tips of the Alternantherea poking through the Crypts:

So that's it for a week or so, as always any tips or suggestions are more than welcome!

very natural

 

[Ps3Steveo]

Nice, I really like this, haven for fish with all those hidey holes.

 

[ATK!!!]

Thanks again everyone, all of the plants seem to have started to root in and are busy growing up to the surface (some have already made it!). I will be thinking about possible stocking soon so some help would be appreciated! So far I am definately going for a Yellow/orange bristlenose or two, along with my army of 20+ CRS shrimp from the smaller tank and I was hoping to get just one large shoal of a good looking shoaling fish (suggestions needed!) and the rest is all a mystery. Any ideas for other fish to think about adding would be very welcome!

 

[NathanPrince]

I found Harlequins to be great shoaling fish, look really nice in planted tanks too. Considering Ember Tetras next though, Steve has just got a shoal and really likes them so that's another idea?

There's so many choices for shoals, Neons/Cardinals, Harlequins, Various Tetras (just nothing nippy like black widows ) Lamp eyes are also really nice little fish, could have a massive shoal of those!

Tanks looks great, keep up the good work

 

[Biulu]

My favourites are hengeli or lambchop rasbora. Very closely related to the harlequins but just nicer in colour.

 

[ATK!!!]

I recently saw a picture of some Celestial Pearl Danios and I was stunned by how beautiful they were. I had a little research and they seem to be very small, a lot of people keep them in <10 gallon tanks, do you think they would be a viable option? I quite like the Hengeli Rasbora as well so thanks for the pointer! I've already kept Cardinal tetra so I would like a change from that sort of fish, although there are so many different types of other shoaling fish I think its going to be hard to choose!

 

[NathanPrince]

CPD's are really little fish, would need quite a few I reckon to make a noticeable shoal in a Rio 180. Very nice fish though.

I usually just walk around my LFS's until something catches my eye, then research it on my phone and go from there. Probably not the best way of going about things but I've not ran into a problem yet if you take the time to research. I've stumbled across loads of new fish just by wandering for hours in shops haha.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

You'd be looking at a lot of money for a large CPD shoal too.