Mistakes that you make without realizing in Low Tech Aquarium
- Thread starter Petet
- Start date
The first mistake I made, is try to believe one of these videos... Loll. No movement = no life.
Even with the most reassuring voice of Morgan Freeman you could not convince me otherwise.
There must be movement.
Anyway look at the video, you can easily see that, while it gives good advice, it's not what would have happened. and the bottom would never look clean as that.
No water changes and movement with this kind of substrate will end in pea soup.
Conclusion is "Use a thick substrate layer"... Without sustained water changes it would surely bring so much nutrients in the water layer that it would turn to murk. On day 390 there would be a noticeable thickness of mulm. If you can see it, lollllll.
No matter what... Mmmmm no... water movement.
The aquarium depicted in the video is a dump setup and as never went trough anything they/he/it is saying.
Even with the most reassuring voice of Morgan Freeman you could not convince me otherwise.
There must be movement.
Anyway look at the video, you can easily see that, while it gives good advice, it's not what would have happened. and the bottom would never look clean as that.
No water changes and movement with this kind of substrate will end in pea soup.
Conclusion is "Use a thick substrate layer"... Without sustained water changes it would surely bring so much nutrients in the water layer that it would turn to murk. On day 390 there would be a noticeable thickness of mulm. If you can see it, lollllll.
No matter what... Mmmmm no... water movement.
The aquarium depicted in the video is a dump setup and as never went trough anything they/he/it is saying.
fishorama
Fish Fanatic
Well, I didn't watch the long video but I don't agree with the premise. I've read about the Walsted method & it's a very few, very hardy fish & many plants. & I still wouldn't do it. I agree with MaloK, no water movement & no water changes; little oxygenation, no thanks.
Depending on how you top up evaporation water loss, it can lead to high mineral content using tap water or loss of some them if using RO. Plants & biologic processes need KH & can use up it up. That's something I learned the "hard way" when I first had very soft water & only a "medium" amount of plants at best. The dead leaves & "mulm" can help with nitrogen for the plants, but probably not all that plants need. It won't be a "pretty tank", it'll be a mess to look at, as MaloK said.
I consider myself to be low tech, but not no tech. No co2 of course. Low-medium lighting & plants that grow in that, albeit slower (less maintenance). No or few stem plants. I stock my tanks fairly lightly & I am very lame at fertilizing regularly. I prefer root tabs. I may wait to do water changes sometimes for a short while, but always remove some of the "concentrated waste" tank water. I almost never test my tanks (see "old tank sydrome") but I know I should more often especially with newly set up tanks. Each tank can be different...
I use 2 filters on most tanks. I can clean 1 every couple weeks. My husband helps scraping algae & will change water, but not vacuum the "debris" out. So only partial help, but I appreciate it.
Depending on how you top up evaporation water loss, it can lead to high mineral content using tap water or loss of some them if using RO. Plants & biologic processes need KH & can use up it up. That's something I learned the "hard way" when I first had very soft water & only a "medium" amount of plants at best. The dead leaves & "mulm" can help with nitrogen for the plants, but probably not all that plants need. It won't be a "pretty tank", it'll be a mess to look at, as MaloK said.
I consider myself to be low tech, but not no tech. No co2 of course. Low-medium lighting & plants that grow in that, albeit slower (less maintenance). No or few stem plants. I stock my tanks fairly lightly & I am very lame at fertilizing regularly. I prefer root tabs. I may wait to do water changes sometimes for a short while, but always remove some of the "concentrated waste" tank water. I almost never test my tanks (see "old tank sydrome") but I know I should more often especially with newly set up tanks. Each tank can be different...
I use 2 filters on most tanks. I can clean 1 every couple weeks. My husband helps scraping algae & will change water, but not vacuum the "debris" out. So only partial help, but I appreciate it.
I’m pretty open minded, but I didn’t even click it… I have enough experience to know that won’t work for me… and while I’m open to new ideas of doing things, if they won’t work for me, it’s just wasting my time…
New ideas of doing things? That's a 1970s tank, back when fish lived short lives. It's not an experiment - I had variations on that in my teens, and I regret doing that to fish.
It's an attractive idea because it's so convenient for us, and we buy ideas that suit us. At a certain point, you have to suit the life in the tank too - to me, that's a basic responsibility.
I got part way through and had an urge to grow my hair, wear flared pants and feel optimistic. But since that was a new idea, I've gone bald and seen the down sides of several systems, including that one. It's an idea that generates a guru every 15 years or so, and tries to sound legit by calling itself a Walstad based method, without using the serious research behind that style of tank.
I've always been an aquarium nerd, and always looked into the methods proposed. That one made sense when I was 17, and failed by my mid 20s when more sensible systems were proposed. They took work (water changes) and research (adapting the aquarium to the fish, and not shoehorning the fish into inappropriate aquariums), but it has been far better.
Been there, done that, sorry to see it regurgitated again and again.
It's an attractive idea because it's so convenient for us, and we buy ideas that suit us. At a certain point, you have to suit the life in the tank too - to me, that's a basic responsibility.
I got part way through and had an urge to grow my hair, wear flared pants and feel optimistic. But since that was a new idea, I've gone bald and seen the down sides of several systems, including that one. It's an idea that generates a guru every 15 years or so, and tries to sound legit by calling itself a Walstad based method, without using the serious research behind that style of tank.
I've always been an aquarium nerd, and always looked into the methods proposed. That one made sense when I was 17, and failed by my mid 20s when more sensible systems were proposed. They took work (water changes) and research (adapting the aquarium to the fish, and not shoehorning the fish into inappropriate aquariums), but it has been far better.
Been there, done that, sorry to see it regurgitated again and again.
A couple months ago I tried watching YouTube aquarium videos . Didn’t take me long to tire of them .
fishorama
Fish Fanatic
Weren't Walsted's tanks dirted too? Another bridge I'm not willing to cross. I know many have done them but for how long before all heck breaks out? It often does...or so it seems to me.
Germangood
New Member
Amazing advices for beginners
Will try on my smaller tank
Will try on my smaller tank
I haven't watched the videos myself but some very experienced members have warned against this type of tank.
The BIGGEST mistake i ever made on an aquarium was letting my brother put in toothpaste; having said that i did listen to the video and have a few comments:
The creator of the video is clearly pushing his agenda; while walstad method is a theory that can work though some limited water changes are now recommended by the person who pushed this method (Diane something or other); i.e, she has revised her approach over time.
-
However he does state some non-sense such as many of his comments on the snail. While it is useful tht snails eat left over food they do as a by product produce waste in exchange for eating extra food.
-
The comment on chemicals is both true and false.
-
He does a very poor job of explaining 'gas' in the substrate to the point of being a useless comment.
-
Now we run into a grey area - he talks about plants replacing the filter but what he is ignoring is that many fishes (including some of the fishes he keep) come from low density large water bodies. Anyway his push of many plants seems ill given. Don't get me wrong my low tech tanks are fairly dense in plants but as a replacement for filtration is weak in a close water environemtn - though there are some fishes that live in a more isolated environment and higher density.
-
Btw his tank is way over stocked. He talks about too many fishes but fail to note that his aquarium is densely populated and therefore per his own comment he is likely suffering water quality issues.
-
He talks about guppies are no no due to rapid breeding. Of course he never suffered from breeding cory (of which he has a few c. hastatus in his tank).
-
He is correct that excess food is really bad for water conditions but he said this already in part one when he talked about snails. Alas he makes a generic statement "do not overfeed" however he never actually talks about what constitutes over-feeding. Nearly everyone knows not to over-feed but have no clue wht is over-feeding. Even if no feed reaches the bottom of the aquarium you probably are still over-feeding.
-
I wish for once these vidoes would give easy instructions for beginners on what constitute over-feeding.
-
He suggest a thick substrate without defining thick - again another newbie mistake - the newbie video creator mistake being not defining what is thick. Also there are trade off because if the substrate is too thick of you can create anti-anaerobic pockets - he sort of alluded to this when he talked about gas in the substrate but he doesn't go into any useful details and some of these pockets can be deadly to fishes.
-
Anyway I didn't find the video that useful because the author was too casual in stating mistakes without quantifying terms.
-
I think the problem is i don't think a beginner would really understand how to use his video effectively - that is 'following' the instructions he provides i think they would fail badly because the details he doesn't provide are important to be successful. Also i would not recommend that a beginner start with the walstad method - if the aquarium is larger than a fish bowl. Too many things can go wrong and a filter really helps to correct these issues which a beginner is likely to make.
--
[New comment: I would say that this sort of aquarium works best if the population is very sparse - the thing is that even in my densely planted 20 long with 6 fishes (2 a. sp bluketa, and 4 otto); i still do 50% weekly water changes with pure ro water. Do i have to do water changes of this size and frequency with such low density - probably not but it works so why break it. The plants are growing gang busters and the fishes are breeidng and appear healthy - though i haven't noticed eggs from the oto which is a shame; however i use inert substrate and 3 or 4 root tabs every 6 months - no chemicals after all ro water has nothing in it that require removal].
The creator of the video is clearly pushing his agenda; while walstad method is a theory that can work though some limited water changes are now recommended by the person who pushed this method (Diane something or other); i.e, she has revised her approach over time.
-
However he does state some non-sense such as many of his comments on the snail. While it is useful tht snails eat left over food they do as a by product produce waste in exchange for eating extra food.
-
The comment on chemicals is both true and false.
-
He does a very poor job of explaining 'gas' in the substrate to the point of being a useless comment.
-
Now we run into a grey area - he talks about plants replacing the filter but what he is ignoring is that many fishes (including some of the fishes he keep) come from low density large water bodies. Anyway his push of many plants seems ill given. Don't get me wrong my low tech tanks are fairly dense in plants but as a replacement for filtration is weak in a close water environemtn - though there are some fishes that live in a more isolated environment and higher density.
-
Btw his tank is way over stocked. He talks about too many fishes but fail to note that his aquarium is densely populated and therefore per his own comment he is likely suffering water quality issues.
-
He talks about guppies are no no due to rapid breeding. Of course he never suffered from breeding cory (of which he has a few c. hastatus in his tank).
-
He is correct that excess food is really bad for water conditions but he said this already in part one when he talked about snails. Alas he makes a generic statement "do not overfeed" however he never actually talks about what constitutes over-feeding. Nearly everyone knows not to over-feed but have no clue wht is over-feeding. Even if no feed reaches the bottom of the aquarium you probably are still over-feeding.
-
I wish for once these vidoes would give easy instructions for beginners on what constitute over-feeding.
-
He suggest a thick substrate without defining thick - again another newbie mistake - the newbie video creator mistake being not defining what is thick. Also there are trade off because if the substrate is too thick of you can create anti-anaerobic pockets - he sort of alluded to this when he talked about gas in the substrate but he doesn't go into any useful details and some of these pockets can be deadly to fishes.
-
Anyway I didn't find the video that useful because the author was too casual in stating mistakes without quantifying terms.
-
I think the problem is i don't think a beginner would really understand how to use his video effectively - that is 'following' the instructions he provides i think they would fail badly because the details he doesn't provide are important to be successful. Also i would not recommend that a beginner start with the walstad method - if the aquarium is larger than a fish bowl. Too many things can go wrong and a filter really helps to correct these issues which a beginner is likely to make.
--
[New comment: I would say that this sort of aquarium works best if the population is very sparse - the thing is that even in my densely planted 20 long with 6 fishes (2 a. sp bluketa, and 4 otto); i still do 50% weekly water changes with pure ro water. Do i have to do water changes of this size and frequency with such low density - probably not but it works so why break it. The plants are growing gang busters and the fishes are breeidng and appear healthy - though i haven't noticed eggs from the oto which is a shame; however i use inert substrate and 3 or 4 root tabs every 6 months - no chemicals after all ro water has nothing in it that require removal].
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