ChrisC
Fish Fanatic
Hey folks,
long time no update, I've been getting pretty slack. Anyways, for the last few months I've been researching and (more importantly) saving for a fw planted aquarium, knowing that this would have to be the tank to replenish my slowly decreasing enthusiasm for the hobby.
So the first port of call was Walstad's EOTPA book. A very technical book which has a lot of useful info in, I'd recommend it to anyone. I then finally gave in and bought myself Amano's Nature Aquarium Bks 1 & 2 (I couldn't get a copy of 3) and his Aquarium Plant Paradise book. All 4 of those books are truly awesome, and should be sitting on the bookshelves of any aquarist.
So now comes the aquarium; I wanted it to be a aquascaped aquarium which utilises alot of the things I've learnt from Walstad's book. This is as much an experiment for me as it is an aquarium and I will be learning (and asking lots of questions!) along the way, which is why I have not put this in the aquariums section.
The aquarium is 800Lx300Wx400D (mm) with a capactiy of rougly 96 litres.
As I did more research, I kept notes of what I found most interesting/important and so I'll post those up next.
Chris
NOTES: SUBSTRATES
(this post can be skipped by those just after the piccys
)
Ok so the first thing to research was the substrate. Below is a copy of my notes. I really should have a bibliography as this is an accumulation of notes from several internet sites and of course Walstad's book.
Substrate choice
A plain, washed gravel substrate guaranties failure with plants and quickly becomes toxic without an under gravel filter and frequent gravel vacuuming.
Soil immediately seeds the aquarium with nitrifying bacteria, and the decomposition of soil organic matter releases CO2, which is much needed in a new tank.
For soft water aquariums, potting soil may not provide great plant growth unless fertilised with Ca, Mg, K and bicarbonates, as potting soil is invariably acidic.
Ordinary garden soil and potting soil should not be mixed together, but both are suitable.
Clay has a 100,000 times the nutrient capacity that sand does. (This could explain Aqua Soil’s success.)
Iron in the substrate is highly detrimental – Laterite is iron based. Iron will kill plants and roots and will support algae growth.
Acid sulfate soils can cause major problems when in aerobic conditions.
Preparing the Soil Substrate
Soak soil in water with added EDTA water conditioner to bind heavy metals.
Add charcoal in the filter for first few weeks to help remove impurities and spikes in water levels.
Soaking soil for 6 weeks prior to use increased average growth by 230%. Anything less then that had no effect.
Substrate fertilisation
In most cases, substrate fertilisation is either not helpful or detrimental. Best plant growth (under aquarium conditions) often appears to be not in the most fertile soil, but in the one that is the least toxic.
A small amount of well-decayed organic matter (e.g. kitchen compost) mixed with a mineral garden soil when the tank is first set up would probably be ok.
Peat moss is not advisable due to the acidity potentially bringing heavy metals into the soil solution.
Inorganic fertilisers can become toxic in submerged soils such as water lily fertilisers due to anaerobic conditions causing hydrogen sulfide toxicity problems.
Anaerobic substrates
If plant growth becomes too low the plants will not oxygenate the substrate and it will become anaerobic.
Anaerobic sediments are problematic with problems from heavy metals, hydrogen sulfide, low Redox & organic acids.
Roots require oxygen. When roots cannot obtain sufficient oxygen due to a very low Redox, they have to use the very inefficient fermentation, which slowly drains the energy from the plant and reduces growth rate and nitrogen uptake. A very high redox though reduces growth rate.
Over time the surface of the sediments becomes blocked with large mulm accumulations making the ciritcal oxidised microzone anaerobic. This mulm must be removed.
Fish will not eat food as readily off an anaerobic sediment surface.
Stunted roots or blackening of roots = symptoms of Hydrogen Sulfide toxicity.
Plants turning brown and dieing, plants detaching from roots and floating to surface & problems with algae = symptoms of Iron Toxicity.
Plants in the substrate
Plants have a major effect on the sediment ecology.
Plant roots release considerable oxygen and organic compounds, encouraging bacterial activity in the rhizosphere, which is the sediment area within 1-2mm surrounding the plant roots.
Oxygen released from plant roots helps reduce the chance of the surface of the substrate becoming anaerobic.
Oxygen released from plant roots helps greatly increase denitrification in the deeper sediment layers.
Soil substrates with rooted plants seem to do well indefinitely without any maintenance such as gravel vaccuming.
The hi-tech aquarium approach
The commercial under gravel additives provides about 1/50 of the soil volume used in the low-tech approach, thus providing a greater reservoir of plant nutrients, and provides CO2 due to decomposition.
Hi-tech aquariums with CO2 injection, fertilisation and commercial substrates often show spectacular growth for about 1 year before giving out, unless and under gravel heater cable is used, which continually “wash†the substrate.
By removing all mulm with weekly maintenance, the hi-tech approach stops the substrate from renewing it’s nutrient reservoir.
CO2 injection compensates for the lack of CO2 due to decomposition with soil substrates.
Substrate fertiliser and heavy fertilisation of the water column compensate for smaller reserve of plant nutrients.
Regular cleaning of the substrate prevents build up of mulm.
There is no guarantee that a gravel additive, just because it comes in an expensive package rather than a shovel, entails less risk then ordinary soil.
Chris
More miscellaneous notes...
Nitrogen Uptake
Order of preferred nitrogen uptake:
Ammonia
Nitrite
Nitrate
Nitrite will only be taken up once Ammonia has run out, nitrate will only be take up once nitrite has run out.
Filters convert ammonia and nitrite to nitrates, thus depriving plants of ammonia.
The low-tech approach
The plants purify the water, not the filter.
Water changes are less necessary as there is a lower build up of nitrogen.
The hi-tech approach
The filter converts the ammonia and nitrite to nitrates, which creates a nitrate build up.
Regular water changes remove nitrogen, not the plants. Macro nutrient fertilisation compensates for this.
Sources of plant nutrients
The three main sources of plant nutrients in the low-tech aquarium:
Water
Soil
Fish Food
Heavy feeding of fish
A water change of 30% every 3 months helps reduce the chance of any major build ups in levels.
Nutrient Removal
The major nutrient removal is from plant pruning.
Water changes and cleaning are kept to a minimum.
The hi-tech approach
Regular additions of macro/micro fertilisers and the substrate are the major sources of plant nutrients in the hi-tech aquarium.
Water changes and plant pruning are the main sources of nutrient removal in the hi-tech aquarium.
PLANTS IN THE LOW-TECH AQUARIUM
Begin the tank with a large selection of different plant species and see which establish well.
Begin the tank with a large mass of plants so they can establish themselves before algae do.
Emergent plant growth should be strongly encouraged.
Always ‘overstock’ with plants.
Chris
I had a hope that I would build up a large album of images which I could then use for a photo diary but unfortunately due to a system reformat I may have lost all of those.
I may have a couple of odd images on the camera itself though, I'll check in the morning.
Anyways, after a couple of months of being obsessive, I made my choices:
Substrate: Garden Soil + Plain Gravel
Ferts: Pro-Plant pouch thingy's from Greenline
Filter: External
Lighting: 2x 18W (1.6 wpg)
CO2: Hagen Fermentation
Water changes: Alternating between 10 ltrs a week and 5 ltrs a week.
This I decided to be a fair balance between the ability to grow demanding plants and keeping maintenance + costs down.
Chris
Next was the interesting part - shopping! (ok, it was internet shopping, so I can still escape with my masculinity
)
Greenline to the rescue:
10 x bunches of Weeping Christmas Moss
12 x assorted mixed leaded bunches
10 x bunches of Java Moss
1 x Anubias Var Nana
1 x Anubias Lancelota
1 x Anubias Baterii
5 x mixed floating plants
2 x bunches dwarf miniature hair grass
3 x Pro-Plant pouch thingys
1 x 25 plant pot luck deal
The focuses being on a wide variety of plants and aerial growth. I wanted to experiment with Anubias in this tank, but god they're so expensive!
I also had a fair bit of crytocoryne bullosa, aete...ajheakd....as (can't exactly remember the latin name ) & java moss left over.
Chris
Okkkk I found a fair few of my piccys on camera.
Anyways, using my amazing artist skills (
), I came up with a planting plan & order.
Hardscape
Anubias + Christmas moss on wood
Add in background plants
Finish off by adding foreground crypts and hairgrass, along with a moss carpet + floating species
Chris
Friday afternoon - large chunky box full of plants arrive from greenline. Long weekend ahead....
Tank drained and ready (didn't have any time to do any cleaning up as I had the current fish stock in a bucket)
Bag of washed gravel and a bucket of dirt ready for use. :thumb:
Soil in. For the sake of briefness, I won't go into the details of how I soaked and prepared the soil, unless requested.
Gravel in.
Quick test just to make sure the wood fits. (yeah I know, I stuck the peices in the wrong way round)
This is where the piccies start dissapearing. Anyways, I filled it up and did a couple of water changes and filled it up about 2/3rds.
Then the hardscape went in:
5 hours of soild planting later I finished.
Chris
Chris
I got out the macro lens and took a few more pics because I didn't like the way the colors seemed to get condensed in the last 2.
Any ID's on the plants above would be great.
Chris
Anubias Lacelota (my favourite plant, it has lovely thick leaves)
Anubias Var Nana
Anubias Baterii
Ok that's all for now folks, sorry for ridiculously long post! I didn't realise TFF condenses multiple posts into one long one.
Chris
long time no update, I've been getting pretty slack. Anyways, for the last few months I've been researching and (more importantly) saving for a fw planted aquarium, knowing that this would have to be the tank to replenish my slowly decreasing enthusiasm for the hobby.
So the first port of call was Walstad's EOTPA book. A very technical book which has a lot of useful info in, I'd recommend it to anyone. I then finally gave in and bought myself Amano's Nature Aquarium Bks 1 & 2 (I couldn't get a copy of 3) and his Aquarium Plant Paradise book. All 4 of those books are truly awesome, and should be sitting on the bookshelves of any aquarist.
So now comes the aquarium; I wanted it to be a aquascaped aquarium which utilises alot of the things I've learnt from Walstad's book. This is as much an experiment for me as it is an aquarium and I will be learning (and asking lots of questions!) along the way, which is why I have not put this in the aquariums section.
The aquarium is 800Lx300Wx400D (mm) with a capactiy of rougly 96 litres.
As I did more research, I kept notes of what I found most interesting/important and so I'll post those up next.
Chris
NOTES: SUBSTRATES
(this post can be skipped by those just after the piccys
)Ok so the first thing to research was the substrate. Below is a copy of my notes. I really should have a bibliography as this is an accumulation of notes from several internet sites and of course Walstad's book.
Substrate choice
A plain, washed gravel substrate guaranties failure with plants and quickly becomes toxic without an under gravel filter and frequent gravel vacuuming.
Soil immediately seeds the aquarium with nitrifying bacteria, and the decomposition of soil organic matter releases CO2, which is much needed in a new tank.
For soft water aquariums, potting soil may not provide great plant growth unless fertilised with Ca, Mg, K and bicarbonates, as potting soil is invariably acidic.
Ordinary garden soil and potting soil should not be mixed together, but both are suitable.
Clay has a 100,000 times the nutrient capacity that sand does. (This could explain Aqua Soil’s success.)
Iron in the substrate is highly detrimental – Laterite is iron based. Iron will kill plants and roots and will support algae growth.
Acid sulfate soils can cause major problems when in aerobic conditions.
Preparing the Soil Substrate
Soak soil in water with added EDTA water conditioner to bind heavy metals.
Add charcoal in the filter for first few weeks to help remove impurities and spikes in water levels.
Soaking soil for 6 weeks prior to use increased average growth by 230%. Anything less then that had no effect.
Substrate fertilisation
In most cases, substrate fertilisation is either not helpful or detrimental. Best plant growth (under aquarium conditions) often appears to be not in the most fertile soil, but in the one that is the least toxic.
A small amount of well-decayed organic matter (e.g. kitchen compost) mixed with a mineral garden soil when the tank is first set up would probably be ok.
Peat moss is not advisable due to the acidity potentially bringing heavy metals into the soil solution.
Inorganic fertilisers can become toxic in submerged soils such as water lily fertilisers due to anaerobic conditions causing hydrogen sulfide toxicity problems.
Anaerobic substrates
If plant growth becomes too low the plants will not oxygenate the substrate and it will become anaerobic.
Anaerobic sediments are problematic with problems from heavy metals, hydrogen sulfide, low Redox & organic acids.
Roots require oxygen. When roots cannot obtain sufficient oxygen due to a very low Redox, they have to use the very inefficient fermentation, which slowly drains the energy from the plant and reduces growth rate and nitrogen uptake. A very high redox though reduces growth rate.
Over time the surface of the sediments becomes blocked with large mulm accumulations making the ciritcal oxidised microzone anaerobic. This mulm must be removed.
Fish will not eat food as readily off an anaerobic sediment surface.
Stunted roots or blackening of roots = symptoms of Hydrogen Sulfide toxicity.
Plants turning brown and dieing, plants detaching from roots and floating to surface & problems with algae = symptoms of Iron Toxicity.
Plants in the substrate
Plants have a major effect on the sediment ecology.
Plant roots release considerable oxygen and organic compounds, encouraging bacterial activity in the rhizosphere, which is the sediment area within 1-2mm surrounding the plant roots.
Oxygen released from plant roots helps reduce the chance of the surface of the substrate becoming anaerobic.
Oxygen released from plant roots helps greatly increase denitrification in the deeper sediment layers.
Soil substrates with rooted plants seem to do well indefinitely without any maintenance such as gravel vaccuming.
The hi-tech aquarium approach
The commercial under gravel additives provides about 1/50 of the soil volume used in the low-tech approach, thus providing a greater reservoir of plant nutrients, and provides CO2 due to decomposition.
Hi-tech aquariums with CO2 injection, fertilisation and commercial substrates often show spectacular growth for about 1 year before giving out, unless and under gravel heater cable is used, which continually “wash†the substrate.
By removing all mulm with weekly maintenance, the hi-tech approach stops the substrate from renewing it’s nutrient reservoir.
CO2 injection compensates for the lack of CO2 due to decomposition with soil substrates.
Substrate fertiliser and heavy fertilisation of the water column compensate for smaller reserve of plant nutrients.
Regular cleaning of the substrate prevents build up of mulm.
There is no guarantee that a gravel additive, just because it comes in an expensive package rather than a shovel, entails less risk then ordinary soil.
Chris
More miscellaneous notes...
Nitrogen Uptake
Order of preferred nitrogen uptake:
Ammonia
Nitrite
Nitrate
Nitrite will only be taken up once Ammonia has run out, nitrate will only be take up once nitrite has run out.
Filters convert ammonia and nitrite to nitrates, thus depriving plants of ammonia.
The low-tech approach
The plants purify the water, not the filter.
Water changes are less necessary as there is a lower build up of nitrogen.
The hi-tech approach
The filter converts the ammonia and nitrite to nitrates, which creates a nitrate build up.
Regular water changes remove nitrogen, not the plants. Macro nutrient fertilisation compensates for this.
Sources of plant nutrients
The three main sources of plant nutrients in the low-tech aquarium:
Water
Soil
Fish Food
Heavy feeding of fish
A water change of 30% every 3 months helps reduce the chance of any major build ups in levels.
Nutrient Removal
The major nutrient removal is from plant pruning.
Water changes and cleaning are kept to a minimum.
The hi-tech approach
Regular additions of macro/micro fertilisers and the substrate are the major sources of plant nutrients in the hi-tech aquarium.
Water changes and plant pruning are the main sources of nutrient removal in the hi-tech aquarium.
PLANTS IN THE LOW-TECH AQUARIUM
Begin the tank with a large selection of different plant species and see which establish well.
Begin the tank with a large mass of plants so they can establish themselves before algae do.
Emergent plant growth should be strongly encouraged.
Always ‘overstock’ with plants.
Chris
I had a hope that I would build up a large album of images which I could then use for a photo diary but unfortunately due to a system reformat I may have lost all of those.
I may have a couple of odd images on the camera itself though, I'll check in the morning.Anyways, after a couple of months of being obsessive, I made my choices:
Substrate: Garden Soil + Plain Gravel
Ferts: Pro-Plant pouch thingy's from Greenline
Filter: External
Lighting: 2x 18W (1.6 wpg)
CO2: Hagen Fermentation
Water changes: Alternating between 10 ltrs a week and 5 ltrs a week.
This I decided to be a fair balance between the ability to grow demanding plants and keeping maintenance + costs down.
Chris
Next was the interesting part - shopping! (ok, it was internet shopping, so I can still escape with my masculinity
)Greenline to the rescue:
10 x bunches of Weeping Christmas Moss
12 x assorted mixed leaded bunches
10 x bunches of Java Moss
1 x Anubias Var Nana
1 x Anubias Lancelota
1 x Anubias Baterii
5 x mixed floating plants
2 x bunches dwarf miniature hair grass
3 x Pro-Plant pouch thingys
1 x 25 plant pot luck deal
The focuses being on a wide variety of plants and aerial growth. I wanted to experiment with Anubias in this tank, but god they're so expensive!
I also had a fair bit of crytocoryne bullosa, aete...ajheakd....as (can't exactly remember the latin name ) & java moss left over.Chris
Okkkk I found a fair few of my piccys on camera.
Anyways, using my amazing artist skills (
), I came up with a planting plan & order.Hardscape
Anubias + Christmas moss on wood
Add in background plants
Finish off by adding foreground crypts and hairgrass, along with a moss carpet + floating species
Chris
Friday afternoon - large chunky box full of plants arrive from greenline. Long weekend ahead....
Tank drained and ready (didn't have any time to do any cleaning up as I had the current fish stock in a bucket)
Bag of washed gravel and a bucket of dirt ready for use. :thumb:
Soil in. For the sake of briefness, I won't go into the details of how I soaked and prepared the soil, unless requested.
Gravel in.
Quick test just to make sure the wood fits. (yeah I know, I stuck the peices in the wrong way round)
This is where the piccies start dissapearing. Anyways, I filled it up and did a couple of water changes and filled it up about 2/3rds.
Then the hardscape went in:
5 hours of soild planting later I finished.
Chris
Chris
I got out the macro lens and took a few more pics because I didn't like the way the colors seemed to get condensed in the last 2.
Any ID's on the plants above would be great.
Chris
Anubias Lacelota (my favourite plant, it has lovely thick leaves)
Anubias Var Nana
Anubias Baterii
Ok that's all for now folks, sorry for ridiculously long post! I didn't realise TFF condenses multiple posts into one long one.
Chris
