The Planted Tank Forum banner

Jeffrey's "Big Boy"---120g Planted: Updated 1/24/2022 w/ pictures

52K views 156 replies 55 participants last post by  jmhart 
#1 · (Edited)
Well, it's finally time. I've been talking about it and planning it out for a year(Evidenced: here, here, here, and here ) and now it's finally coming together, my 120g planted. To read a fair amount of background on me and my planted tanks, and especially the details leading up to this 120g, you can check out the link to my blog in my sig.

I've been waiting to put up a journal until things were starting to move a little quicker, and now the speed is picking up. I'm taking my time on this one, doing everything right from the get go, but there should start to be some action in the coming weeks.

For now, a little teaser shot:

 
See less See more
1
#141 ·
I've finally put this tank back together.

I've never really liked the plumbing. I spent a lot of time thinking about the plumbing when I first set it up, but I made it overly complex. Biggest issue was all the turns. I was losing a lot of head pressure, so I really had very little flow in the tank. So, I decided to redo it.



Supply
Same internals as before. Two tank drains, left and right, plumbed to a corner drilled hole in the tank. These feeds into 6 port manifold. The manifold feeds three Eheim Classic 2217s, and has ports for automated macros, micros, and a burp/manual drain/fill port. At present in the picture below, I only have the macro line installed. The micro line and the burp line are currently plugged off. I'm doing dry micros right now and for the immediate future.



Filter Loop 1

A single Eheim 2217 pumps to a substrate level spray bar. In line after the Eheim are two solenoid valves: one for drain line, one for fill line. At present I do about a 10% water change once a week. Been doing that for a few years, while dosing a modified PPS-Pro and have been pretty happy. Not a huge waste of water/ferts and the tank is happy.

In the back of the picture here you can see the green irrigation solenoid on top for the fresh water supply line, and you can see the top of a Asco Red Hat valve on bottom for controlling the drain line.



Filter Loop 2

Two Eheim 2217s run in parallel. In line before one of them is an atomic CO2 diffuser. Love that thing. Then the two filters come back together via a manifold yee fitting and run through a single Hydor inline heater.




I got it all plumbed in and turned on, and was immediately thrilled with how it turned out. Much better flow and circulation in the tank. Reducing all those turns from my previous plumb job has been a great thing. It has also improved how long it takes to drain this tank. The loss of head pressure to do all the turns meant it took forever to drain even 15% of the tank via the automated process. Now I can drain that in just a few minutes.

Here it is all filled and cycling:

 
#142 ·
I started off by just scaping a bit with rocks and manzinita. Got this piece of wood from Tom Barr a couple of years ago. Used it in my old scape, but decide to turn it upright this time to give a more height to the scape. As I was bringing in plants from my storage area, my tank started to show signs of life:







But she quickly exited when I started filling the tank



Initial planting was with what I had on hand: Anubias (mostly 'nana'), Barclaya longifolia, marsilea minuta, and some random crypts.


I then ordered in some plants from aquariumplants.com. I'd gotten some tissue culture plants before form Petco, on sale I think, but I really didn't know what they were exactly. Looked into it, and decided it was worth a shot, especially since aquariumplants.com had them on sale.

I ordered some S. repens, L. hippuridoides, Crypt wentii 'brown' and 'tropica', Downoi, and Lobelia cardinalis.






I'm really pleased with the tissue culture plants. Once rinsed and separated out like suggested from the seller, there are really a lot of plants in here. Really got my money's worth. I''d still consider it a good deal at the for $9 price. But I'm patient, so I don't mind waiting for them to fill in over the next few weeks.
 
#145 ·
I'm going to fast forward the grow story a bit. I've been taking pictures with my iPhone, and it's just not doing it justice, so I spent some time with my D200 tonight:

This is now a month after planting the tissue culture plants







Really nothing major to share. I've added ~50 cardinals, 12 Otos, and 2 Sterbai Cories (looking to get 8-10 more). I also tossed in about 25 red cherry shrimp from my upstairs 60-P. Everyone is doing really well.

I've added a few more tissue cultures. Some ammania bonsai, alternanthera reineckii mini, and some Rotala 'pearl'. Now it's just a waiting game to let it all fill in.

Things are growing so well that I'm thinking on replacing the Marsilea minuta down front with glosso. I've been using the Marsilea for years because I couldn't commit the time to really maintaining a high light thank like a good glosso carpet with require. However, with all the stems I've put in here, I'll need to keep the light up to get great colors, so might as well take a shot with glosso.

Still thinkiing on that.
 
#149 ·
Time for an update. Photos first:








This thing has been doing pretty well. I'm not the best aquascaper, but I can definitely grow plants. Most of the plants in here started from tissue culture last fall/early winter.

Current Plant list:
  1. S. repends (left foreground)
  2. Marsilea minuta (middle-right foreground)
  3. Staurgoyne sp 'purple' (far right foreground)
  4. Ludwigia mini super red
  5. Blyxa japonica
  6. Ammania sp 'bonsai'
  7. Anubias nana
  8. Syngonanthus sp. 'Belem'
  9. Rotala ramisoir 'Florida'
  10. Crypt wendtii 'tropica'
  11. alternanthera reineckii mini
  12. Lobelia cardinalis 'small form'
  13. Downoi (pogostemon helfeir)
  14. Tall Crypt species (far left back, not sure of the species)
  15. Barclaya longifolia
  16. Limnophila hippurdoides (aka aromatica)
  17. Ludwigia glandulosa
  18. Rotala macrandra
  19. Rotala rotundfolia
  20. Rotala 'pearl'
  21. Crypt wendtii 'brown'

Fauna:
  1. Cardinal Tetras (40+)
  2. Pristella Tetras (13)
  3. Sterbai cories (6+)
  4. Otocinclus (10+)
  5. Red Cherry Shrimp

On plants, it seems like a lot, near collectoritis, but I'm trying to move this into a hybrid Dutch scape, so that number seems about on par. I'll almost certainly pull the Barclaya longifolia out. It's a nice plant, but I'm tiring of it. Might ditch the crypts and anubias sooner than later. The crypts aren't doing so well in the extremely soft acidic water in this tank. When I raise the hardness up to help the crypts out, the red plants lose some of their brilliant red colors, which is not a trade off I'm willing to make. The anubias are algae magnets. I used them in the beginning as filler because I had a to of them in the previous scape of this tank, but now I'm not sure they work in high light of this tank. The driftwood isn't the greatest placement, but I'm going to ride it out a bit longer.

Current things I'm excited about:
  1. The ammania 'bonsai' was a slow starter from the tissue culture. I think I actually planted two TC cups, and all but 3-4 stems melted and died, but now it's growing strong and I'm really excited to propogate it and have a nice midground patch
  2. I'm really excited about the color coming out of the Ludwigia glandulosa. This wasn't a tissue culture, but it was a slow starter as well. I think maybe it was emersed growth when I received it. Took several months to really get going, but now it's shooting up light a weed...a bright magenta weed. Excited to move it to a more prominent position.
  3. The synogonanthus belem was also a slow starter. It was submersed growth when I got it, but I think it just needed to adjust to my tank. It's growing much better now and sending out babies. Pretty excited about this guy.
  4. Really excited about the Rotala pearl. Pretty plant. Started as TC and took time, but now quite lush.
  5. And I always love Limnophila aromatica. Love that plant. Been my favorite since I started the hobby. It's not showing a lot of purple right now because I just cut it majorly back 2-3 weeks ago. When it gets closer to the surface it turns deep purple. But I'm currently loving the angled growth of it. I didn't cut and replant (like I often do), instead I just cut and remove the tops (for sale) and let the bottoms grow out. The bottoms sent out 2-3 shoots each at angles and really filled the space nicely.

Things I'm looking to change:
  1. Going to pull out the Barclaya. I'm just done with it.
  2. Going to remove some or all of the anubias
  3. Going to remove some or all of the marsilea minuta. Great little plant, just ready to change it up.
  4. Need to move the AR mini. When they say mini, they mean it. It grows low and dense, so I need it to be more foreground to really enjoy it.
  5. Not sure the Rotala rotundfolia is needed/works in this scape. Love the way it looks when it's dense, but I think I might accomplish the same thing with the Rotala pearl.

That's about all I've got. The plumbing is still working great since I replumbed it. Great CO2 diffusion, great flow. I'm currently manually dosing all ferts. Probably will go back to auto dosing in a while, but meh. Automatic water changes have been and continue to be the most amazing thing. 1:00 a.m. every Monday morning. Drains and fills before the sun comes up. I never even see it happen. Wondeful. Only thing I have to do is change the filter on the water supply line every year or so.

I'll post again after I rescape and make the above changes.
 
#150 ·
Great journal and thanks for sharing the pictures.

It was interesting following your journey through the years.

The latest version is my favorite. Looks really healthy and a beautiful presentation.

You should update a little more frequently. Would like to follow along and see how things progress from here.
 
#151 ·
Let me tell you, life sure comes at your fast. Can't believe it's been 5 years since I updated this. The tank is still running, technically. Since I built this sucker I've had a bunch of kids, changed jobs a couple of times, on and on. The last time I redid this tank, I thought I was ready for more maintenance, so I loaded it up with some fast growing stem plants. Well, as happens, life happened, and I stopped trimming them back. They took over. Filled the entire surface. Killed everything underneath.

And that really took the wind out of my sales, so this thing has just been coasting for at least 2 years. I haven't done jack. At this point there's some MTS alive, 3 olive nerites that have gotten huge, and some crypts and anubias that are hanging on for dear life.

But as also happens, my kids are now old enough to starting to show A LOT of interest in the tank. They want fish again. So here I am again. Hopefully more updates to come in the next few weeks. I've ordered a bunch of plants and plan to replant the tank one evening next week or next weekend.

I'll post an update picture in a bit.
 
#152 ·
I stopped trimming them back. They took over. Filled the entire surface. Killed everything underneath.

And that really took the wind out of my sales,
Same. I don't have kids, but I had a tank going great last year. At some point I got busy and let it start to overgrow. I kept trying to get time to work on it. The more it went to crap, the more I dreaded having to deal with the disaster and the more it went to crap the more I dreaded dealing with it, repeat, repeat..... Eventually, I broke it down. Tank is still empty.
 
#155 ·
Couple of quick pictures. Ordered in some plants and got thing started. Takes a lot of plants fill a 120g.

Plants include Lilaeopsis Mauritius in the foreground, AR mini, RotS. repens, Lobelia cardinalis up top. Bunch crypts spread around. Some Cyperus Helferi in the background behind a big clump of Anubias.

Now just let them grow and spread them out.

Took the kids to the fish store and let them pick some fish so there are some serape tetras, white clouds, and Otos in there now along with some Red Cherry Shrimp.
Plant community Plant Vertebrate Botany Pet supply

Vertebrate Plant Pet supply Organism Wood
 

Attachments

#156 · (Edited)
So here we are a few months later:







Not the best pictures, but have had some good growth. Going to do a small trim and move some things around today. The A. reineckii was supposed to be ‘mini’ form. There’s a certain online plant store that I really should stop ordering from because I get mislabeled stuff from them nearly every order. But alas.

Will post updates later after the trim and the water settles.
Plant Plant community Vertebrate Wood Organism

Plant Plant community Flower Nature Botany
 
#157 · (Edited)
And here’s the update after everything has settled:

Plant Plant community Organism Vegetation Underwater

Plant Plant community Natural environment Pet supply Fish supply

Plant Plant community Leaf Pet supply Organism


Pretty pleased with how it’s coming. Moving the A. reineckii realy made the whole tank pop a lot more. The lilaeopsis is starting to (slowly) fill in. Crypts all melted with the rescape a few months ago but are back in full force. Really digging it.

I add a TC worth of Crypt axelrodi, moved the reinecki, brought the S. repens forward to serve as a border for the lilaeposis. Now another month or two for growth and see how it does. There’s still room for growth, but I’m maxed on species. I think if I want another species, I’ll need to pull soemthing too.

I added some Cobalt Blue Gouramis yesterday and they really look great in the tank. Super pumped. I think I’m about done with fish. That brings me up to 11 Serpae Tetras, 11 White Clouds, 5 Cobalt Blue Gouramis, and a handful of Otos. Probably get a few more Otos, but other than that the tank is about as active as I like it.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top