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The 120-P Reader - Pictures Included (56KWarning)

40K views 210 replies 43 participants last post by  theblondskeleton 
#1 ·
A little background, first. I’ve been a member for a while, but out of the loop for about a year.

I have been a planted tank hobbyist for around 4-5 years. I have made some truly horrific planted monstrosities. I didn’t keep the pictures of all the bad ones for, well, obvious reasons, but I kept some. Remember that I said these are the ones I didn’t toss out, haha…

I had always been fascinated with the iwagumi style. I particularly value the wabi-sabi aesthetic it demonstrates – and really that’s what draws me to Mr. Amano’s work and Japanese style gardens in general. My own work as a theatre director follows this same transient, imperfect ideal, and I have always been drawn to art and expression that reveals frailty, character, uniqueness, organic origin and development, etc, particularly as it represents isolation and flawed beauty.

While I am only a doe-eyed novice yet, I always strive toward this sense of wabi-sabi – with little success, I admit – in my layouts. The areas I need the most experience and practice in are plant selection and trimming techniques.

I’ve spent a lot of time lately on the ADA View YouTube channel, and really it couldn’t have happened at a better time. These videos have been invaluable to me. Seeing these scapes planted for seminars, and then trimmed and grown in - seeing their development over time - awesome.

We don’t have an active club in my area, and the members around Portland are not terribly active as a community, so we have little opportunity to share plants, techniques, and tips with one another. This has been a good substitute so far.

A quick retrospective of my previous work. I do this for context. Go ahead and skip, if you want the build begins later. But, If you like a good, old-fashioned house of horrors, or a nice freak show, perhaps the type you'd rather not admit you love to see, then please by all means share in my past failures!

An early attempt:



Things I got right: CO2 and Light
Things I didn’t: Ferts, substrate, layout, trimming, and plant choice

I wanted to represent an area much like my home. High desert. Tonina sp. “Lago Grande” was a poor choice, here. The other plants grew ok, though.

Another:



Things I got right: Layout, substrate, CO2, Light
Things I didn’t: Ferts, trimming and layout material

Ugh… why am I sharing this? Well, I think it’s important to remember where I’ve been, so that I can see how far I’ve come. Plus, it’s kind of cathartic to relive some of these horrors, haha…

My first collectoritis tank:



Things I got right: light, ferts, heavily planted
Things I didn’t: CO2 (neither stable nor well distributed), substrate, layout, gassed my fish ☹

This was my first 90-gallon scape. Perfect footprint, but the height was a LOT to deal with. I couldn’t get the proportions to look right. I couldn’t tolerate the complete chaos, either. I enjoy engineered chaos. My job is a lot like that.

My first (sort-of) success:



Things I got right: Light, CO2, diffusion, ferts, heavily planted, substrate, layout
Things I didn’t: trimming

That was my 90-gallon from a few years back. I had a chance to practice some trimming techniques and grew a pretty awesome HC carpet. I never trimmed the carpet though, so it eventually uprooted when it reached about 2” thick. The plants grew so quickly that I couldn’t keep up with them. 6xT5HO plus reactor diffusion and PPS classic dosing was a very high-growth combination!

The next version of the 90-gallon:



Lace rock and Manzanita. Kind of a tough scape to maintain with the sand. Eventually, my routine broke down, and I ceased to be productive scape-wise. I still really wanted an iwagumi scape. So, I built a few nanos to try my hand at stone layouts.





And then, back to the 90 for some wacky stone scapes:







That one was more like an aquarium clown-car: How much hardscape can I cram into a 90-gallon glass box?

Others:













 
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17
#2 ·
You get the point. My last big tank was my 130 gallon. 60”x18”x26”




I was inspired by the 2010 IAPLC 4th place winner (beautiful tank), but ultimately this one failed – big time. Not enough plant matter, ill-conceived lighting scheme, trouble with CO2 from the start, changed my fert regime and destroyed it, maintenance became a huge hassle with the depth and it generally went poorly. Around December, I nearly decided to call it quits - totally.

I took a break. I rethought that decision. Why did I go that route? Why did I “go big?” Admittedly, the discus lured me in. Gorgeous fish. Fun to raise. Temps not friendly to the kind of layouts I like, though, so I was stuck with plants I wasn’t passionate about, in a tank I was constantly rescaping because it never felt the way I wanted it to. So, I asked myself: What DO I want? What kind of scape do I want to have in my life – as a long-term layout? After all, isn’t it worth it to do it EXACTLY the way I want to?

I started searching again. Viewing images, videos, IAPLC contest winners, random hobbyist tanks. I decided to sell the 130. I sold the 90. I sold the discus. I rebooted my aesthetic. I cleansed my palate of all the distracting crap that had been bogging me down and decided to start fresh. What did I want? What did I keep returning to, but only consistently half-a$$ed?

Iwagumi. I still got that sad, peaceful, longing feeling every time I saw one that was well done. I got very excited when I saw interesting rocks. I have an addiction to beautiful stone, I think. My wife couldn’t count the number of times I’ve interrupted her concentration with and excited “Hey, honey – check out this rock!” I had to tie myself down to keep from buying every gorgeous rock that passed my sight. I trolled the S&S like it was Internet p*rn, searching for rocks that satisfied my perverse need.

But what would I do with them when I got them? Well, it was clear: I needed to take my earnings from selling off the big mess and invest in the system I should have bought in the first place. So, I asked myself:

"What do I think is the perfect tank?"
 
#3 · (Edited)
Remember the 90? 48”x18”x24” A little tall, but a perfect footprint. Enough depth that you could do some amazing stuff in there - but the proportions are skewed, too tall.

I worked hard to make the cabinet for the 130 nice and pretty. It was gorgeous in its own way: deep warm stain, well sculpted trim. Very traditional furniture style.

I’m not a traditional guy. My preferred interior design style is more contemporary. Clean lines. Pops of color. So… ADA?

The ADA 120-P. I’m pretty sure the P stands for “perfect”. Perfect footprint, proportionally appropriate height (say THAT 5 times fast) It’s the tank I have always wanted. Others may not agree that it’s perfect, but for me: this is my dream build.

Now, the 180-P is gorgeous and also well proportioned, but it’s more than I need. It would feel like too much to me. If I didn’t feel that way, you know I’d be farming mosses for the S&S and saving until I could afford it, haha! The 90-P is ok, but too short. I need length. So, there it was. Case made.

Big Stones. Gotta have the real deal. 77.5 pounds of seiryu stone. To be honest, I prefer ryouh stone. The color and texture more effectively communicates the wabi-sabi aesthetic in my opinion. I couldn’t afford it, unfortunately. I’m on a budget, here. A STRICT one. Ordered the stone – thank you, PC1 and another seller from the other forum ☺ - I got exactly what I wanted. Three HUGE seiryu stones with tons of character, and an assemblage of smaller stones to support them. Now, we’re talking.

But, first, I needed a stand. I need the stage upon which this little drama would play out.

So, I built one. Thanks jB for the tutorial online! I have used it twice, and modified your design to my taste, but your plans and how-to made it possible.

I’ll admit it’s not my best work. Frankly, I’m disappointed in my craftsmanship. There are details that could have been more gracefully handled. However, I was limited in time and space, as my wife would only let me use the living room as a cabinet shop for one weekend. So, here’s what I did.

Before paint and finish:



After:



Blue? Yes. Blue. I wanted a lighter shade, but that’s what I ended up with. I plan on skinning the cabinet in laminate as soon as I can afford it – maybe next summer? For now, it’s sprayed and finished with satin finish polyurethane so it’s waterproof and sealed.

I used poplar plywood, and I should have gone with oak, but couldn’t afford the extra price (2x the cost!). I know poplar is soft for a hardwood (more of a dense weed than a wood – it grows very quickly) as I have done a lot of work with wood, but I doubled it up, glued and screwed it, and it is sturdy and solid. Should do just fine.

I put two 6” vertical portals in the side for filter intake and outlets. I have built one of these before for my Mini-L, and the problem I keep running into is that the portal for hoses is too narrow, and the hoses get pinched there, reducing flow and causing all sorts of trouble. So, I rotated them 90 degrees, and added another. Solved that issue. I also put a small 1” round portal on the other side for air and CO2.

I built a conduit light hanger to keep it off of the tank. I considered bending the pipe, but the length of the curve was too great for my taste. I used street elbows instead, and it’s not as clean, but it works. Painted with galvanized primer and gray Rust-Oleum. Still scratches off too easily. Any tips? Would coating it with polyurethane work? Anyway, final product:
 
#4 ·
Ok, here’s where the part you really came for starts. So, I have a process for design. Usually starts as research on what I want to achieve, moves to sketches, and then a color drawing, then a prototype model, then the final product. I mention this because I have read here that some people have posted all around the forum that they have trouble with the planning of a good scape.

My earliest scapes were pretty phenomenally lacking in planning – and it showed. I just grabbed what I thought I liked and threw it in, with little forethought. FX says to visualize your final scape. I agree. This is a visual as well as a tactile art form, so visualizing what your goal is remains important (degree in Fine Arts came in handy after all!).

I started with what I want to see from the front. Concave, convex, triangular? What is the feeling I want? I was ok with concave or triangular. I knew I wanted iwagumi with some stems in the background. I made my sketches. Here’s a doodle I did at work:



I also did a color version, but it seems to be missing. No worries, because things change as I get the actual materials I’ll be working with.

Planning is important, but remember: this is a largely organic process. Unless you know exactly what you are working with from the start, your end product will inevitably be different than you expected. I’m ok with this aspect. So I plan and doodle with the knowledge that I might throw it all away when my stone arrives.

My delicious stone. My magical stone. Yes, I love my stone.

Remember that this is without substrate (or a tank, for that matter), so it will appear different. Mr. Amano used this process to create the Tokyo SkyTree scapes. If it works for the father of Nature Aquarium Style, it should work for me! I laid out my stone on top of my stand, on a towel so it wouldn’t scratch the finish. It’s the same dimensions as the tank, so I have my footprint. I can use a tape measure to estimate the height.

The stone arrived, and I immediately set to work:



Started poorly. Rigid. Artificial. I like the height, but that’s about it. I think I was just too excited, or maybe I just didn’t have the feel of the stone yet. I went back to the little I know about Japanese gardening, and remembered the Crane and Turtle motif. With a few additions, here is my attempt:



I like this one, but there is something about it that doesn’t sit right. Maybe the “crane” stone should be at more of an angle?

I shook it off, and let it sit for a day. Decided to re-approach it later. About this time we had a transit of Venus.



I realized I tend to place my focal point just left of center. Let’s mix it up.



Single spire, right of center, vertical alignment. Hmm. Ok. Let’s try concave.



Could work with substrate in there, but right now - a little weird. Let’s go back to the spire.



Closer. Better. Still lacking balance and I didn’t like how the secondary stone sat. Take another break, buy one more stone. A big one. The Big One.

Wait.

It arrives. Now, we play:

Spire A


Spire B


Not working. That new stone… rotate? Take a break. Come back later, refreshed.

Spire C


So close… What’s wrong? Take a break.



This is the final version of this spire concept. I may use this if I still like it in a few days. I may also go back to something resembling the Crane and Turtle concept with this new stone.

Meanwhile, I wait for the tank and substrate system to arrive and hope it hurries along!
 
#5 ·
Cool story man, you can really see how your knowledge is growing and you're getting better and better. I like a couple of the stone layouts. The crane one was neat. The last could be really good, you just need to adjust it. It looks like the two rocks pointing left need different angles.

Nice work taking your time and going through it over and over. Keep in mind though, that the scape looks rather different with soil and you aren't using slope to your advantage in the earlier scapes. I do see you have a few books or something to create some height in the new layouts. You may want to get some dry AS in there and play with slops and such before you decide which particular layout to move forward with. The crane layout could be more dramatic with a mound, as well as the last layout there. The concave would look completely different with a valley, or a mound.

Try it out.
 
#6 ·
Thanks man :) I totally agree :) I am using 1" foam insulation (had a bunch lying around) to stack under the towel to give it height and stabilize the bigger stones. It works pretty well. I'll probably use it in the tank too, since AS is so light, with big stones it tends to just slide around. When the tank shows up I"ll see how it goes. I'll also add more height, as I have plenty of vertical space to play with.
 
#8 ·
Haha... a LOT. Thanks :) glad you enjoyed it - it was fun reminiscing, haha...At one time I had 7 tanks running at once. That's a lot of water :) I have pared it down now to 1 planted and a 20 long for hospital/temporary housing - not counting this build. To be honest most of these are the same tank, (the 90) but layouts that didn't last more than a year, as I was unhappy with them shortly after I planted them (A consequence of working in an industry where we work on a project intensely for 3 months, run it for a few weeks, and then tear it down again). Getting plants to grow was pretty easy when I had the basics down. Trimming, layout, planning - these things I'm still struggling with. I'll try to work out the kinks as I go. I don't mind screwing up in public :)
 
#9 ·
I have enjoyed a few of your tanks here. I don't know how many journals and pics you posted here but I didn't have any idea you had done that many scapes. I remember one in particular that you didn't put up in this thread. It may actually be the last one in your first post, looking back at them.

I have to be honest, I don't particularly like the criss cross in Iwagumi (though I do think Jermaine Dupri was a genius for putting his faith in Kriss Kross however). I actually like your first layouts better than your last ones. I don't say this to be critical, it's a difference in taste. I like rock scapes that have height as they tend to give more power through a grander sense of scale. I also don't like the main stones facing opposite sides of the glass. Again, a difference in taste. I am on my first rock scape I actually like, second one ever, so I am no expert here either.

That said, I really like what you are doing across the board. I personally like seiryu over ryouh stone so I am glad you couldn't afford what you wanted :red_mouth It looks like a lot of the large stone cliffs that poke over the ocean on the coast in my area (well, the coast that is closest to my area I should say). The stand looks great IMO, I personally wouldn't choose the color but I actually really like it.

I can't wait to see where this goes.
 
#11 ·
Thanks! My journals were the first victims of my insane schedule the last couple of years. The tanks were often the second. The scapes developed but I didn't have time to share how. Also my cameras broke, and that made it challenging. The last one (the Ohko stone scape) in my first post did very well for a while but eventually succumbed to a hair algae outbreak that I couldn't shake. I still need to figure out how to get rid of that stuff. That was one of my favorite hard scapes.

The criss cross (will make you jump, jump) creates tension which may be what you don't like about it. I'm not sure how I feel about it, myself. It does kind of counter the serenity of an iwagumi scape. Serenity is a VERY difficult effect to achieve.

I like the height in the earlier versions as well. I'll likely attempt to vary that with my main stone. I also want to try rotating it in different ways. I'll try more tomorrow. I keep the pics as a reference so I can always go back if I want.

Thanks for the comment on the stand - I wouldn't choose that color again myself, haha... WAY too saturate. At least the lines came out nice and clean.
 
#15 ·
Wow, thanks! Glad it could be an inspiration.

I toyed a bit with the stone arrangements today, but succeeded in only one original layout. I'll throw up the pictures later. I have narrowed it down to two possibilities, but I think I'll hold off the decision until I get the tank. I chose my plants today as well.

Hemianthus callatrichoides
Riccia fluitans
Hydrocotyle sibthorpioides
Rotala indica
Eleocharis acicularis

I've used all of these before except the hydrocotyle. This will allow me to feel confident with the plants in such an ambitious layout (well, ambitious to me, anyway). I have some mini pellia in another tank that I might use to contrast the riccia and hc. There is an awful lot of light green in there, haha...

I have some Amanos on order, and I'll likely pickup some otos locally. I have 30 glow line tetras I'll put in with maybe a few Celebes rainbows for variety. I have to be careful or this will turn into a zoo, haha... I tend to do that.

The pattern here is restraint. I haven't limited myself much before, so I'm implementing that now. I don't want to go too crazy with this just yet. Keep it simple. Clean. Maybe opt for one of the simpler less cluttered layouts I tested...
 
#16 ·
Narrowing the choices...

I think I have it down to three possible layout choices. Now, when I get substrate in there things will look different. The rocks will be buried somewhat, the angles might be skewed a touch as I'll be better able to refine them to my liking, and there will be a slope visible which will have an effect on the depth of field.

And then, of course, there are plants to consider. I'll have some of those, too.

So, when I say "final" I have to throw in the caveat, same as before: organic process, etc. Right now, these are the three contenders.

1. "Crane and Turtle"

I think I figured out what was sitting wrong with this one. There are eight stones. The small one at the foot of the main stone (on the right side) is extraneous. I would also elevate the main structure more, and try to angle the entire composition from back to front a little so it is less linear.



2. "Two Spires"

I think I have the height I'm looking for in this latest version of this one. I want to play with lowering (or increasing, depending on your perspective) the angle of the main stone, opening it up more. it is less cramped than previous versions, and I like that it feels less tense. Lowering the angle of the main stone will also help that. I used fewer stones to avoid clutter, and I could even use less, but I'd like to maintain a certain amount of detail.



3. "5 Stone"

"5 Stone" is the one that I believe most closely fits the Iwagumi style. The long flat stone on the left would be able to support a layer of substrate on top so that it could have HC on top of it. This would really bring out the aged feel. The more I look at this, the more I want to see it with the main stone reversed, pointing left. In one way, I think it would create some tension, going against the established pattern, but in others... maybe I'll just try it and see.

It's not like it's set in stone.

Yeah, I just went there. try to suppress that groan/chuckle.



Thoughts are welcome, as I have plenty of time to waste before I can do anything permanent about it, haha...
 
#17 ·
I like them in the same order you listed, 1 is my favorite, 2 is 2nd, 3 is 3rd. However, I like 1 and 2 quite a bit better than three.

It's hard to say my opinion because I assume you may angle things a bit differently once you have substrate.

I love #1 as it really shows off the character of the largest stone. However, with #2, you get the character of the large stone left of the main stone (don't know the Japanese terminology). Have you considered turning the two left rocks around on the left side. It may look more "tranquil", maybe not lol.

I think the first 2 will look great, just kind of nit picking.
 
#18 ·
Thanks for the input, talontsiawd :) Yeah, it's tough to make any calls right now, really. However, if I can narrow it down to one or two possible layouts it'll make it easier when I get the tank. To be honest, I don't even know if the stones will support themselves the way I'd like. I'll just have to see.

I don't know the terminology either, really, haha... just what I have read in a few articles. I've read it referred to as a "lord" or "master" but only in quotations. However, it seems to be a literal reference. The only ones I'm sure of are the Crane and Turtle. That's present in the first and last layouts. The crane would be a tall stone, and the turtle would be a low, flat stone.

I tried turning those rocks on the left in (#2, I'm assuming?) as it's currently set up in this layout. It does bring the eye back to the center more. It's still very energetic, though. The trouble is, I have two distinct focal points in that layout and I think that's whats giving it so much energy. I'd just have to be ok with that. The others really only have one, so they feel more relaxed - especially with the long low sloping lines.
 
#19 ·
Tank is on the truck :) looks like Saturday I might be setting this beauty up. I'm pretty much giddy with excitement. I have wanted this setup since I first started in planted tanks.

My dad was always a big hobbyist. He builds military models, mostly tanks and artillery. I got into it because he was into it. First it was cars, then planes, WWII bombers and biplanes, scifi models (sweet Shuttle Tydirium and Millennium Falcon), then WWII ships. Finally I got into model sailing ships. That was great. But I always felt like I was doing my fathers hobby (...come to the Dark Side, Luke...). I never felt like I owned it.

An old friend got me a goldfish after my brother was killed in Iraq. I was a mess, of course, and the routine of it was therapeutic. I found plants and totally fell in love with the "zen" of the maintenance routine. I cant say anything like "it saved me" or any ridiculous claim like that, but it was as much a part of what helped me cope as anything else.

Like the sand mandalas the monks created once a year at my alma mater:

Focus on creation. Foster life. Experience virtue in labor. Wipe it clean and begin anew.

Art is an exorcism, sometimes. Even if the only sweet agony is in looking at an algae infested mess, haha...

Anyway, the point of the story is that I own this hobby. It became mine not because of an inheritance, but because a need presented itself in my life and I was fortunate enough to have access to sites like this, and an interest. This is one of the places where I choose to find meaning and a measure of peace.

This setup is a part of the image I always had in my mind when I envisioned my scapes. Yeah, it's just a bit of dirt and some glass.

But not for long :)
 
#20 ·
There's something about that first ADA/Rimless tank, they just have that elegance and simplicity to them that tickles your visual cortex in just the right way ;)

Read through all of the set up posts, didn't go much passed that though; it's 4:30am and I've had a beer or two. You've definitely got everything down, I'm expecting a top notch scape. On a side note, I really like your writing style. I took an East Asian art course last semester at TCNJ and it was nice to see someone actively incorporating Wabi-Sabi aesthetics... fleeting beauty, transient imperfection, that feeling of slight melancholy because you know nothing lasts forever... it's also why I prefer Iwagumi.

It seems like you really know how to grow whatever you want, and based on the seiryu arrangements, you have the essentials of hardscaping down as well. I really like how you have the patience to set up hardscapes and then completely tear them down to accommodate new ideas and a fresh set of rested eyes.

I was surprised by your preferences in tank dimensions though. I really have a great preference towards tanks that are 1/2 as high as they are long. Thus the 90P and 120H are my favorite tanks, closely followed by the 180P, my dream tank. I'm constantly wishing my 75P was a 90P... I got it when I was 14 and didn't have the spare cash for the extra 6" length.

Will be following this tank's progression for sure, you better make me appreciate the fleeting beauty of nature with this one ;)
 
#22 · (Edited)
Thanks on all fronts :) I'll do my best at achieving at sense of Wabi-Sabi: it is what I'm striving for. It's nice to see that others are attracted to something other than our western ideal. I've been practicing a lot of arrangements, but of course everything will change when I get the dirt in there.

I like the 120-H of course, the dimensions are ideal proportionally. It is the same dimensions as my 90 gallon was, so my major issue is my comfort level with the height. I suppose I could get around it eventually, but was that worth another few hundred bucks? Maybe next time, haha...

My process for creating scapes is pretty much the same as for my designs in the theatre. John Cleese has some pretty great things to say about creativity and developing that process here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VShmtsLhkQg&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Good stuff.

Oh, also - huge NIN fan here.

Tank arrives Friday. I've chewed my nails to the quick. Need a distraction. Skyrim? Yes, please.
 
#23 ·
Thanks green_valley! I think the rocks make it easy. They have a ton of character. There are a lot of fine adjustments I won't be able to make until I get some power sand under there. I might mix the power sand a bit with small lava rock just to give it more mass. Tom Barr suggested this in another thread. I did that with my 120 after having some substrate issues in the 90 (the clown car scape resulted in anaerobic substrate) and it worked really well to fill out the hills. It will also help hold the rocks in place as the AS is super light and just slips about under the rocks when I angle them steeply.
 
#27 ·
Photobucket is doing site maintenance right now and I'm tired, so no pics tonight. Hard scape is installed, substrate is as well. All I need is water and plants.

This tank is gorgeous. No pictures can do it justice. Even my wife was impressed with the clarity. I sat and stared at it empty for about an hour. Then I got thirsty. Then stared at it some more. Now, under the lights, I'm just happy that it's here.

You know what? Even the funky blue stand doesn't look so bad with this tank on top, haha...
 
#29 ·
Thanks, Green_valley, me too! The wait is over!

Here is the setup.



The stone with Power Sand and lava rock. The layout is a combination of what I thought were the best elements of Crane and Turtle and 5-Stone, with some modifications. The choice was the approval of my wife (the real commander around here) and my own preference of layout. I really liked the flow and triangular composition of Crane and Turtle, so I tried to emulate that with this one. I separated the layout into two groups of stones, and added some small accent stones to balance it out more. I'm still considering adding two more very small pieces.

I built up the back to about 8” to create a nice slope. The depth it has created is pretty incredible. I always thought that too steep would look funky, but now that I see it, I’m hooked. I thought it would look like a wall of substrate, but from my viewing throne on the couch, it looks fantastic, and I'm able to see all the way to the back of the tank. I could go steeper with a different layout. Perhaps in the future…

Trivia: I'm a theatre director, designer, practitioner, teacher, etc. So, historically stages were built with a rake or "slope". This was so that the audience could see the actors and scenery all the way to the back of the stage. Nowadays, they rake the audience instead - too many actors literally "breaking a leg" as they crossed DOWN stage, I suppose. It seems to me with this knowledge, I would have recognized the benefit of a steeply raked substrate sooner.

Moving on...



And the final hard scape with substrate in place.



I had more pics from the process, but other threads have done this better, so I’ll just describe it briefly.

Base: Lava rock for large stone stability, Power Sand Special M. Set lava rocks with some AS, and then placed the stone. When stones were set, I filled around it with Power Sand, focusing on the back of the slope.

Middle layer: ADA New Aquasoil Amazonia. Much redder than the old stuff when it’s dry. Pretty. I filled in the planting areas with AS, making sure to not completely bury the stones, as I still needed to cap this with Powder.

Top Layer: ADA Aquasoil Powder Type. For this, I focused mostly on installing it in the foreground areas where there will be large quantities of HC, but the whole tank got at least 1/4" of it. The stems in the back do not need the fine textured substrate so much, but HC really benefits from a finer substrate. I layered it about 1-½ inches deep in the front.

The next thing I did before I moistened the substrate for the evening was to sculpt the rolling hills the way I’d like them to be. I used my sand scraper for this. One could just as easily use a paint scraper or spackling knife or anything thin and flat. I think this step is important in a larger Iwagumi, especially with HC as the foreground, as the lines of the rolling hills greatly contribute to the composition. It also lends more detail to a large-scale scape that would otherwise be flat, less dynamic, and thus less interesting to look at. It also creates the illusion of sedimentary buildup when you taper the substrate up to a rock. Use the lines of the rock to help suggest the flow of the water around it by building up the sediment as ridges and valleys.

That said, you can’t really see it in the pics, haha… it will be more evident when it grows in.
 
#31 ·
While I await the arrival of my plants and Amanos (they will go into a holding tank until the tank cycles), I thought I’d share a bit more about process. We spend a lot of time here shooting pics of equipment, substrate additives, gadgets and doo-dads, but we rarely ever get a glimpse of good procedures for preparing plants for insertion into the scape. I have developed a few techniques over the years that I find very effective in doing a large-scale planting such as what I’ll be doing later today.

With 2 square feet of HC to prepare, it will be essential to the quality of my personal health that I make it easy for myself. I do not want to walk around like Montgomery Burns for the rest of the week, and Quasimodo already has the market cornered on famous singing hunchbacks.

Here is an overview of how I prep my planting area. Some may just hack at it with a devil-may-care sense of whimsy - limbs akimbo and roots flying about like a swarm of Africanized bees - but I find that being able to locate my spring scissors whenever I need them leaves me much more time and head space to focus on creatively composing my layout. Your results may vary. Here’s what I do.

Surfaces

I need a long flat one where I can sit, and a high flat one where I can access things while planting. Today, I have a sheet of melamine about 5’x2’ stretched across two cubical ottomans. Works just fine unless the cat gets spooked and rockets across the room taking my entire batch of veggies with her. I’ll hope this doesn’t happen.

The taller one doesn’t need to be as big, but it needs to be able to hold at least a few things, some of which are pictured below.

Scaping Tools



From left to right: Large SS pinsettes, needle-nosed SS pinsettes, SS spring scissors, (all courtesy of Rumford Aquatics) Fiskars spring scissors, Cheap-o Chinese-made chrome-plated pot metal pinsettes, pro scissors, curved pro scissors, angled pinsettes, sand scraper, and shrimp net.

I use each of these tools while scaping or trimming, remarkably. My newest set is the SS tools from Rumford Aquatics. These are pretty awesome and the quality is far superior to the cheap-o Chinese ones (though these have lasted me 5 years with an initial investment of $30 for the set).

The large pinsettes will be for planting stems and heavier-rooted plants like crypts. The needle-nosed are specifically for smaller rooted plants like HC. I knew this would be a trial of endurance. I have planted large plots of HC before, and it is exceedingly fatiguing, so I wanted something that would keep it enjoyable. These are incredibly low-strain, and the fine points will create little disturbance of the AS Powder.

The spring scissors are for trimming, like all the others. The Fiskars can be very helpful in trimming large stands of stems and hairgrass. They are still extremely sharp and shiny, even though they have been used for many years.

The net is for catching shrimp. And stray HC during trims.

Plant Storage and Prep

Here is where I took notes from Amano’s videos online.

Step One: Hire a dozen Japanese college kids to frantically run about and prep your plants for you. Make sure they hand you the right plants exactly when you need them.

There you go.

Just kidding.

However, I can take some tips from what they show in the Sumida Aquarium videos. My long table is for plant prep. So are these:



10 for 10 bucks (puppy not included). Plastic shoe bins with lids. The bins can hold plants in water for temporary storage until I get to them, and the lids can be used to stage the prepared plants. I’ll photograph this when I get there, so it makes more sense. I’ll trim the HC into 1cm plugs and lay them out on the lids so I can access them easily while planting them. I’ll do the same with my other plants, the hairgrass, stems, and riccia.

Sundries

Sundries.



Fishing line fro the riccia, hoses, zip ties. Things I find I need at random.

The Sprayer

So, Amano uses hoses with garden sprayers to keep plants moist during a long planting, but I won’t have the water pressure to make this possible (I age my water in a barrel upstairs. Gravity feeds it to my tank.) Oliver Knott uses a different approach for his seminars. He uses a pump sprayer. I thought this was genius. I’ve used regular sprayers in the past, but they are fatiguing after a lot of planting, and they are low-capacity. They are always falling apart and breaking/dripping all over the place. Also, my wife keeps abducting them to use as window cleaners. Not very healthy for plants or fish.

She won’t get this one.



Intended for herbicide and other unpleasant nastiness, it’s really well-built, pump-pressurized, high-capacity and very easy to use with an adjustable stream. Best of all it was only $6 at the Big Orange Box. There are more expensive ones, but this one is good quality and the right price/size for my needs.

So, there are the prep materials. I’ll post more about how I use them when the stinkin’ plants arrive. I need to call to find out what’s up…
 
#33 ·
:confused1: Well... hopefully that doesn't happen often. Nice little setup. I'm the kinda guy who just gets the ball rolling, and looses my tweezer three minutes into the planting session. And then finds them a week later in the the back pocket of the jeans I was wearing. My gf asks why I always work in my tank now wearing only boxers. :icon_roll

That way I have nowhere to hide tools from myself.
 
#34 ·
Haha, I've done this a few times myself. Once I found them in the trash. Not even sure how that happened.

As for the plants, I'm more annoyed at this point. I've had issues with these folks in the past, but they are pretty good about making good on mistakes. Nevertheless, it throws my schedule off quite a bit. I'll be out of town next weekend, so it will make water changes difficult at best. That is, if they arrive before then. As it is, I won't get a reply for a few days do I'm a bit stuck. In the meantime, I have a damp and empty tank. I just hope everything will be ok until I get to plant.
 
#36 ·
A couple of things I keep forgetting:

First, a huge thanks to Frank at ADG for his patience and service. This guy is great at relating with and taking care of his customers, while maintaining a great presence here on the forum and contributing to our growth as aquarium hobbyists. Your threads are always informative and I look forward to more of them! You are the man! It has inspired me to use this thread as a means of sharing my tricks that it might help others find more enjoyment in the hobby as well.

Second, the prize for the best poorly translated line I've read in a while.

"ADA is not responsible for the crack problem of the Aquarium."

Apparently they are taking a very hands-off approach to substance abuse in their aquariums.

This was in the instruction booklet for the 120P.
 
#37 ·
Plants are due to arrive tomorrow morning! By sunset tomorrow, I'll have this bad boy 90% planted. Then, I just need some DHG Belem to finish it off. I've added mini pellia to my plant list just to get a darker color in there, and I have a ton of it in another tank. Should make things fairly nice tomorrow. I have planted what little DHG I had already, but it looks very lonely in there.it has, however, made me very excited to get some more!

I think I'll start prepping things today just to save energy tomorrow. It's going to be a very long planting session with all that HC.
 
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