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The Black Gate GLA 12 long-New photos 2/6/13

22K views 88 replies 20 participants last post by  Green_Flash 
#1 · (Edited)
Current state as of 2/6/13

Completely rescaped. Did the hardscape reboot about 2 weeks ago-it hasn't fully carpeted yet, and is one of those organic tanks- I did not really plan the tank as much as dropped a bunch of plants into the mix and will see how it turns out. No livestock other than some tough RCS.

So I have had this tank for a year now and after a generous christmas gift of aqua soil multi, I decided to redo the tank in an iwagumi style. Unfortunately, I never got any shots of the original scape, which was a mix of manzanita, and siryu stones, with a smattering of Anubias nana and C parva with africana soil and a white sand foreground. I housed sterbia cories who promptly destroyed the sand:) It was pretty cool, but I had some real challenges with CO2 and the cories took the brunt of it:( Now that all but one are gone, I decided to break in the new year with a new look.

I found a neat rock store in southern Utah that had some obsidian stones with great character, bought about thirty pounds of it to play with. I had four bags of Amazonia multi, a bag of power sand special. I picked up a couple of pots of HC, and I have a line on some eleocharis "Belem" that I would like to use in the scape. I have a historical tendency for collectoritis, but I am going to try to keep this simple.

The tank is really fun to work with, but the length is kind of a challenge from a logistic stand point. For instance, I originally ran a XP 1 on the tank, and the filter just wasn't circulating enough water to reach the far side. I eventually put an old fluval 404 on it and the seems to have enough reach, but I will probably do something different once I put water in it. (It is really old and noisy) It also is a challenge to supply co2 as well. I have been running an inline atomic diffuser and have had serious flucuations with fatalities. The large surface area and shallow depth means serious out gassing, and I haven't gotten great results from diffusers. We will see if I stick with the inline diffuser, or make a switch.

Equipment list
GLA 91-B tank 36"x 8.3" x 9.4"
Aquatic Life T-5 fixture 78 watts geisemann powerchrome
Fluval 306 canister filter (changed my mind 306 is too powerful, will use a Eheim 2026)
Archea regulator w/ 5lb CO2 tank
Hydor inline 200 watt heater
Ista Mix Max CO2 reactor
Hand made acrylic lily pipes, intake outtake

Hardscape and substrate
Aquasoil Amazonia Multi w/ power sand special
Obsidian stones

Plant Species list
Hemiathus Callitrichoides
Elocharis sp "Belem"

The initial stage will be an emersed growth period of about a month. I am probably going to add additional DIY co2 to speed it along.
 
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#87 ·
The tank has been rescaped in early January. I (more or less) ignored the tank last summer and when you ignore HC, bad things happen. I had a nearly insurmountable overheating problem when the glass top was on (anytime) and during the entire summer. We don't have central air and rely on swamp coolers-somewhat counterproductive with aquariums. I am not willing to add a chiller to the system. I will be switching over to LEDs in the not so distant future. I have taken the t-5 light down to a single geisemann bulb, since I am not raising HC for sale (anymore), and don't want to deal with that level of light intensity.

Pictures to follow:)
 
#88 ·
Quick I-Phone shot


The hardscape was rescued from other tanks- you will see some of the same seiryu stones in the original configuration. Not necessarily the best composition, but a little fun and with lots of interesting features IRL. The HC carpet should tie it together nicely and when the Blyxa J. gets after it, it should have a nice mix of texture. I will try to put up some better photo's soon.
 
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