ADA Mini L: Iwagumi X-2

[Francis Xavier]

After getting back from being gone, I'm frankly quite surprised with how this tank grew in. There was a good patch of some algae that had branches so individually thick that if I didn't know any better I would have told you it was a plant, seemingly the co2 was at some low levels during this escapade, the adjustment nob probably had something turn it down to lower levels on accident. One of these day's i'll master the art of being able to leave the tanks unattended for these trips.



Super-small glosso growth, each single leaflet is about the 1.5x the size of an HC node, here you can see it growing with an HC patch:



More small glosso and the left side:


Right side:


I'm pretty pleased with how thick and short the hairgrass has grown in, it seems my guess about hairgrass and shou stone working together was about spot on. All the plants in here are hugging the ground pretty tightly, even at HC grown properly levels of tight. Considering the tank hasn't been dosed at all in the past month, this leads me to believe that close, intense light (I don't have anything supporting the light fixture above the rim of the tank) really does work wonders. The super-small glosso really aids this tank in coming together. Which is pretty cool since the glosso I planted had leaflets much bigger and much more straggly/taller (which you can see in the previous pictures) than this - I honestly believed that they might not recover so well due to the shape they were in when I planted them. I'm going to monitor the HG until the tear-down and move about a month from now, and see if it doesn't grow any taller, hopefully it doesn't get taller than it is now.

[blair]

Lookin' good! Love the mixed ground cover; very natural

Likewise, I went to DC for a long weekend and returned to awesome growth. But sadly I lost 1 green neon tetra. I also need to work on that art of leaving my tanks unattended. Even with someone feeding for me I have bad luck. If you figure out the secret, let me know

[ddtran46]

Wow. What an amazing growth for a month time period. Looks very nice

[Francis Xavier]

Thanks ddtran and blair. I think if this tank hadn't at least survived mostly intact I'd have pulled my hair out.

I was able to remove most of the algae manually but it suffered from the problem of coming back, so I'm going with a 3 day blackout on this tank, so wednesday we'll see how it's doing with a water change and all that.

[Reginald2]

Originally Posted by blair

Lookin' good! Love the mixed ground cover; very natural

I whole-heartedly agree. That dwarf hair grass looks really good up against that stone.

[Francis Xavier]

Well, with the move up to Seattle done, I only had one more task to complete; well, a couple tasks, but all involving the job search and my two tanks I brought with me.

Honestly. I can't tell you what inspired this aquascape. I wish I could point to a cool mountain or the abstract concept of one, and say HEY LOOK THERE, THAT'S THE IDEA. The reality is, I basically just had a lot of oversized stones, an empty tank, some mixed soil and a floor to work on.

After finishing and fine-tuning the scape a little bit with the help of my fellow Iwagumi enthusiast and associate, Blair, I believe he has more insight on the impression of the tank than I do. I'd love to say that the design concept from the beginning here was four main-stones struggling for dominance in a mountain chain, using subtle shadows, hues and stone textures to create various illusions and tricks of the eye to create an interesting scape.

However, what really went through my head mostly was "Oh my god, these are all the wrong rocks. Well, that's cool like that right there...hmm, that creates a shadow...this leads the eye over here...this side needs more stuff..." You get the idea.

Without further ado, I humbly present to you an aquascape that is yet to have a name, maybe some divine inspiration will hit later. So lets just call it Iwagumi X for now.





When I'm feeling more poetic or inspired, perhaps I'll post more insights on the aquascape - for now, I'll just leave it at this design pushed to the limit my knowledge of Iwagumi, and a lot of the creativity driving the design was fostered from examining and critiquing fellow Iwagumi aquascapers and their works here.

All Comments/critiques welcome!

[trigun808]

beautiful scape *speechless*
i wish i had a scape like this!

[Ugly Genius]

Welcome back, X. Glad you're all settled in Seattle.

The hardscape looks great. You and blair did an awesome job!
I don't think the rocks are oversized at all. I think they're exactly the right size. Initially, when you fill it with water and the water does it's magnification thing, they will seem too large, but once the plants grow in, they will look spot on.
While the rock on in the back-right is the most distinctive, I think the left hand rock(s?) is the star of the show; so many textures and contours! Beautiful stone.
Have you decided what plants you'll be using?

As I find the left hand rock so appealing, your tall stone leaves something to be desired in my eye. The ratio in size to the other rocks seems about ten percent too small and/or low. (I think the knee-jerk reaction to this hardscape may be that the left hand rock is too big, but I believe it is exactly the right size. It's the right hand one that is too small and/or smooth.)
Or:
Perhaps due to how the light falls on it, it has a smoothness absent in the other rocks. Perhaps if it were pushed backwards a bit (half an inch, even), it would either gain texture through shadows or -- if it is indeed smoother than the other rocks -- appear further back in the distance.
Or:
Even simpler, move the light forward a half and inch and take care of everything like that.

Please note that the above suggestion/criticism is me digging really deep to find a flaw. Even if you filled right now without changing a thing, you'd have a really good tank. The Seattle air done good by you. (Maybe now, surrounded by all of that beautiful brown and green, you'll learn to appreciate the beauty of wood.)

Good job on this one. Can't wait to see it grow out.

Oh, wait, I can find a flaw. Your substrate line is too crooked. Yeah, there you go; a solid critique that is easily fixable. Now smooth that out and make us a pretty tank, whuddya?

[Bubba_Shrimp]

Outstanding scape! Beautiful stones and very well put together. Added to my collection of nice aquascapes

[thief]

Hi there X,

Really intricate scape!!! I love the flow from the left rock downwards into the dark crevices of the other stones.

But I do you have an idea you might like. Have you thought of maybe changing up the scape. Let me explain my idea. Ok take the photo of the tank and split it directly in half. Now switch those two half's and one can end up with another possible sweet scape right there. The tip of the smooth stone sticking out can align with the ratio that the eye is naturally attracted to. Again this is only an idea that you can try out and see how it looks. I do really favor this scape with the textures and shadows of the rocks but I am wondering how it would look the way I described?

[monkeyruler90]

im loving those rocks! great scape already.

[Francis Xavier]

Thanks everyone for the comments and critiques, it really does help volumes for the development of a tank when there is collaboration. Seems like after you sit back and stare at the same rock structure for hours you tend to get into the rut where you stop seeing your own flaws for sanity's sake.

I've got to be honest, I've been at an impasse when it comes to what needs to be planted in this tank to make it work (or more accurately to not mess it up, since at this point bad planting could ruin the tank, or at least that's how I feel at the moment!). For now there's been some HC growing in there emmersed, which, as anyone who has grown anything emmersed can tell that this tank presents certain challenges to the concept of growing something emmersed.

In short, my thoughts have been varying from a 100% hc carpet, to hc in the front and center, with glosso up near the tops and around the right center rock, etc, or Hair grass or e tenellus growing around the left hand side, however any e tenellus or hair grass usage would have to be trimmed fairly aggressively to keep it low and away from blocking the impact of the upper tier of the stone structure. I have the feeling that UG would look really great here, but the only real surviving plants through the move (and the massive fluctuations in temperature adding to their shock I'd guess) are a little bit of HC, a few sprigs of e tenellus, some glosso, and new hairgrass shoots that emerged out of the mulch that became of the rest of the plant mass. I've yet to find any of the UG I had in plethora that grew out from the previous setup in the mass of plants, and I know there's mini pellia still in there somewhere!

Here are some photos:











From behind:


Morning view:


It warrants noting that my primary challenge with this tank was creating an Iwagumi that maintained the interest to look at that driftwood tanks tend to generate due to their jungle nature. The biggest flaw in my previous Iwagumi's and a common error I see in others are that they are fun to look at for the first time, but get progressively more boring as time goes on, perhaps because there isn't enough to look at, or because it seems like every nook and cranny has been observed. This is the reason for a lot of the tension and myriad stone-work of this design, to try to bring that jungle driftwood appeal of always something new to look at while maintaining the core Iwagumi principles. For this reason, and this reason alone I've been contemplating the mixing of a carpet in the upper decks.

I really wish I had a camera (or could use my camera to the extent) that I could show you what it looks like coming in the door in the morning with the light on, it even caught me by surprise and I had been staring at it for about a week! I almost feel like the photo's don't do it justice when compared to the experience of it being early morning or night with the light on, and the apartment being completely black and just seeing the tank and all it's nooks and crannies from a distance in perfect detail.

[Francis Xavier]

Thanks monkeyruler, bubba, and trigun. I'm glad you guys like it. Hopefully it continues to live up to expectations, and I feel humbled by such praise.

Thief, that's a good observation. Initially I did try that idea out as you described it, but in a nut shell, most of these stones end up looking forced or lose their best faces when positioned around the other way - something about it just always looked off or didn't quite fit due to their size and the constraint on the aquascape. By the way - I like the direction you're going with the rocks and driftwood in your new rescape.

UG, yeah the left side really is the winner of the scape, they by far have the most detail. I'm happy to hear your feedback, and I should've known that the left side wouldn't be able to sneak past your eye (Thief caught it too I believe), The lights in the original photos were originally way way back on the edge of the tank to over-emphasize the shadowing effect (not where they are normally for growing or will be anyway). The right stone is indeed much smoother than the left side in general, but this is where the interesting contrast comes into play, the feeling that the real dominate side is the left, and the right is merely trying to jockey for control of the scape by height and status. You and Blair both caught that one lightning quick. Now, granted, i'm not sure how this will turn out in the long run. Oh, and I'll straighten out the front substrate line when planting is done .

I'm all ears if anyone has any good plant suggestions here, and believe me, where this one will end up is just about as much a mystery to me right now as it is to everyone else!

For any die-hards: There are 7 stones in total here, and the focal points of the rocks (the most interesting parts of them anyway) more or less fall within the golden rule, which will have to be emphasized by proper planting, all 4 primary focal points are in use.

[CL]

Yes!

[mountaindew]

Good looking start.
These little tanks are so cool!
I might have to put one together
MD!