Hello! Well that didn't take long. Only after 3 weeks back into the aquarium world, I have decided to start another tank. I visited a LFS that was under new management recently and fell in love with the 12g Long by Mr. Aqua. I am going to do a Iwagumi style tank with HC. This will be my first ever Iwagumi style tank. Here is a brief equipment and fauna/flora list. Pictures are coming soon.
Fauna:
- Celestichthys margaritatus (Galaxy Rasboras)
- Some kind of shrimp that is not RCS
I am going to start this baby off emersed. It'll be my first emersed grow but i want the HC carpet completely covered before I fill this baby up. I have a few concerns I was hoping some of you might be able to answer.
Is my lighting too much for a 9.4" deep tank?
If so should I replace a bulb with a 18000k bulb?
How hard is it REALLY to keep an iwagumi setup with HC trimmed? I can imagine a bunch of loose leaves and roots flying ever where.
Right.. damn algae. Too bad I already bought the fixture. The last time i was in the hobby T5HO were still expensive so I saw these lights priced at $110 and jumped on em. I'm going to try running 1 bulb and see how that goes.
looks nice. I been working on an iwagumi with this tank for awhile now (same plants you can see link in my sig). Finally getting some HC spread but i have had to battle some algae. The worst thing for me so far is cyano/bga. I have a 2213 on the tank but there just always seems to be some areas that dont get the flow you want and others that get almost too much. I am running furcata rainbows in it so they like the flow but with out the filter on full blast its hard to make the water hit the end. Before i go chemical to fight the bga im planing on getting a small powerhead and point at the trouble area. I read good flow will usually get rid of the stuff.
Also a heads up with this tank it needs like daily topping off. It has soo much surface area for such low gallons that water evaporates really fast. Temps swing really fast too i vary from 73F-74F at night to 81F during the day. I think the swing would be better if i had a better heater but i dont have the mula for an inline and i haven't found an affordable small heater for the tank other then my 5 dollar hang on one.
I would have done immersed if i had thought it about it more because my HC is growing so slow. BTW thanks again xmas_one for the hc!
OiZO, I just peeped your tank. It looks good! I like the scape very much. One thing I am worried about is algae. With so much light I'm running on this bad boy I have been considering turning it into a hard SPS reef tank. I might just sell the light and buy a T5NO fixture Thanks for the top off tip. I will definitely be looking into a good 2nd hand heater before I fill it up.
im running 2 t5 ho bulbs on the standard tank stand and its doing fine. I noticed that with only one t5 bulb running my HC would strat growing tall. Im not having any issues with algae(knock on wood) and ive had this thing running like this for over a month.
Great tank! I just peeped it. Are you running two 39w as of right now? And for how long? I think that might be the cause of your current algae situation. I think im going to just use one bulb throughout. Maybe start with 2 bulbs during emersed even.
hey guys... finally received my bag of amazonia today so i filled this puppy up. This is my first iwagumi tank so be nice... any criticisms are welcome
So.. im probably going to need another bag of amazonia before i can start planting. The ends of the tank have barely half an inch at some places. I miscalculated the amount i needed and should've just bought a 9 liter bag If any of you guys are local to me in SOCAL and have extra amazonia they can spare, please let me know. I will pay you for your troubles
i think it would look better if you turned the second rock from the left the opposite direction and put the first from the left in front of the two middle rocks.
it may look different in person but it seems like the rocks kind of flow to the right, which would be fine if the arrangement wasnt in the center of the tank, but it feels unbalanced. im not great at aquascaping but i am an artist and it just doesnt "feel" right if you know what i mean.
The second rock from the left has a buncha grooves in it so there are only a few ways i can place it without it looking like an outkast. It kind of looks like slate on top of slate if ya know what i mean. But good suggestion, I moved stuff around again.
Thanks for the link. I just ordered another bag of amazonia because i was a bit short on the ends of the tank. Ill buff up the mound when it comes I need to prop up the Oyaishi a bit. I kind of feel like my Soeishi is a little too big too. Haha!
BTW sorry for the crappy pictures. Im using my blackberry. My camera wont be back until later tonigt
Finally added more substrate to the tank. I added MR. Aqua soil to it though. I couldn't wait for another bag of ADA to come in so i just went to an LFS near me to purchase a bag. I actually walked in looking for a new pair of metal tweezers. I left with a bag of soil and no tweezers haha. I also got a nice aluminum spray bottle from CVS. It was kinda pricey but i like the way it looks, kind of got that ADA metal look to it. I also got a small pot of HC from my LFS. The place is called A+ tropical fish if you guys are in the area. Great group of guys and they have some pretty good stuff that you would otherwise have to order online.
Im expecting a pack of HC from xmas_one soon too. Thanks again man!
Let me know what you guys think of the scape. Its still early so i can still move stuff around. One concern one of my friends had was that it looks a little too centered. I made the slope on the leftside a little more slanted but this picture is prior to that change. Im still waiting on the camera so i can take some better pictures. These are all from my bb tour. Thanks for looking!
I have the same GLA version of the tank and still deciding on the light. I'll wait and see how your works out so I can decide. LOLOL
Did you decide on a filter yet?? I'll be getting an Eheim 2215, it will have more than enough flow for the tank and you can play with the quick disconnect taps to adjust the flow.
Hahah smart choice. I kind of went overkill on the lighting lol. But defiant's tank is running the same lights and says his stuff is doing fine. I was going to go cheap and buy the azoo mini canister. It looks like the Tom rapid's filter but everything is more solidly built. I've already spent more on this tank than i originally planned so i dont know if i want to shell out another $100 for a filter. Heres my price list so far:
Tank - $70
Light- $110
Mr. Aqua Soil + ADA soil - $55
Seiryu stones- $50
----------------------------
$285 no fish no co2 no filter... FML
Oh well. I have a buddy in HK right now. I asked him to look for fishtank gear while hes over there. Last time he came back with bomb stainless steel utensils and diffusers for cheap. Now i need to determine a good Co2 and fert regimen.
Run the lights as long as you want, I would say no more than 18 hours, though. 16 would be good- it gives the plants 8 hours to rest and breath out CO2/ take in O2.
Great. Ill be leaving the lights on the majority of the day now.
I am having one problem though and i dont know if its because of my T5 lights. But, the leaves on the newly planted HC seems to be turning somewhat yellow. Does anyone know the reason for this? Its been like 3 days and some of the HC that i planted the first day have maybe 10% of the leaves turn yellow.
With good reflectors, you want one T5HO bulb about 17-18 inches from the substrate in order to have medium high light. The light intensity will increase rapidly as you go towards the fixture (ie, as plants/substrate get taller).
You can see from the chart just how much light T5HO can put out. I used to run a similar fixture to yours at a height that gave me well above "high light" PAR, and at first things were okay. Eventually fate will catch up to you though... my aquarium turned into hair algae heaven. After reducing the lighting to one bulb and fiddling with the height, my algae problems went away again.
17-18" means that i will have a huge amount of light spill in the room. Not to mention it will look funny. I think I am going to switch out the current fixture for a regular t5NO eventually. For now, the light doesn't seem to be hurting the HC too much. Unless the leaf burn is from the high light...
Isnt the yellowing a defeciency? I know in some dry start methods ferts diluted with water in a spray bottle are misted onto the plants to help aid in what is lacking.
In my experience, the yellowing is just the old immersed form leaves dying as the new, thicker and waxier leaves grow in that can handle being exposed to the air and won't wilt as easily.
I can almost guarantee that there are no deficiencies present due to the fresh AS.
Bah. Missed the aquasoil part. Such a great substrate.
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