20 gallon long dirt tank

[Borikuan]

That picture of you holding the new 20g still gives me a good laugh...

Yet another testimony that HC grows well in low tech conditions. Look at my 2.5 in my sig for my testimony.

[Apyrase]

Awesome tank, hoping that my HC will grow like yours

[tryank]

CO2! Probably the coolest bottle for DIY CO2 that I've seen.

[tryank]

The POM bottle is where the yeast mix goes, producing the CO2 that goes through the tube and into my little homemade bubble counter/nasty yeast mixture catcher. I don't really need it for bubble counting since I can hear the bubbles get chopped up in the filter impeller, but it should stop any alcohol that forms in the tube or top of the POM bottle from making its way to the tank.

[tryank]

Growth comparison shots...

October:




Dec. 17th, right before moving:


Today, January 26th (I trimmed the tall guy a little):

[tryank]

The HC growth has slowed... which is why I am going to start DIY CO2. Maybe the dirt has been sucked dry of all it's magical nutrients, or maybe that plant on the right is rough competition.

Here's a close up of the HC today...

[Sakuras]

Are you getting root tabs or liquid ferts? Nice contrast of fish and plants!

[marioman72]

looks like u def could use some co2 the HCs looking a little bit yellow compared to how it looked. but still looking awsome love the color of the platies

[tryank]

Originally Posted by marioman72

looks like u def could use some co2 the HCs looking a little bit yellow compared to how it looked. but still looking awsome love the color of the platies

Yup. I agree. The HC was losing its color and a bit of brown algae was growing on most of the leaves.

Now that I've had co2 going for about a week, I can already see the color coming back and new little leaves popping up through the old stuff. And talk about pearling! About six hours after the lights go on, tiny TINY bubbles stream up from all over the place. I've had "fake" pearling after I do a water change, but nothing like this. Guess that's a good sign.

[tryank]

Along with adding co2 a week or so ago, there's a few other changes to the tank.

First, the hardscape situation: I never really liked the right side of the tank. If you look in the past pictures, there's always been this little rock with java moss attached kinda thrown on that side of the tank. Totally out of place. So in October I bought that plant to put next to it. Beautiful plant, but it grew big enough to become the focal point of the tank, taking away the emphasis from the rocks and HC. I'd known that something had to be done for quite a while. Yesterday I took out the two rocks and put others in that I found in my backyard.

[tryank]

Second, more plants: I was down in Provo over Super Bowl weekend and found a local pet shop called Animal Ark. Freaking rad place. They had a great planted tank on display.



Anywho, I bought some glossostigma and another plant that's tall (can't remember its name). Just planted the glosso last night and still deciding where the other one needs to be stuck.





It took for-freakin-ever. Like an hour for the whole process. But my shrimps really dig the tall plant. And speaking of shrimpies...

[tryank]

Third, the shrimp vs filter dilemma:

In October I bought some "supreme cherry shrimp" from speedieaquatics. Same dude that goes by speedie408 here on TPT. Started with 12 or so, now I've got 25+ swimming around. Love it! However...

Whenever my filter flow slows, I open it up and rinse out the little pad that catches poop, leaves, whatever. A few weeks after I had my shrimp, I did that and found 10-20 little shrimp on it. Depressing. So I cover the intake with pantyhose and it still happens. I have no idea how they get in. And recently, bigger shrimps have been getting past the pantyhose AND the filter pad AND the foam and end up in my spray bar. Right now I can see five in there. ?

So I decided to get a canister filter. I have wanted an Eheim for over a year, but could never talk my wife into spending $80 bucks on a quality filter, until now! I'm pretty pumped to not have my Fluval Nano inside my tank, taking up space, being a shrimp trap. It's a good filter, I should do a review on it since I couldn't really find a good one when I was wondering if I should buy it, but the external canister is gonna be pretty sexy.

[tryank]

After working my tank over a little the last few days, I am pretty darn pleased with how it looks and where it's headed...

I now have an Eheim classic 2213. Talk about the Cadillac of filters, wow.

A friend of mine just started his first planted tank and gave me half a bag of Eco-Complete substrate (made my CaribSea) he had left over. So I scooped up the sand on the right side of my tank and re-planted the glosso-starts in that instead. This tank DID start out as a dirt tank capped with sand, but the layer of dirt on the right side was really thin. That might help account for why my HC didn't really spread farther. Just shootin in the dark.

Sand...



Eco-Complete...

[tryank]

After marinating on the current hardscape for a few days, I know something has to change. Way too symmetrical.

[StraightAddicted]

The tank looks great, love seeing the progress over time. In my opinion you have no real background plants. The back left corner would be more appealing with jungle val if u want real hieght. Or nice piece of driftwood similar to the photo of the tank you liked at lfs. Add some moss to it and shrimp paradise lol... keep up the hard work it lookss great