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29-gal Low Tech Journal

1K views 5 replies 4 participants last post by  Hilde 
#1 ·
Hey everyone! I think my tank is finally shaping up enough to show it off a little bit. :)

Fish:
1 male betta
2 oto cats

Plants:
Hygro difformis
Dwarf hairgrass
Crypt lutea and wendtii (at least, I think that's what it is)
Java fern
Java moss (the betta untied the moss from the wood, and most of it got sucked into the filter)

pH - 8.1
NH - 0ppm
NO2 - 0ppm
NO3 - 0ppm (bad, I know! I'm paying for it by fending off a minor BGA infection. I ordered some Flourish Nitrogen today.)

I currently dose Flourish Excel every week after the water change. Lighting is at 1.6 wpg, normally for 8 hours a day, but I've taken it down to 4 hours a day to deal with the BGA (seems to be working).

First day, May 24th. I was a little careless with the dumping of the water, and my tank was way cloudy for a few days.


Once the water cleared up some, I put the betta in so he could stretch his fins in a body of water bigger than a cup.


Added more crypts.


Added hairgrass.


Added hygro. The green thing stuck on the wood is food for the otos, who made very quick work of the algae I had. I didn't want them to starve!


June 13th picture.


Today's pic!


I had amazingly little crypt melt, and all of them have grown new leaves and even made babies. The hygro is growing slowly but surely, and is the betta's favorite hangout. The java fern and moss have been disappointing, but I blame the moss's demise on the betta and his love of chewing apart cotton thread. The hairgrass has started sending out horizontal runners, and that makes me super stoked! Hairgrass carpet yay!

Thanks for looking. :)
 
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#3 ·
Thanks! :bounce:

The light is a 40watt CFL that's sized for a 10gal (that's why only half of the tank looks lit), that I was given by a kind fellow planted tank hobbyist. It was supposed to be temporary but has developed into a more permanent solution as my impending baby has started to slurp up all our funds. ;) I'm always on the lookout for a good deal on better lighting, however, so hopefully I can get stronger lights soon.
 
#4 ·
Your tank looks good, I like that wood. It's nice to see dwarf hairgrass growing with such low light too. I'll have to try that out.

You might want to look into dry ferts rather than seachem. They will be much cheaper. I just noticed you joined 2 years ago so you probably know about dry ferts already, but I just thought I'd let you know in case you didn't.
 
#5 ·
Yeah I've been lurking for a while. :) I started to get a tank set up, and then life put the brakes on that. I finally now had the opportunity to set up the tank!

I'm kind of wary of dry ferts, mostly because I'm convinced I'll do something and screw them up and kill everything in my tank (or wake up one morning and have an algae farm). And I'm in an apartment, so I don't have a lot of storage space for aquarium stuff. Tragic. :(
 
#6 ·
Very interesting. My tank is similar to yours. I just have more variety of plants. Less variety seems to be better to get a clean scape. Where did you get the wood? My NO3 is neel too. I occasionally get BBA. Dosing with nitrogen and Excell eliminates it.

I think the addition of API root tabs (Iron sulfate, Nitrogen, Potassium carb, Potassium sulfate) would be beneficial too. Then you can dose approx. 2ml weekly. That is how I dose. Also don't forget Excell. Sometimes there is a generic form of it available. I have found 1 at my aquarium association.

The best and cheapest light for non-Co 2 injection is the T5NO from Big Als. I found this out the hard way. After spending more on a diy fixture using under counter light fixtures.
 
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