The Fisherman's 20 Long Journal - The Workbench

[thefisherman]

I'm just learning how to grow plants and keep my fish happy. I guess I have a Noah's Ark approach to planted tanks... collect 2-3 of each and shove em into the tank and hope they grow lol.

20G LONG - WORKBENCH (11-19-11)

Specifics:
Tank: Deep Blue 20g Long - 30"X12"X12"
Substrate: 40lbs Eco-complete black
Equipment: Ehiem 2217
Heater: Hydor ETH 200
Lighting: Deep Blue 230 2X T5HO, 24W 6500k (Azoo lamps)
CO2: Matheson Dual Stage inline GLA diffuser
Ferts: modified EI
Photoperiod: 10hrs

Flora:
Crypt. Walkeri Petchii
Crypt. Beckettii
Crypt. Wendtii Green
Crypt. Wendtii Red
Crypt. Wendtii De Witt
Crypt. Wendtii Tropica
Crypt Wedntii Mioya
Crypt. Blassii
Crypt. Undulata
Crypt. Pontderiifolia
Crypt. Parva
Crypt. Albida
Crypt. Ferruginea "Sg. Sempit"
Dwarf Lily
Egleria fluctuans
Sunset Hygro
Limnophila Repens mini
Staurogyne Repens

Fauna:
14 Cardinal Tetra
2 Black Tetra
1 Khuli Loach
2 Cory
3 Otocinclus
2 EBR's

[thefisherman]

Newly setup. Harvested a bunch of cuttings from my nano. I thought it was a lot but as you can see... I had a lot of room to work with!

[thefisherman]

Yep... I couldn't stand the look of an empty tank! I met with Partobe in the city, went to Winn and Pacific and grabbed a bunch of stuff. I felt like Bob Ross just shoving pants in the dirt... it felt soo good, happy accidents! My nephew seems to like my handy work

[thefisherman]

So I just hooked up my 2217 a few days prior and was in total awe of its beastly ways... and thus my eyes were opened to the world of over filtration, ahhhhh so refreshing

What do you do when you've got a filter that seems to have as much water in it as your tank you say? Of course you go to the LFS to buy fish!

6 neon rainbows and 3 GBR's later.. Nitrite spike I had levels .25-.50 ppm it was nutz.

Since I experienced crazy stuff while my nano was cycling, i kind knew what I had to do:

- initial waterchange to protect fish (dilute levels)
- raised spraybar to super oxygenate water at night (foster bacteria growth)
- bought an entire tank of hornwort from the LFS (absorb nasties)
- open the flood gates on the 2217!

Result: levels yo-yo'd for a couple days, by the 3rd day it was regular scheduled waterchange, rinse and repat. One bacteria bloom later (cloudy water) levels stabilized. [I had to do this twice to my tank btw... tank fully cycled by the 6th week]

[thefisherman]

Fast forward to right before xmas.. performing weekly prune/trims... repositioned my walichi added some DW, finally my plants are all starting to wake up!

[thefisherman]

I received a wonderful package yesterday of assorted crypts from a very generous man I shall not name [cough gordon richards cough thank you!] lol

I was going to do a little photo narration like other journals starting with a pic of the bag, then the plant on the table, prepping the plant, planting the plant...sorry

I think I managed to take two pics before I ripped all the plants out of the bags, crypts were everywhere! on my desk, on my keyboard, my phone in my nano, my bed, the floor, my mouse, and c. pygmea! my God that's a small crypt!

Pure bliss I tell you.. I literally was tossing plants into my tanks to inspect, clean and prune them...QUARANTINE you say? I say SHAWREMTINE ... yeah my tanks have snails; that I feed to assassins!

ICH? bah SHMICH! I've had the sickest ICH outbreak in my nano that made me afraid to put my hand in the water...cured it. Any fish in there are immune at this point, my cories eat theronts for breakfast, besides my tanks are a balmy 80-82 degrees.

Ya so I basically lost track of what I was planting and will probably post ID threads in a few weeks lol. I got bag of 300 DIY osmocote capsules that I probably plugged 150 in every square inch of my substrate...after several hours and a waterchange and fert dose my tank is on its way to becoming a crypt tank!

In all honesty, I felt like today was a turning point for me and my tank. I feel like I am only now beginning to understand plants and what they need from me and what I need from them. I hope you enjoy my pics!

[partobe]

OMG!! I Love your Tank. When we go on our plant shopping this week you have to give me some pointers.

[ChadRamsey]

very nice low tech!

[thefisherman]

Originally Posted by partobe

OMG!! I Love your Tank. When we go on our plant shopping this week you have to give me some pointers.

thank you partobe! you remember the half dead stargrass and hygros we got from winn? i'll have plenty cuttifs for you if you like

pointers?! idk if I can give you any except, if its green leafy and rooty...shove it in the dirt!

ps. here's a shot of a beautiul specimen I got from Gordon Richards


Sent from my iPhone

[thefisherman]

Originally Posted by ChadRamsey

very nice low tech!

thanks chad! it took me a while to figure out the proper excel dosing... CO2, pH/KH was tricky to stabilize.

but right now i'm at:

pH 6.4
KH 2
CO2 14-20 ppm

now dosing 15ml every other day... melted a few plants and almost near suffocated my fish in the process of finding that number :O


Sent from my iPhone

[partobe]

nice plants so when are you going to start the 75?

[thefisherman]

Happy New Year everyone!

So I received a surprise (since I didn't expect any deliveries till 2012) package of stuff yesterday... It was my Hydor ETH and scaping tools. Very impressed with Bigal's.

Of course I couldn't wait to install my new heater! I didn't realize how huge the external heater was and had issues with the length of my tubing and the position of my outflow spraybar. I had some new tubing and an unused ehiem outflow pipe, so I relocated my outflow to the other side of the tank. Giving me enough length to play with. I still plan to install my GLA inline diffuser once my regulator comes in.

Here's some pics of my upgrades

[thefisherman]

Originally Posted by partobe

nice plants so when are you going to start the 75?

thanks pat.. well as you know the 75 will be on hold for now. I need to focus on getting my 30B's setup first. Also I think the 75 was intended to be a showtank in our living room. I think I am interested in doing something bigger (150g+) low tech, with a lot of large crypts and slow growers.

[partobe]

Happy New Year Ryan!!! I love the new goodies you got. Do you remember how much that upright fluval with stand was at pacific?

[thefisherman]

Originally Posted by partobe

Happy New Year Ryan!!! I love the new goodies you got. Do you remember how much that upright fluval with stand was at pacific?

the "osaka" you mean? idk it looked pricey. last time i was there i didn't see it, i think it was sold.