29 Gallon Planted Journal (adding the final plants)*

[Hilde]

Yeh, I found that the colormax bulb has more white photons that red photons. I was just wondering what brand is the10,000k bulb?

I have read that some have algae problems after they add a 10,000k bulb, so keep a watchful eye for it. Nothing is written in stone when it comes to planted tanks, so maybe you won't have problems with it.

Link of affects of different bulbs:
http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/lighting.htm

Great tank!! What luscious growth you have.

[fishboy87]

Thanks alot! It's a 10,000K 30" 18 watt coralife bulb. I will keep the algae part in mind.

[fishboy87]

So the bulb was installed and the co2 is set. . .my tank is finally a soda can of pearling. I'll try to post pictures of it after I have dinner. . .

[fishboy87]

So I just have everything new planted to see if it'll grow and start finalizing the scape after I know how everything grows. The plant to the right of the rotala that I've identified as L. Pantanal has already pearled for me and so has the alternanthera reineckii somewhat. I just want to see how the plants will color up and take it from there. The pics were taken after the lights were already off and turned back on so the plants have already closed up for the night.

[monkeyruler90]

hey, whats your bps? i have the same setup and same biomass.
how are the rams?

[fishboy87]

i have 2 bps on my tank. the rams are still aggressive by they are still there

[Ebichua]

That ludwigia looks more like Cuba to me. The leaves don't look as fine as pantanal.

[FrostyNYC]

Looks really great.

[fishboy87]

Thanks!

I just did a big overhaul on the tank trimming the rotala to the height of the blyxa. I also moved around the flame moss more towards the top of the wood and tied it down so it hopefully won't look as 'poofy' as it did before. I cranked up the co2 as well. For the past week or so, my tank started failing on me and got fuzz algae and some die-off of the plants. I've lowered my dosing and photoperiod and since then, the algae has definitely receded. The alternanthera isn't growing as I had hoped and has pretty much stunted. I'm going to try another plant being ludwigia glandulosa so I put up a WTB in the SNS *hint hint*. We'll see what happens with it.

[Hilde]

Originally Posted by fishboy87

The alternanthera isn't growing as I had hoped and has pretty much stunted. I'm going to try another plant being ludwigia glandulosa.

I only difference I see between the alternanthera ludwigia glandulosa is that the hardness tolerance for ludwigia glandulosa is very soft-hard.
http://www.tropica.com In plant finder saw it too need trace and iron ferts.

Looking at it I wonder if adding CSM+B or Flourish Comprehensive would improve its growth.
http://www.rexgrigg.com/

[fishboy87]

I dose iron somewhat heavily and do my best to keep nitrate low. The alternanthera is growing but the leaves are about a third the size of the norma size. I'm kind of scared with dry ferts just because I feel I'll dose too much and kill my fish.I'll go on a calculator right now and check if it makes sense.

[fishboy87]

Back to bumping this up Got my desired glandulosa. I also took it the limno. and cut back the pantanal/cuba. Added some more italian val to fill in the dying spot and the hairgrass has one or two patches. I'm hoping the glandulosa will fill out the are where the limno was and finally make that row of bright red I've always wanted. Pics up tomorrow as lights just went out and I can never reset the timer right.

[core212]

Originally Posted by fishboy87

Thanks!

It's the RedSea500 reactor with the vortex chamber tilted 90degrees from the pump.

Hi fishboy87,

Any special reason for tilting the vortex chamber 90 degrees on the reactor? I'm asking because I own one of these and I hate it with a passion. I am currently waiting for a reactor from Rex Grigg to come in and will be using a diffuser from GLA as well. Thoughts?

Thanks,
sandy

[fishboy87]

I actually switched to the diffuser also. The reactor didn't work well for me. I tilted it 90 degrees because it seemed more aesthetically pleasing. You can see in the most recent picture there is a light blue tube. That runs from the right side of the tank where the cylinder is and into the diffuser under the filter intake were the bubbles can be chopped up by the impellar.