[hallzoo]

My old planted tank reborn! Started this journal 4 weeks into it so this post is catching up a little. Last time this tank had plants in it (2 years ago), I had serious algae issues and gave up. This time I'm trying to do it the right way:

65 AGA tall
110w 9325k PC + 75w 8000k T-8 (approx 2.9 wpg)
XP3
magnum 350 running pleated cartridge
pressurized CO2 with modified Rex reactor
koralia 2
flourite, eco complete, & plain gravel (50/20/30)
EI dosing+excel

I had full blast CO2 & EI going before I put plants in. I planted about 60 plants all at once.

So far 4 weeks into it I have a little bit of BGA, diatoms, and hair algae. They are all pretty small amounts and I have been able to manage them with cleanup kritters, excel, H2O2, and cleaning. The ottos and BN pleco have been great for the diatoms. I may have to hit the hair and BGA with a blackout if they get much worse, but for now I'm focusing on growing healthy plants to hopefully beat those out.

Plant growth is good and so far the only plant I haven't been able to grow is lilaeopsis. Oh well, I chucked it for some dwarf hairgrass which is already starting to grow and hasn't gotten the algae crud (yet).

Flora:
Ludwiga, rotala, melon sword, kleiner bar sword, hairgrass, bacopa, pennywort, vals, lotus, and a few others.

Fauna:
2 full grown angels, 4 otto's, BN pleco, 2 SAE's, 1 opaline gourami, 12 amano, lots o MTS.

Thanks for looking!

Week 1:

Week 2:

Week 4. Rearranged a little, added some more bacopa from LFS and added 60w more light:

 

[Triv]

I love tall tanks. Bet that was a pain planting. gotta have some long arms.

 

[hallzoo]

Thanks, yep I'm 6'4" so it works pretty well for me.

Here's week 5. The pennywort and rotala swapped places. The rotala seems to want to grow sideways, is this normal?

Brown algae is gone (waiting it out + oto's is a great way to deal with this). Hair algae has subsided, BGA is about the same but I don't let it cover more than a few rocks befoe I nuke it with h202, still having to do that daily. Plant growth is great, just started adding 2 tsp/week mgso4:

 

[BMueller777]

Lookin good man

 

[Triv]

Mine grows any direction it happens to choose.. sideways, up.. I never really have a choice.

 

[hallzoo]

Thanks!

I wish the damn BGA would go away...

I feel a blackout coming on:icon_eek:

 

[problemman]

u could always try a garra or a SAE

 

[hallzoo]

Here's week six, starting to feel what "balanced" might be all about. Took out BGA w/EM, no problems with that process whatsoever, highly recommended if you can find a cheap source of antibiotics. I also improved surface movement and overall agitation, vacuumed the gravel, and upped my NO3 slightly. Hopefully this will provide a long term solution to my BGA issues:

Here's some plant closeups now that I have some great growth going on:

Bacopa Australis

Your basic Wal Mart "plant bulb" - Red Lotus, just starting to throw up some lily pads.

Water Wisteria, finally learned how to prune this one. Instead of getting frustrated about brown/algae covered lower leaves, just hack em' off!

So far good. Tom Barr's EI method + lots of CO2 + lots of cleaning and attention = success!

Thanks for looking!

 

[hallzoo]

Cheers again to Tom Barr and all the other great plant folks out there! I couldn't have made this work if you guys didn't share your knowledge.

Here's some pearling pics from the end of week 6. My plants are growing like they are on steroids:

Rotala Indica

Pennywort

Red Lotus

If you look closely you can see the whirlwind of bubbles in the tank. After about 5 hours of light the tank is so saturated with CO2 and oxygen that you'd swear I was misting (I'm not, only using a Rex style reactor). I think max'd out CO2 has really helped the plants to grow to thier full potential. The CO2 comes on 1.5 hours before the lights, and my DC is full on yellow about half way through the photoperiod. My fish are usually breathing a little harder by the end of the photoperiod, but still active and eating. Add to all this about 1300 gph of circulation (magnum 350, XP3 and a koralia 2) and it's quite a madhouse in there. I'm pretty sure there isn't a square centimeter of the tank that isn't at 30+ ppm CO2 during the last half of "lights on".

 

[Regloh]

Looking good !!!

Hey with 1300 gph those fish are just exhausted, trying to maneuver the current, LOL

 

[hallzoo]

65 Gal "Tall" journal (56k)**updated 2/26/10**

Week 7, showing growth after a major trim last Sunday:

 

[Chrisinator]

What the green plant in your foreground? The one closer to the right?

 

[hallzoo]

Bacopa Australis. Got a small bunch from Freshwateraquariumplants.com and it just took off!

 

[hallzoo]

Update for the week of 3/8/10. Battled murky/green water last week so didn't get any photos. All I have to say is thank God for UV clarifiers:

Thanks for looking! I love this tank!!

 

[hallzoo]

Moved some stuff around. Week of 15 March:

 

[!shadow!]

u could always try a garra or a SAE

sorry to backtrack but i just wanted to clarify that sae don't eat bga. you see bga isn't really a type of algae but a cyanobacteria. l know, l have 3 sae's and none will touch it. l found the best way of getting rid of bga is to check the dead spots in the tank(water movement), add some air stones, l used maracyn-tc but l try to resort to using anti biotics as a last resort. it's a very effective antibiotic against gram-negative bacteria (Blue Green Algae is a gram-negative bacteria). l hear some people worry about it damaging the biological filter of beneficial bacteria at the point to nitrite spikes but this is very unlikely to happen. The spikes are actually the result of dead cyanobacteria, not beneficial bacteria from what i've read. 3-5 day black out works as well. Just some times for prevention:
1-Dose nitrates (NO3)
2-add powerheads to aid circulation
3-frequent partial water changes
4-do not over-feed
5-and make sure your substrate (if any) is well oxygenated.

hope that helps and serves as a future reference friend.

 

[MissMTS]

Your tank is absolutely stunning! I love what you've done with it 65g's are such great tanks. My last larger planted tank was a 65 tall and I loved the large footprint that it had as well as the height. Are you using excel as your only source of carbon?

 

[hallzoo]

Thanks folks for the kind words. Sorry to take so long to respond:

Haven't seen any BGA since I nuked it with maracyn. Keeping the tank circulating seems to help, but I believe that night time aeration probably was the best I could have done. I kept losing black mollies overnight, and couldn't figure it out. Came up with a theory that plant respiration after lights out was sucking up all of the oxygen in the water, killing fish and encouraging BGA. After adding the airstone I haven't had a problm with either.

I do use excel, but pressurized CO2 is my primary source of carbon for this tank. I dose excel per intructions, it seems to help with BBA and some forms of hair. I don't use it all the time. If I detect an outbreak I start dosing excel (as well as clean filters, water change, and removal of affected leaves) and keep it up for a few weeks until things calm down.

Because I'm running about 180w of light, I use a 10lb CO2 cylinder, a cornelius regulator, Fabco NV-55 needle valve, and an integrated bubble counter (all from GLA). I run about 5-8 BPS into a needle wheel pump that blasts mist into a Rex Style reactor. My plan was to get the effects of both misting (small bubbles come out of the reactor discharge) and a CO2 reactor. Seems to work pretty good:

Thanks for looking!

 

[pianofish]

Your tank looks phenominal, so lushhh! Love your angels as well. Keep up the good work,
Your pal,

 

[hallzoo]

Thanks again!

Today was water change day and I ditched the driftwood (created a huge dead spot and allowed fish waste to accumulate), got rid of the remainder of the vals (too long), and thinned out the ambulia and ludwiga. Gonna try spacing those two types a little better, like 2" between individual stems, to see if they show better health on the lower leaves.

Here's how it looked before water change:

I'll post the "after" next week. Tank looks a little bare right now need a week to let the stems grow in.