Aquarium substrate

Two bags of Flourite would give you almost 3" deep bed with no added gravel.

You have to be very careful when mixing substrates. If the standard aquarium gravel you have is too large (and most of it is) then you will end up with the gravel on top and the other substrate on the bottom.

Hey

One more question the aquarium I have is a 29 gallon all-glass starter kit it says is the reading on it that the light it comes with is ideal lighting....however it does not say what the wattage is anywhere not even on the light? The light is a marine land eclipse does anyone know the wattage? So that I know what my wattage per gal. is.

Oh and on the substrate thing i am considering using the substrate of aquariumplants.com that comes in the red 5 gallon bucket. Any reports on this? I have opted against mixing.

Amanda

Ideal for what? starter kits are horible to get. you wind up having to replace all that junk they sell them with with good equipment.
on a 29 gal 30" most likley there is a 24" bulb in there. probably something like 18w. no where near what you will need for a planted tank.

Get good substrate. you don't have to spend a lot. you can get 3 10lb bags of shultz aquatic soil at home depot for 6 bucks ea.
Or you can get a 50lb bag of soilmaster select from lesco and baseball feild supply stores for around 10-16 bucks. There is no need to mix and in the end you will wish you didn't mix it.

two months ago I bought the $75 20 gallon kit from walmart. $500 later I now have the makings of a nice semi-low tech planted tank. welcome to the hobby

Ok, I have a plan...kinda scary for me lol

1st I am going to replace my light with a AHS 1 x 55 lighting kit...with an AHS 55 watt bulb...going with either eco-complete or aquariumsupply.com substrate...Last but not least I am going to go with an Eheim Canister filter model 2232 ...hell may as well I am changing everything else...So does everyone agree with my plan? Or rather have any strong objections. Complete total of upgrade is going to cost 150.21...I will have 6 monts to wait until I actual get my aquarium to run sigh...Hubby is a penny pincher and i can not pinch any harder lol.

Amanda

If you have a Lesco store nearby you don't need the aquariumsupply.com (do you mean aquariumplants.com) substrate.

Does the aquariumplants.com substrate lower the pH and hardness like the Soil Master Select from Lesco does ?

I have a pH of 7.6 and a dKH of 6.7 (i think that pretty hard ?). Would it be a good idea for me to use a substrate that lowers the pH and KH ? I really dont want it to get out of control as i have read some horror stories about the pH dropping from 7.5 to less than 5 in 2 days after adding SMS.

I had an initial PH effect drop from soilmaster select but it disappeared quickly. It will not effect your PH long term and is a great affordable substrate. My plants seem to like it a lot. Your PH at 7.6 should be fine as mine is around there as well. My PH dropped by maybe half a point so from about 7 to 6.5 on PH initially and that was only for the first two weeks. The best thing to do is work with the PH you have. It'll save you a lot of headaches, and again regardless of the minor initial PH effect I would suggest SMS to anyone.