[MichaelMcG]

Before the flood





Mineralized top soil with black Petco sand cap


After the flood









Tank - 54 gallon corner with overflow. I have heard some stories about corner tanks being difficult but I found it VERY cheap on craigslist so I had to take it. I was actually looking for a 50g/60g with the same footprint as a 40B.

Substrate - Mineralized top soil capped with black Petco sand. I wanted sand that was very black, any blasting sand I found locally was not totally black.

Lighting - 2x24watt AH supply kit custom fitted into a standard 29g light hood.

CO2 - Aquatek regulator and 5lb tank with a DIY Cerges reactor.

Equipment - DIY trickle tower loaded with filter floss and sponges/pot scrubbers. 200 watt and a 150 watt heater in tub below tank. If this is causing my co2 levels to stay down I may consider a DIY sump with no trickling.

Ferts - EI dosing

Plants - Ludwigia rubin. Lilaeposis Chinensis 'Maryland'. Lobelia Cardinalis 'small form'. Dwarf Sag. I hope to get a nice center carpet with the L Chinensis and a surrounding carpet of dwarf sag. After a few months I will have enough dwarf sag to plant on the cliff. I do want to get a tall Jungle Val type plant to put in the back on both sides of the background.

Fish - None yet.. I have my co2 cranking right now! I want to get a shoal of Rasboras and a pair of German Blue Rams.

DIY Styrofoam fake rock background.

 

[MichaelMcG]

So I got rid of the DIY tickle tower. Too much oxygen in the water and it was pretty noisy..

Instead I am using an 8 gallon heavy duty waste basket to act as the sump and my fFluval 306 connected to the sump.



I have a Durso Standpipe overflow to keep the over quiet but there was still alot of air bubbles in the sump. To get rid of that I connected "BeanAnimal's overflow, which is a siphon tuned with a ball valve to keep the water line barely trickling down the Durso.

No bubbles and the only sound you hear with my tank is my Fluval 306 and Rio 1100 pump, and even that is pretty quite!

 

[Crazy4discus]

Nice tank! Can't wait to see the progress.

 

[MichaelMcG]

Ok.. I had problems with cloudy water.

Since it was a new tank and high light and not heavily planted yet, for almost a month I thought I was fighting green water algea. I was doing large water changes every few days, and it kept coming back. I borrowed by cousins 'green killing maching' UV bulb and did large water changes, and it kept coming back..

Then finally with nothing left to try, I figured I would let it go, not do anything about it and see if it can just run it's course. After about a week and a half the water wasn't really looking green anymore, but BROWN!

I was leeching dirt into the water. The petco sand was too light and/or it was leeching from under and behind the DIY background.

I drained the entire tank and got rid of all the substrate. Now my substrate is MGOCPM with clay capped with black blasting sand. I also got rid of the background.

I also added some limestone from around the pond behind my back yard. The look I am going for now is a nice carpet and midground with stems in the back to cover the overflow a little.

Substrate - powder clay mixed with MGOCPM and capped with black blasting sand

Lighting - 3 dome clamp lights with 23w/100w 6500K cfl bulbs

CO2 - Aquatek regulator and 5lb tank with a DIY Cerges reactor.

Equipment - 8 gallon heavy duty waste basket sump. Durso Standpipe overflow and "BeanAnimal's" overflow. 200 watt heater in sump.

Ferts - EI dosing

Plants - Ludwigia 'red'. Ludwigia repens. Lilaeposis Chinensis. Lobelia Cardinalis 'small form'. Hygro Scarlet. Ammania gold. Rotala Rotundafolia. Hemianthus Glomeratus. Vesuvius sword. Pennywort. Glossostigma Elatinoides. 'True' Dwarf Sag and regular Dwarf Sag. Salvinia Minima.

Fish - 6 Harlequin Rasbora. 2 white/blue tetras. 1 dwarf BN Pleco

Re-planted 5/17/14

5/23/14

 

[Raymond S.]

Did "they" tell you the limestone will drive up your PH ?
Not a complete test but if you pour a little of vinegar on any rock and it fizzels...don't.
Probably don't matter if you intend Chiclids but then they don't usually go/w plants.
Just a thought, but this site sells plastic mesh in various sizes. You could make a virticle "mat" of mosses etc to cover the filter from it.
http://www.everythingplasticcanvas.com/default.aspx?
See "Plastic canvas: sheets" The smaller the number the bigger the holes #5 is just under 1/4" and would probably make a good mat but unfortunately only comes in white.
I have Alternathera reineckii in both my tanks and the one in the tank/w more iron in
it is a darker red even though the other tank has more ferts and higher light.
Saying this because my Repens also started out green in/on the new leaves so I got rid of it not knowing they needed to adjust to the tank. People on here say the iron don't help the red but what about those results I just mentioned? Some people I should say.

 

[MichaelMcG]

I'm not even really sure if it is limestone, I just figured it was. It has been 2 weeks since my last water change and PH is at the 7.2 color on my API test kit, tested after the co2 has been running for 5 hours too. I did the vinegar test before I added them and I was good.

ph=7.2
ammonia=0
nitrite=0
nitrate=20

Thanks for the idea of the moss wall but to he honest I'm really not a fan of moss. I am really liking the coloring of the l.red and l.repens. They are growing fast too! The new leaves do start out green but turn to red. once the stems get a little more mature and taller we can see how they look and might add a little iron with the ei dosing.

 

[MichaelMcG]

First trim time! and a little overdue..

Glosso didn't quite make it. Dwarf sag took off, completely ivaded the Lilaeposis Chinensis.

The L red isn't red at all.. repens is bright green, gets shaded by all this Salvinia Minima..

trim pics coming soon

7/10/14

 

[MichaelMcG]

Moved most of the dwarf sag over to the right side. Also took out alot of the Salvinia Minima.

Oh and I forgot to mention I ran out of co2 about 2 weeks ago but everything seemed to keep growing just fine and I don't really have any algea.

7/11/14

 

[MichaelMcG]

Well, sad to say I tore this tank down. For me, the corner tank was just difficult to keep maintained. Also could really never find any good lighting for the tank. I was using 3 shop lights with 23w/100w 6500K cfl bulbs, the plants seemed to love it but it was just an eye sore.

Before this corner tank - I actually wanted the same footprint as a 40b but a little taller. Couldn't really find anything for a decent price and I stumbled across the corner tank for a really good deal so I jumped on it.

After a few months I came to not like the corner so started looking again for a taller 40b. I was in no rush but I kept my eyes open. Then I came across a 60g - 36 x 18 x 22 for a really good price.

You can follow the 60g journal here.