Help with my 50 Gallon Aquascape

BenFishin

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Jan 15, 2014
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Here we go! Pulled and bagged all the plants. Bagging all the community fishes. Taking everything to the LFS for credit. Don't worry I don't have anything rare.

I am keeping all the algae team in my future wet dry, and running my previous canister and ten lbs of old substrate to hopefully keep everyone happy. I am bucketing the substrate as I will reuse all of it. I will be adding a lot of new substrate but, I want to keep all of my bacteria and I will bury it in the mound that I am making with the new.


This bucket of used substrate is a concern to me. Is it going to live with open top, at room temp, over night? Or do I need to run an air tube or something down to the bottom?

Also where would the best place be to put this used substrate in the new layers of sediment? I want to swap in algae eaters right away if possible. Unless the old substrate, water and filter media from the previous tank is not enough to have a good jump cycle. There will be quite a bit of new landscaping in this new tank so maybe not.

I am in the middle of this process and I stop to ask questions. Time is ticking.

Thank you in advance. I will respond next time I dry off and take a breath.
 

BenFishin

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Worm Casting Substrate

I never thought I would utter the words to my wife, "I'm going to boil some worm poop." Once more, hear a nonchalant, "Ok, turn the fan on, and be careful."

I'm moving as fast as possible on the swap. I don't want to rush it too much, but I am still worried about the life of the old substrate and the "jump cycle." I don't want to kill the substrate or the fish...

Can anyone shed some light? I could search but I would be wasting time needed on the project.
 

BenFishin

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The Scape and Questions about Plants and CO2 Injection

Well I have the hard scape done and I have added certain plants that I wanted to keep from my 65 and some gloss and HC I picked up.

Here are some step by step photos:





I changed the position of the tank in the room so I mirrored my test layout, to give a better view of the tank in the room.





I want to use my old Flourite mixed with worm castings as my nutrient rich substrate. This also keeps my bacteria from the old tank and will help keep from my tank cycling. I do not care for the look in this tank so I bury it with merrimac stones. Up against the glass I need merrimac but need Flourite/WC behind it. I use a scrap piece of plexiglass to equalize the substrates on opposite sides, then remove. A final layer on top and you don't even know it is there.



My hands got rather dirty in this process so I didn't take many pictures. I repeated the same process throughout the tank and middle of the tank got a very thick layer before the being covered.

I had a large amount of small broken chunks of the flagstone, so I use these to look like they have fallen from the surrounding stone wall.









Test fill and drain



Leftover plants





Day 3






Still working on hiding electrical and plumbing. With this new tank and scape, I also built a 20 gal wet/dry sump that I may start another build thread about. Having trouble getting my co2 right. Every way I go about injecting in the sump, or into the external canister filter I got from Tom, yields little results for the amount I am injecting. I now have it hooked to an old power head aiming at my sump pump which pushes water through the external canister and then to the tank. Frankly I had it easier hooked up to my Rena Canister or at one point, through the impeller on my UV sterilizer. It is a clean look not having anything in the tank though, and I would like to keep it that way.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Also suggestions on plants that will compliment the scape. Of course I have gloss, HC, crypt parva, anubias, hygro kompact, other mosses and such. Just looking for other small leaf rarities.
 
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BenFishin

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Thank you for your compliments. I like it. Growing and trimming the plants properly for the scape is going to be my problem. I am just used to Dutch, so this is a change for sure. Lots of AGA influence for sure.

My wife likes it better too. She took more interest in the tank in this past week than my previous tank in 5 yrs!
 
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user name

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Mar 25, 2014
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I love a good rock scape. Dutch looks best from far away, but a nature style aquascape can really captivate you from up close. Great details!
 

BenFishin

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Thank you very much!

Yes, it's the Eshopps PF800. A little big for the tank, but it flows well. The looks of the overflow are not the nicest I've seen, but it is what my LFS carries and I try to give them much support.

It flows through a sump line tube to the sump. I would like to change this as it could have better flow. I'm sure I have plenty, far more than my old Rena Filstar Canister, just greedy I guess.

The actual sump is just a two chamber. Pond filters and floss then lace rock in with the pump. I set the pump on the lace rock to limit its ability to flood too much water in the chance of a clogged overflow. Probably need a third chamber to have the same effect, I just rushed things and skipped that part of the build. I was anxious to start the scape. I can always add it in when I have more time.

From the pump it goes to an Ocean Clear 325 external canister filter with 100 ppm filter. It expands out from the outlet of the canister of 3/4" rubber hose to 1 1/2" PVC. There is a ball valve before the elbows so I can adjust volume and the last two or the three 90 degree elbows were left unglued to allow for adjustment of height and direction.

Surface agitation is medium to high, flow spreads throughout the tank, gently at 600-800 GPH.
 

RedGhost

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Oct 12, 2013
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Aquaticlife....

FWIW....my quad 24" Aquaticlife fixture with x3 6,500k & x1 actinic was reading about 130 par at water surface and about 28 par at 14" depth.

It's a 20 gallon high I have..... the lights I only have on 8 hrs a day, dose lean EI and keep pressurized co2 at about 1.5 - 1.8 bbps. With decent flow in tank I can keep out any algae...

I got BBA and stag this last two weeks caring for my 9 month old who suffered from her first Febrile seizure...scary stuff... WC didn't happen for 1.5 weeks and nutrients weren't dosed. :(
 

Overfloater

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Mar 3, 2014
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Can you post a picture of your sump?

I'm looking into moving to a sump setup with a PF-300. I'm still trying to figure out how to get CO2 into the setup for minimal cost.
 

BenFishin

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I would have rather cleaned it first but I just got off a 14 hour shift. Maybe Friday, looks like I'll have a rain day.

You can see the power head in the right chamber. I had the co2 connected to the venturi on the power head. This did not break it up enough. I through it into the intake screen on the power head. It chops it up and throws it at the pump. The pump and the external canister does the rest.



I don't care for the way I have routed my output from the canister.

I also still need to clean up inside the cabinet. The hoses in and out of the sump are sloppy as well as the way my electrical is run. Like I said though, maybe a rain day on Friday ;)

Also thinking about building cover to hide the co2 tank and the canister that could double as a shelf.
 

BenFishin

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I've got it at my best guess is 8-9 bps and I finally have a good response from my plants. I am guessing the amount of degassing that is taking place is higher than I thought. Being new to wet/dry I had no idea. Also I have been running both lights for most of the day vs the short overlap in the middle of the day. This is showing better results. Could be the rooting of the plants finally, but it seems I may have it fine tuned. I'll leave it alone for at least a week.

Also what do most run from the overflow to the sump intake? This sump line is an eyesore and looks sloppy.
 

user name

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Mar 25, 2014
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Yeah. "User name" as a username probably throws some kind of flag...
I thought I was being creative lol
 

BenFishin

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Update 50 Gallon "Rocky Holler"

Here is what I have going so far. Had a bad battle with GSA and BBA a couple weeks back. Just got through that. I'm blaming co2 and bad water. Thoroughly cleaned filters, upped co2, and started doing daily 15-20 gallon water changes with my new RO set up. Went with the RO buddy and it fits nicely under the stand. I also got about 50' of airline hose to run waste water to the garden. Things are starting to turn around after a short stunt. Still need guidance on plant placement. Really waiting on some of the mosses to fill in. They are attached to individual rocks so they can be moved easily. Fish won't stay away from me when I'm taking pictures. :)







 

riverpat

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May 12, 2014
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Really like the rock work. As mentioned previously it looks good even with a limited number of plants.

Also, from one of your last photos it looks like you've got a fair bit of surface agitation. That might be causing a lot of your CO2 to gas off, hence the reason you have to keep upping the bps.