What suggestions do you have for planted aquarium substrate? There are many options out there such as Play Sand, Eco-Complete, Flourite(heard good things), and many others. Has anyone had success with these or maybe even a mixture of substrates for the planted aquarium?
I'm using a mixture of Eco-Complete and fluorite in my new planted tank and it's about 3 inches deep. I had partial bags of each laying around and ended up with a little more fluorite than EC. I think Eco-Complete looks better than fluorite. It's supposed to stratify where the smaller particles fall to the bottom and the larger stay on top and from pics I've seen the color and texture is really nice, especially if you like some bare areas as I do. It has a nice grey/black color with some larger sized pieces where fluorite is kind of a dog doo doo color and all the same size like cat litter. I can't give any comparisons in plant growing ability as this will be my first non-undergravel filter planted tank, I've never used EC before, and I've just started growing in my new set up. For looks, if I had to start again, I would go with only Eco-Complete.
Well I'll keep this simple..hopefully. lol
I was pretty skeptical about flourite since I added it to an established tank and in doing so needed to rinse it thoroughly, which removed most of the sediment and fine nutrient-rich particles that I figured the plants would feed off of.
However, just 3 weeks after adding a small Amazon Sword, its now double the size and has sent up a shoot with a new plant and what looks like a possible flower. Which seems pretty remarkable at just under 1wpg of lighting. Then again I'm still new to planted tanks.
The largest drawback to the flourite being my only source of plant nutrition (rest of my sub is playsand) is that my loaches and cory's often get scraped by the rough surfaces while grazing. Adding sand over the surface of the flourite seems to have helped with this.
I think flourite would be a better base layer if used with EC, as the iron enriched substrate will continue to supply your plants with iron for a long, long time.
I hope so. The mix of both I have doesn't look that great in my opinion. Just bought some micro sword and I hope it does well in this tank. My bulbs are VHO double twin fourescents but they're about 8 months old so I'm hoping for the best.
Thank you for your suggestions. The lady and I were darn near going to buy flourite as it seems to be the only decent substrate available in North Dakota. We decided against it and ordered Eco-Complete from MarineDepot.com. It came to our doorstep this afternoon and we spent the last few hours giving our tank a thorough workover. Luckily, our existing substrate was black and matches the Eco-Complete superbly! We took out a portion of the existing substrate and mixed the new Eco-Complete with it. I love how it comes in water with natural bacteria in it. After running the filters for about 2 hours now, the water is almost clear! As you said Peter, the color of the Eco-Complete is awesome. We have recently added 4 pieces of driftwood and took out the mushroom cave. We created our own little hiding area with some natural flat rock. I love this all natural look. The fish seem to love it too. I will be updating my page with new pictures as soon as the water clears a little more.
Sounds great! Can't wait to see the pics. Java moss is great stuff. It takes a couple months to bond to the wood, and then you'll be able to tear it short when it gets long and rangy. Freshwater shrimp are great at keeping it clean too. Eco-Complete is nice the way it settles out leaving some larger pieces on top. Great stuff! My new tank with the mix I said didn't look so great is looking perrrty goood I guess. I used a piece of air line and sucked about 6 inches of Flourish liquid fertiliser into it, stuck the end into the roots of a few of my plants, and blew it in. I figured this would be a good way to get fertiliser to the roots and keep most of it out of the water column. I have to borrow the GF's camera again so I can get pics of this and the upside down tank.
Wow, I can't wait to see that. I know you have been talking about the upside down tank. I checked out that video on YouTube and it looks pretty cool. Keep us posted on the pics.
I'm sure your new micro sword will do just fine, pete. Its sending out runners in my tank, of which I'm sure you know my lighting, ferts, and CO2 specifics by now. That is...bare minimum, none, and none. :) the largest variable I seem to encounter is growth rate( very slow ) but they continue to grow.
Someone at plantgeek said that the reason plants can grow in the wild without added co2 is that:
1) Many of the plants co2 aquarists grow are not really under water plants, and there is a higher percentage of co2 in the atmosphere than can dissolve in water, so when they are forced to stay submerged they need extra co2 to grow well.
2) Aquatic plants get extra co2 because of co2, or carbon related substances being released from the rotting mud that exists naturally in nature. I don't understand this, whether it's actually true or not, and the guy didn't know how this actually happens. I think it's an assumption on his part.
My plants grow pretty fast in my oppinion and I actually don't like it if a tank is too overgrown. I like to have open space for looks and for the fish.
Just thinking.. wouldn't most plants in nature grow outwards to the sun and reach the surface where co2 would be readily available. The plants aquarists keep must be trimmed and submerged, and therefore require co2 injected into the water column. I might be way off, just guessing.
from what people on plantgeek have been telling me is that co2 doesn't dissolve into water and eventually reach the same percentage as it has in the atmosphere. That means that plants cannot get that atmospheric percentage until they actually break the surface. It's light that actually stunts growth on a plant. If you plant a plant and plant it sideways the stem on the side exposed to light, the top, will slow it's growth compared to the growth on the non exposed side. This causes the plant to "bend" toward the light. This is also why when a plant is not given enough light it will grow fast and be spindly and weak.
My plants were growing pretty well without high lighting or CO2. I recently upgraded my lighting from about .5 WPG to nearly 3 WPG and I have seen a difference. The plants were getting streched out under the low-light and since adding the higher lighting, they are growing new leaves near the bottom of the stalks like crazy. I also set up a simple DIY CO2 system last week to test it out. I simply made a mixture of Yeast, Sugar, and Water in a 2L soda bottle. A hole was cut in the cap to allow the airline tubing to set about 1 inch into the bottle. I used silicon sealant to seal and hold the tubing and put a no-return valve in the middle of the tubing so the water from the tank can't return to the bottle and cause a syphoning overflow mess and destroy my tank! I put the other end in the intake of my HOB filter so the impeller can dissolve the CO2 bubbles and return them to the tank. It began bubbling about 1 hour later and has been going strong for about 5 days now. I have been monitoring the PH and it is holding steady at 7. I guess time will tell if the CO2 is really benefitting the plants.
How do you monitor the co2 levels so you don't poison your fish? Do you use pH as an indicator with dissolved co2 becoming carbonic acid? I want to make one of these DIY co2 systems. Could you give the ingredients and amounts of each?
Yeah, I am monitoring the PH as an indicator. I read up on this a bit and the main indicators are the PH getting too low and the fish gulping for air. We run our bubble wand every once in a while to keep O2 levels up (not sure if it actually does anything, but looks cool). Out fish have been just as active as the day I added the system, so it doesn't seem to be a problem. Other indicators have also remained steady. One thing I should have done that people recommend, but isn't probably necessary, is to add a second smaller bottle between the CO2 chamber and the tank so any backwater from the tank or gunk from the mixture is trapped. There is an awesome how to at the following link regarding DIY CO2.
I put 2 cups sugar into a 2L bottle and filled it to the top of the label with warm water. Shake this around to dissolve the sugar. I then added about 1 tsp of Dry Active Yeast. The amount of yeast is a great way to monitor CO2 also. As I used the higher end of the spectrum, it is producing more CO2 at a faster rate. Recommendations are between 1/2 to 1 tsp. I will probably add less in my next mixture. Also, the no-return valve was a check-valve. I couldn't think of the name last time.
