I'd like to introduce my 1 year old enhanced Walstad Tank.<br>The Goal of this tank is to provide hobbyists with a cheaper alternative to running a planted tank, and hopefully, eventually a cheap alternative to set up an Amano aquascape. I believe the expensive solutions provided by the big corporations are not necessarily the only one available to hobbyist, nor even necessarily the best. In a way its like comparing conventional medicine such as chemotherapy with alternative medicine / TCM, especially in treatment of diseases like cancer. Besides cost, I also prefer an organic approach towards aquascaping.
The setup for this open-top 120cm x 45cm x 45cm tank consists of :
1) Garden Soil Substrate 2-3cm thick (cheap garden soil, not compost or peat etc).Topping by sand and gravel (the white gravel is a mistake, added due to my impatience when couldn't find sand). Gravel has too many gaps, according to Dr Walstad. I added Malaysian Trumpet Snails (thanks to a member here) and it helped to churn the substrate, preventing buildup of ammonia and hydrogen sulphide.
2) Air-driven water circulation system, using 4 outlet air pump connected to submerged rain-bars arranged diagonally to drive the water up using air power. Estimate to move 700l of water per hour. I chose air pump driven rather than water driven to avoid water heating by the pump. Something Dr Walstad did not mention about was the algae growth vs tank water circulation. So when my first set of air pumps weakened, I had an algae bloom, which went away within weeks of my pump change. But there are some spots of bba on my driftwood which I left as decor. Water circulation via air-pump alone could bring down the tank temp by 1°C from 29-30°C to 28-29°C.
3) Due to heavy bioload I have added 2 air-driven sponge filters. Earlier experiments with emergent plants such as pandan, ipomoea aquatica and artemisia scoparia was inadequate for the fish even though the plants flourished. Surprisingly the cherry shrimp had higher tolerance to the water quality compared to the fish. But eventually when the fish flourished after adding the 2 sponge filters, the shrimp slowly disappeared, probably due to hunting by some of the less shrimp-friendly species.
4) A small high power cooling fan. Initially used a cheap fan which brought the tank further down by 1°C to around 27°C during the hot months. After the fan failed, this new, higher powered fan brought temperature down by 2°C TO 26°C during the hot months. Of course water change can be a hassle, especially during dry weather like the hazy days. But I just keep a pail of de-chlorinated water beside my tank, which lasts ~2 days. Just scoop in when I'm looking at the fish.
5) A 48W LED light only on the front half of tank. Not really sufficient for some plants perhaps.
6) Back half of tank utilizes indirect sunlight from full-length window.
7) Initially I thought of doing an aquascape, but decided that this tank should be a learning process. The front half should now be good enough for HE, glosso, staurogene, downoi etc. But basically the current tank is overran by sagittaria, mosses, HM, etc. Maybe in future I will try to do aquascaping with this setup. As it is, the plant growth in general has been rampant, without the use of fert or CO2. I had to do pruning every other week.
8. The fauna are all small sized fishes, except for 1 very tame SAE, and a couple of long kuhli loaches. There's a lyretail killifish which I had removed after observing it hunt my dario dario.
9) I would also like to share my success in my battle against ich parasite using crushed garlic. In this case, I do not think that the ich was iradicated, but that the garlic actually helped the fish develop immunity against it. When I bought some neon tetras, they soon typically showed the white spots, which then spread to my boraras, otos and other fishes. It became really bad, and fishes were dying. I cannot use copper due to the shrimps and snails in the tank. But in the process I found that old garlic was ineffective. One must use freshly harvested garlic (as fresh as we can get from the market or supermarket). According to the scientific papers I read, the amount they used was continuous soak, but I just apply 1 clove per cubic foot. After a couple of weeks, the spots completely disappeared and the fishes recovered. After I stopped, I saw one or two spots but they did not multiply, and now there are none. I think its still there, but the fish are now immune.
So there's a lot that can be achieved using low-tech, with patience, care and understanding of the problems.
This is interesting , thanks for sharing . I read it over twice at least to see I could get any tips to improve the economical and green factor in running planted tank.
Care to share exactly the small high power fan that could bring a drop of two degree for a 4 ft tank? This will certain throw the balance off the need to use the energy sapping chiller for many of us
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Hi
The fan I'm using is a Taiwan made Ista Gulf GA2123XST 18W unit. I bought from Seaview for about $31.
Rgds
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks