Need opinions on my 1000L setup

[medicineman]

This is my other 1000L tank, just totally overhauled yesterday.



The right side is OK. Especially the hardscape turns out smooth, looking like a tree stump. Perhaps minor arrangement could be done for any improvement.

The left side sucks. I was too tired to think of anything when I set it up, I mean it took a whole day to finish. The wood is kinda out of place and I think it would be better to remove it intirely and the tank might look instantly better. But then there would be too much empty space if I do so.

And the tank is two sided, so any scape must look OK from each side.



I intend to make a lower maintenance tank with CO2 and short burst of high light to boost growth and colours. So far I have in the tank: anubias nana, nuphar japonica, a bit of taiwan moss, big java ferns, windelov, val gigantea, crypt, echi subulata and some water sprite for temporary plant load.

Any opinions about what to do on the left area?

Low maintenance huge mother plant might be right for the job but I havent thought of any. Tiger lotus would be nice but to grow good size takes like forever. Colourfull echis are more likely. I have the idea of moving the smaller wood (those wood on the left consist of several pieces) to where the valis are and switch position.

[eddyq]

Two sided tank, very tough to scape indeed. I would put branchy woods on the back of the existing woods on both sides. So everything are on the centre of tank and plant tall plants or narrow-leaves ferns around those woods.

[Fei Miao]

perhaps some bare wood to add to the piece on the left would give it more character, the right side seems okay, I'm sure the scape will look good when you have the plant mass, like now it still kinda of bare.

[|squee|]

Need more plants!

Since your scape is two sided, you have to put the background plants at the sides of the tank. So the Vallis must go to the side. Try to plant around the driftwood so that there are two triangles reaching out from the sides of the tank.



These are just thoughts I have when I dream of a big tank with two viewing sides, so not applied practically yet.

[medicineman]

Thanks for the thoughts. I will think it over trough this weekend.

If you see that I lack of plant mass, I agree. Right now the local market seems to be short of what I'm looking for, especially those mother plants. So I end up using mostly seedlings and whatever bigger plants I can salvage from my storage. I can use stem plants to add instant plant load, but for initial balance only as I do not intend to deal with high maintenance stem plants for long.

There are lots of seedlings which you cannot see right now, such as hundreads of scattered dwarf sag and 100ish small crypts. All washed out and not visible due to strong lighting and thick haze from setting up.

I played with simple photoshop and this is what I get when I remove the wood on the left. NEAT!



The tank instantly got the flow and harmony (I think so).

I still agree that I need more disposable plants for the first one month to prevent algae problem. Going to buy some weeds on weights and toss them in. I opt for water sprite. It is going to be a long time waiting the seedlings to grow and fill out nicely.

[|squee|]

That works, but imho your hill has to be very eye catching otherwise the tank will look empty. Imho of course.

[medicineman]

The water cleared up and here are pics again for you to take a better look at.





I decided to do just what I illustrated before, tearing up the smaller group of driftwood. I think of some long, slender driftwood and connect it to the main hill, creating a continous root-looking structure. Along the add-on wood I'll plant more short plants like cypts. The scape should be triangular by then and has the plant mass while still retaining its original shape and open space style.

Here is a group of bigger nuphar japonica I got from local market. The rescent monsoon season proved a blessing. I bought it for cheap from plentiful stock. The short stalks speaks of long draught, leaving shallow pools for these to grow in.


Here is one of the crypts variety I use


The others are from wendtii varieties.

[medicineman]

So later on I decided to make concept into reality. Murky time again.

I get myself this long slender piece of driftwood and use it as an extention to the existing root-like driftwood structure.

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d6...2/IMG_0211.jpg

And with it I throwed in some more plant load. Now it looks like a tree root with a long extention of root forking out by the middle.

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d6...2/IMG_0208.jpg

Not too great but at least I did something to the much too plain open space, without changing the main look of the scape.

Here is the look from another side



Water is crystal clear and it is a good time to take photos again.

side A


side B


Fauna returned back to the tank. To keep this one low maintenance, I did not intend to stock to the limit. Currently there are 5 albino congo tetra, 5 rasbora hengeli, 3 rainbow shark and 4 algae eater. I kept photoperiod at lower rate and quite short while dosing less ferts. MH runs for 5 hours a day with extended 2 hours of T8 and that is it. So far so good, no serious ill effect on the plants. It seems my vision for lower maintenance high tech tank is a reality as up to date there is no speck of algae visible, a very good promising sign (as per usual I would always find small patches of algae within two weeks).

[grey_fox]

Nice, I like the wild look of the scape. The windelovs look really nice on that large driftwood. I'm sure once things grow in, it'll look really nice.

[medicineman]

Thx..

In the case I've never stated the specs:
Size : 1000+ L
Lighting : 3 x 150W Metal halide with 120W T8
Substrate : plain silica sand 2-4m
Ferts : Self made macros and micros
Temp : 25-26C, 4 mini fans and a DIY chiller
Filtration : overflow with a sump
CO2 : pressurised 4 bps via reactor/diffuser combo

Pics again from the sides, enjoy (love the reflection)




Here you can see the root fork, viewed from the side

[Jungle-mania]

I don't know, but somehow something is missing, the X factor that give that WOW feeling. Maybe some red plants?

[spilopterus]

It could also be that the green is too overpowering. Instead of red plants, you could bank on having fishes that will bring out your plants. Some really good ones that provide good juxtaposition against the green backdrop would be a large school of harlequin rasbora.

Perhaps adding a piece of plain driftwood branch that 'breaks' out from the plant mass might help, or some small slates near the foreground of your tank to break it up.

Very inspirational, 1000L.