4ft A-venture

[sfk7]

Decided to jump onto big tanks as there was a good deal

Tank in my living room


Stuff waiting to be placed inside


Hardscape


Planted


Plants bought from Mizuworld ( stones too!! )
Rotala rotundifolia 'Green' (left)
Limnophila aromatica (centre)
Didiplis diandra (Right)
Blyxa Japonica
Wendtii Green Gecko
Bolbitis heudelotii
Echinodorus tenellus
Echinodorus Red Rubin 'Narrow'
Ceratopteris thalictroides (Water Sprite)

Some leftover nanas, java fern and crypt from the previous owner. Planning to plant glosso for the foreground

Both cypt green gecko and the long unkown behind the stones have started melting. Hope they will pull through

Planned fauna
20 Espei
30 Cardinals
16 Green Neon
5 Otos

1 pair of apisto!! any kind as long as its beautiful.. haha
will hunt for that when the tank is stable
Hopefully the cardinals n green neon will school together

That's all from me. Please comment on how i can improve on it, much appreciated.

Thanks

[Mizu World]

The whole layout is quite pleasing. However, you can consider getting larger driftwood as they will all be hidden once your plants become established.

However, if you are going for a large foreground carpet (which seems to be the case from what is seen in the pictures), you can use the rocks to prop the driftwood up and make it more significant.
A gloso lawn in that large an area will be very heavy maintenance.

It's underplanted right now. Planting heavily right from the start will prevent most problems you may encounter later.

[Panut]

I see lots of hiding spaces for apistos/fish

[troyz]

hi bro, nice cabinet tank you have there

[Shadow]

bro you need to plan more, much-much more

As for the fishes, in my opinion, single species should look better when schooling

[Jervis]

Your big chunks of Nana Petite can be distributed more evenly to allow better growth later on... if you intend to tie anymore plants to the branches... now is the time Personally I would add some mid ground plants surrounding some of the rocks to create a softer touch to the scape... Glosso foreground (as per your plan) is alright

Definitely lots of potential.

Oh yeah, why do you fill the soil surrounding the branches with Africana instead of Amazonia II? Something to do with lowering pH?

[oblivion]

i think you can adjust the rock positions and half bury them to look more natural
some of them look like they are sitting there ontop of the soil in kind of an odd manner

some crypts in the midground around the wood and rocks would look good
i suggest wendtii 'tropica' or wendtii brown, adds some texture and color to the scape
petchii may also be suitable

and i concur with jervis, maybe you can spread out the nana petites a little
break them up into slightly smaller bunches

what filter are you using? 2 hydors or atmans?
i think i see 2 sets of intake/output pipes

[sfk7]

Thanks for all the kind comments

As for the planting part, i think every square inch of space available at the background has been planted, and i've just planted 10 dollars worth of glosso from teo's onto the foreground. hopefully all these are enough plant mass

actually theres E tenellus, green gecko amongst the rocks, but i'll shop around and see if theres anything in LFS that will blend in

the nanas are actually from the previous owner and quite mature. so i dont think i'll change it

thanks to all

[sfk7]

An update after 10 days

Cloudiness has cleared



Problems that i'm facing with my rotalas



Don't know why the stems are all drooping and some are dying. The rest of the stem plants are fine, only the rotalas are having this problem.

Lighting : 4 x 54W ( same config as bro jervis; 2x 880, 1 865 & 1 plant pro)
Duration : 8 hours ( only half an hour siesta )
Filtration : 2x Atman CF1200
Fert regime : daily - JBL ferropol
every 2 days - seachem trace and potassium
2 days ago added 3 tabs of wondergro root+ around the rotalas after seeing this problem

I used to have a rainbar vertically near the rotalas which i suspect is the culprit and have since changed to an outlet which resembles ADA lily pipe.

Can anyone help me improve the rotalas?

and glosso:


they are in patches is because of my plain laziness as i gave up after 3 hours trying to seperate them into plantlets. Those that i actually seperated are not growing low. could it be not enough lighting?

[sfk7]

Oh yeah, why do you fill the soil surrounding the branches with Africana instead of Amazonia II? Something to do with lowering pH?

the africana is just the top (only 3L), hoping that it can further lower PH since quite alot of apistos keepers swear by it.

But recently came across a test that malayan is even better in lowering PH, so maybe i'm wrong. haha

[Verminator]

Glosso growing up rather tall is due to lack of lighting yes. I notice you have an arcadia light set? It looks very much the same as mine. Do you use T8 lights or have you converted it to T5? I ask this because i'm thinking of converting mine to T5 but i'm not sure its worth the hassle.

I personally would have gone for a HC lawn rather than Glosso. Certainly a great looking tank, do keep us updated.

[Jervis]

I can see your Glosso is growing well underground too Interesting sight!

And yes, the use of 3L of Africana to help bring down pH is a good choice

[torque6]

rotalas dying ? Not likely, as they are pretty hard and have very low light or ferts requirements. Were they emmersed form when you bought them?

[sfk7]

thanks for all replies

they are all drooping, what could be wrong with them?

lightset is using solite 4x54W T5HO, upgraded from a hopar one as the solite set has individual reflectors, which as a result more light gets reflected

arcadia is only present in only one of the 4 tubes, namely arcadia plant pro

rotalas are from mizuworld. not sure if they are emersed or submersed.

since i don't think i am going to add one more lightset, i'm just gonna see how the glosso goes. if they are still gonna b still so tall, may just going to change to HC. or anyone has better foreground plant to suggest?

ha! glosso is beneath the soil due to my laziness. i just anchor the patch there and pour amazonia powder onto them. i know i know... LAZY

guess i'll give both rotalas and glosso one more week

[blue33]

Glosoo growing up rather tall is due to lack of lighting yes. I notice you have an arcaria light set? It looks very much the same as mine. Do you use T8 lights or have you converted it to T5? I ask this because i'm thinking of converting mine to T5 but i'm not sure its worth the hassle.

I personally would have gone for a HC lawn rather than Glosso. Certainly a great looking tank, do keep us updated.

He just started to grow Glosso, newly plant Glosso still cant tell whether enough lights or not, give them about 2 weeks and you will know the result.

I think your rotala maybe emersed type, sometime new plants may melt and reborn later. Give them sometime.

[blue33]

When you plant Glosso, plant it down and pull up again till you can see the abit of roots is the right height. I think you have plant too deep already.

[sfk7]

Thanks blue33 for the tips on glosso, is this the start of my nightmare?



rotalas still not doing well... cant be they are starting to creep??



any help out there with regards to the rotalas? or just let it be for a while longer?

[sfk7]

17 days update



Plants are doing generally well other than the rotalas



Limnophila aromatica seems to be doing relatively well, or its supposed to be even redder? if so, how do i go about achieving that?

Thinking of getting helferi or something similar to replace the wisteria once the tank grows more as i think it will help the scape abit?

Some exotic fauna that i've added (never have i spent so much on one specimen before)



Added 2 male dicrossus filamentosus from LFS and gotten 4 female ones from Ah_Zhan, great bro who also taught me how to improve on melting crypts! Pair of zebra otos are impulse buys but love the colouration and pattern on it

comments welcome! especially on improving the rotalas

[Magnum-]

Hi bro Weng Keong I just booked out from Tekong and still in my BMT. I was just jumping off sites when i chance upon this thread. No time to for fishkeeping anymore, only can admire the photos in aq

Thats a nice scape, just need a few more months to mature mmmmm... may i ask, why did u decide not to use the hood? Anyway......hope u have a pleasant fishkeeping/aquascaping experience

[sfk7]

hey magnum! thanks for your comments!

The hood is still lying somewhere. 'Cos in the first place forgot to put the filter hoses through the holes in the hood and to do it now seems abit troublesome so did without the hood altogether. haha

It still looks pretty good without the hood wouldn't you say?

How's NS life man