Some urgent questions!

**szesteve** · 16th Dec 2002, 13:55

I'm gonna make some purchases within the week and need some advise.

My tank is going to be 4x2x1.5(height) and I plan to plant about 50% of the tank with high light requirement plants.

1) So, should I go with 8x36W or 6x36W?

2) How thick base fert and gravel should I use?

**eggz** · 16th Dec 2002, 16:05

Hi sezsteve,

My tank is the same size as yours and has quite a lot of high light plants.

What I've eperienced so far is that 6X36W is enough, I have 6 X 36W PLs. I do recommend that you use good PL tubes. I've just changed a couple of tubes to the Osram ones and they are good. Started with AECs, but after about 6 months they dropped quite a bit in intensity.

Not too sure about base fert...

eggz

**vinz** · 16th Dec 2002, 16:28

Base fert depends on your choice of plants. If you intend to plant large root system, heavy substrate feeding plants like medium and large Echinodorus, and lotus, then base fert I would say at least 3 inches where they will be planted. At least 1 inch of base fert for foreground plants.

For stemmed plants, at least 2 inches.

Of course, 1 to 1.5 inch of gravel.

**szesteve** · 16th Dec 2002, 16:56

Okay,

I think I'll go with 6 x 36W temporarily. Will it suffice for plants like elatine and glosso?

And I'll go with 3 inches base fert at the back and slope to 1 inch at the front.

How much does one bag of those sand costs? The kind in the big brown bag?

**vinz** · 16th Dec 2002, 17:15

The lights are sufficient. Even better if you dose K at 20ppm.

**eggz** · 16th Dec 2002, 17:58

My attempt at glosso was a failure, though I don't believe it was due entirely to lights. At the time, I did not have a proper fert dosing regime, also my AEC PLs were already quite dim and a couple of them went kaput....[

]

BTW, since starting on 20ppm of K (K2SO4), the plants have been doing much better. It's like 7UP city every evening!

. And I do notice now that ALL the stems plants are growing shorter er..internodes? ...y'know that space between the leaf sections.

eggz

**szesteve** · 16th Dec 2002, 23:12

I'm dead beat. Why?

Cos I just came back from NA and played soccer too. I bought 45kg of gravel and 25kg of base fert and also purchased and modified some lights so I'm set back by a cool $400!

Plus the other extra stuff and the need to buy plants....This setup is gonna cost me $500 in all!

I lugged all the stuff I bought back alone up 5 storeys of stairs!!!!ARgh! Need to tell my parents to move to somewhere where there's a lift....

Whew....

**szesteve** · 16th Dec 2002, 23:39

Btw, would you guys recommend the use of a surface skimmer?

**tawauboy** · 17th Dec 2002, 00:09

a surface skimmer is good for clearing the surface protein film.
however, if you do not like extra equipment cluttering up your tank, you can use platy or molly.

**eggz** · 17th Dec 2002, 00:35

----------------
On 12/17/2002 12:09:16 AM

a surface skimmer is good for clearing the surface protein film.
however, if you do not like extra equipment cluttering up your tank, you can use platy or molly.
----------------

Actually I find that a surface skimmer only takes up a little more space than the typical Ehiem inlet U-pipe. I find it quite worthwhile as that surface protein does seem to block out some of the light intensity.

eggz

**vinz** · 17th Dec 2002, 01:00

Err... Steve, why so much gravel? The fert is too little for average 2 inches.

One bag of gravel is enough and you'll need another 2 bags of basefert... if you're aiming for average 2 inches of base fert and 1 inch of gravel.

**BFG** · 17th Dec 2002, 09:18

That means Steve got 2 bag of gravel n 5 bag of fert?

**szesteve** · 17th Dec 2002, 16:05

yup....that's right, I got 5 bags of base fert and 2 bags of gravel...

I also no idea why I got so much gravel man...shucks....

Hmmm....if I were to use all the gravel it would work out to about 2 inches of gravel....okay, maybe I'll use about 3/4 of it and sell the rest or something.

**vinz** · 17th Dec 2002, 19:48

It's ok if you have less fert. It'll just get depleted sooner then if you gotten more, and you just start supplementing it earlier.

**loupgarou** · 18th Dec 2002, 10:02

I'm about to buy sand/lonestar, if you're in clementi you might want to sell me one bag.. heh.

**szesteve** · 19th Dec 2002, 10:47

sure....call me...

**szesteve** · 19th Dec 2002, 22:56

URGENT!!!

I've dumped 7 bags of JBL Base Fert into my 4 x 2 x 1.5 ft tank.

The front is 1 inch thick and gradually sloping to 3 inch at the back. I plan to add on 1 inch of gravel tomorrow which will bring the front to 2inches and the back to 4inches.

Is it too thick? My tank is 18inches high.

**vinz** · 19th Dec 2002, 23:46

Only if you think it's too thick. Consider the plants you're planning to get. Anyway, how much can you shave off? Probably only one inch in the back?

**DEA** · 19th Dec 2002, 23:51

i'm trying to figure out why this is labelled &quot;URGENT&quot;

mai kan cheong, szesteve
what i suggest is perhaps you ask about something BEFORE you go and do it, yeah?
2 in for an 18 in tank is a bit tall, but workable
like what vinz says, you can't really do much about it, so work AROUND it
pick shorter plants and it'll do just fine

**szesteve** · 20th Dec 2002, 12:56

heheh, the reason why it's labelled urgent cos I haven't put in the gravel yet.

So I still have time to remove some base fert.

What is the minimum amount of gravel i must have? 1 inch?

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