Nav's Iwagumi Project Log "Greater Heights"

[Navanod]

If you're asking my opinion.. i prefer setup 2

As for HC.. just be careful with it growing on brand new ADA soil. It might not be the methods you choose.. it might be just that the soil exudes so much no3 or is so acidic when it first contacts water, that it melts HC, or any other sensitive plants for that matter, to bits. But that said, amazonia 2 isn't as bad as amazonia. Lets see how it goes.

Don't get me wrong.. it is one heck of a good soil though. Just need to be realistic on its past properties.

Heh, thanks
I'm sure you realized that the 2 setup differs only in that tiny rock's position?
Could not resist stuffing the rock which you took out back in as another "cliff" and moving my favorite stone to the foreground
I think I'm set!

The HC only melted around the edges of the tub so I think the soil's not to blame. Those in the middle are growing rather well but seemed to be trying to grow upwards

I think Amazonia 2 is probably the safest choice at this moment for planted tanks and even shrimp tanks.
Will post after planting phase 1!

[Navanod]

Here's the HC in a tub



Can see the melting in the corners and patches here and there, planting once I can find time


Here are the mosses on rocks
They all came from a bag of mini pellia a friend gave me but I found US Fissidens and an unknown moss in it which I webbed to a rock as well


The bag of mini pellia had alot of nasties though. BBA, Cladophora, seed shrimps and a planaria worm. Here's some of it after being bombed for 15mins with Potassium Permanganate. Some Clado can still be seen on the left side.


Note the dead pellia soak up the brown stains of the PP much more than the healthy parts


Out of a big bag, only left enough mini pellia for 5 rocks after screening under a bright light and throwing out the algae infested

[ranmasatome]

Hey.. if you need stuff to moss up the stones drop me a pm...it'll be free (since this thread is pretty useful to everyone), you just need to come down to pick it up.
Some of those stones quite naked la.

[Navanod]

Thank you very much for the generous offer! hehe
They're actually so bare because I'm anal about testing a pet theory that we can keep exotic algaes out of our tanks. Thus I threw out most of the "contaminated" parts...rather start with semi-naked rocks and let it slowly grow out than to have BBA attacks!
The super bare white rock is because I only found this tiny bits of unknown moss amongst the pellia so I'm just curious to see what it'll grow into! haha

There are some clean US Fissidens on standby yet to be tied so I should have enough moss rocks at the end of the day, although I'm very keen to get my hands on mini-fissidens and mini-bolbitis. Will keep in mind to come crying to you for help if I do run short on mosses during the project!

[Navanod]

Progress had been slow...I had been held back by melting HC and the purchase of additional HC on wool freaked me out.

Part of the wool was completely green (and it's not green wool) and for those who advocated planting with the wool:

Free algae! And this was after more than 5 washes! Its Cladophora most likely, one of the 2 worst algae to have. The were also worms and a mosquito hidden in the wool!

But I also understood why people plant with the wool when I tried to separate the HC from the wool. Lost alot of the root system and crush quite a fair bit of HC in the process. Note to self: Never buy HC on wool again!

Threw the remaining HC into a tub and gave it the "Purple Rain of Death"


Can you see the 2 worms? There were many more and it was disgusting to see them bursting to the surface right after the purple rain hits the water.


After blood bath, painfully picked out all the good HC (bad ones will be stained brown) , pull off any leftover algae (dead or alive) and replanted everything in clean soil and waiting for them to develop more roots before planting into the tank. Its much easier to grow them under high light in tubs then trying to crank up the light for the bigger deeper tank.

I then turned to the semi-melted HC that came in pots. Dug some up healthy ones and was pleased that there's plenty of root...until I washed them and found just as much cladophora fragments in the water as the wool raised HC!
More Purple Rain carnage followed...

[Navanod]

Hi everyone! Finally an update!
Much setbacks and painful lessons were learnt...enough to write a full page wall of text on, but I know a picture speaks a thousand words


Please ignore the meshes of stuff lying around...those will be removed eventually. There's currently a hornwort + frogbit floating colony as well that'll eventually go.
What do you think lads? I'm quite happy with the way the marimo lawn turned out although I wish those fissidens in front would hurry up and grow. The HC is also not spreading as quickly as I would liked it to...may have to transplant some to the front from the back, where the HC is growing lushly

By the way, I caught a picture of a baby helenas snail on the lawn! It's only about 2mm!!

[xjiahua]

i read through your post and i must give it to you for your attempts at achieving such beautiful scape

may i know where did you purchase the marimo lawn ?

and how much did all the rocks set you back ?

[blue33]

Hope your Marimo lawn will not turn into "Cladophora" algae which is the usual case it'll happen. That would be a nasty algae you going to encounter. Good luck.

[ranmasatome]

Wa! so different! good that you have the plants in now!

[Navanod]

i read through your post and i must give it to you for your attempts at achieving such beautiful scape

may i know where did you purchase the marimo lawn ?

and how much did all the rocks set you back ?

Thanks for the encouragement. Still a long way to go before this scape is considered complete though.
The marimo lawn is a DIY, with custom holes and curves to accomodate the rocks. Took about 5 balls of marimo and alot of time to tie

The rocks costed about a hundred dollars in total and can only be found at Biotope as far as I know

Hope your Marimo lawn will not turn into "Cladophora" algae which is the usual case it'll happen. That would be a nasty algae you going to encounter. Good luck.

Thanks, I'm gonna need the luck. I specifically targetted BBA and Cladophora during the setting up of this tank. Sadly, BBA has proven to be immuned to quarantine and chemical warfare. It stays hidden or in the water until conditions are right. From research into red algaes, BBA seemed to disperse male and female reproductive cells into the water and these mate mid-water before settling on a suitable surface, kinda like barnacles. I'm thinking UV filtration or excel overdose will be very useful...and excel+CO2 is indeed proving very effective in stopping and killing the BBA so far. Its only been able to appear on corners of the rocks or on the plastic and glass accessories. I simply boiled those things and the BBA turned brown, red, and then white. Excel spot treatment took care of the remainers that can be seen.

As for cladophora...no signs of it so far (touch wood!) as it seemed to be very sensitive to excel or potassium permanganate baths. I think its important to choose marimo from clean sources. Those sitting at the bottom of dirty looking tanks covered with brown dirt is certainly not good. I can't bomb marimo with baths without killing everything, so the only way is to quarantine and look out for parts that seemed to be growing extra fast (potential clado)?

So far so good...I've killed off most of the algaes that showed up except green spot and some brownish hairy thing that likes to cling to the HC and sometimes the marimo lawn (hopefully not a form of clado?). I'm sure there're some BBA, staghorns and other less scary algaes around but can only hope that the EI method + CO2 + Excel can keep them under control

[Navanod]

Wa! so different! good that you have the plants in now!

Erosion had been a constant pain to fight. Luckily you experts here adviced me to use lave chips as the base for the big rocks or everything would've came tumbling down by now! Lesson learnt: Never put in large number of amano shrimps until the soil's completely covered with plants!
Strangely, some rogue Hemianthus micranthemoides that sneaked in as HC are growing well in the foreground while the HC is simply refusing to grow there...
Some unknown moss (xmas?) also sneaked in with the zipper moss and somehow attached themselves to the main rock (on the left). They looked good there so I left it alone.

Now...where to plant the zipper moss? I'm thinking of sticking it in front of the last rock on the right, to cover the unnatural rock face?

[xjiahua]

Thanks for the encouragement. Still a long way to go before this scape is considered complete though.
The marimo lawn is a DIY, with custom holes and curves to accomodate the rocks. Took about 5 balls of marimo and alot of time to tie

The rocks costed about a hundred dollars in total and can only be found at Biotope as far as I know

i believe its going to be breathtaking once it matures. thanks for the info and i must say i'm definitely taking in some inspiration from you. ;D

[ranmasatome]

Actually looking at it again, i'm wondering if you're going to face issues with texture management?
You have how many species of moss in there? all of them giving different textures to the scape.
You going to moss wall it? would be a little unusual to moss wall an iwagami.

[Navanod]

Actually looking at it again, i'm wondering if you're going to face issues with texture management?
You have how many species of moss in there? all of them giving different textures to the scape.
You going to moss wall it? would be a little unusual to moss wall an iwagami.

Certainly no moss wall! I had over-bought the US fissidens, which is why there're so many meshes lying around. All will eventually be grown as irregular overlapping domes at the foreground area only to simulated hilly terrain.
The zipper moss may or may not be incorporated. Anyway, its on a mesh so its somewhat modular. Am thinking of using it like hairgrass, around the base of the rocks

As for the unknown moss stuck to the main rock...it's starting to show xmas moss'ish growth patterns, still considering what to do with it.
No other mosses in there otherwise

[blue33]

it looks pretty dark green overall due to low tech low light environment. small tank with no stem plant and so many fauna will lead to algae most time.

[Goththug]

Hi Navanod,

That's a very nice scape! I have just tore apart a Marimo Moss ball last night in an attempt to create a carpet effect just like yours. However, what i did was just tear up pieces of the moss ball and placing it flat on the foreground and pushing it a little into the substrate, it appears very artificial now and not as lush and green like yours. =( If i had come across this thread, i would have asked for your advise first before going ahead.
May i ask how did you tie down the marimo to the rocks? Is it just like how you tie spiky moss to driftwood using fishing line?
Please pardon my questions as I'm new to this wonderful hobby!

[Navanod]

it looks pretty dark green overall due to low tech low light environment. small tank with no stem plant and so many fauna will lead to algae most time.

I think my camera skill is the problem here. Paiseh, heh

Its supposed to be high light and tech. Its using a 3ft LED light (so there's light coming in from the side as well) with 3 LED tubes over the back of the tank. NA claims each tube can output about 19W equivalent of a T5. Plus there's a 2ft T5 2x24W for foreground added after I noticed that the main rock blocks quite abit of light, causing the foreground to suffer. 8 hours lighting per day.
CO2 is via a CO2 ceramic diffuser inside a reactor hidden in the cabinet below, switched on an hour before lights and there's a constant mist of fine CO2 bubbles in the tank during lighting hours.
Fertilization is EI dosage at 60% of max, with daily dose of Excel at 1.5x normal dose.
Added a large Atman 600 HOF on the right side of the tank to improve circulation and also surface agitation to eliminate the surface film. At $17, this thing is a steal and works like a charm.

Main fauna are the school of about 40 Boraras brigittae and a large colony of painted fire red shrimps. A small group of CRS, a reticulated hillstream loach, a (fast reproducing) squad of Anentome Helena snails and 4 otto catfish are the current denizens.

I'm using the hornwort and frogbit as a replacement for stem plants and its proving to be a formidable nutrient sink. The thing needs trimming every 2-3 days or it''ll engulf the right side of the tank. In a week (when I got lazy), the entire tank will be shaded by it. From your vast experience, has anyone managed to use hornwort to replace stem plants successfully?
I feel abit silly overdosing with EI only to have to use the hornwort to suck it all up. But on the other hand, this lets me dose EI without worry and be assured that there's no limiting nutrients at any time. The last I tested on Sunday after a 50% WC, nitrate was at about 15-20ppm.

Will post more pictures of the setup

[Navanod]

Hi Navanod,

That's a very nice scape! I have just tore apart a Marimo Moss ball last night in an attempt to create a carpet effect just like yours. However, what i did was just tear up pieces of the moss ball and placing it flat on the foreground and pushing it a little into the substrate, it appears very artificial now and not as lush and green like yours. =( If i had come across this thread, i would have asked for your advise first before going ahead.
May i ask how did you tie down the marimo to the rocks? Is it just like how you tie spiky moss to driftwood using fishing line?
Please pardon my questions as I'm new to this wonderful hobby!

Thank you.
I had also ripped apart a marimo ball at first, similar to what you had done. Bad idea. The smaller tufts are difficult to handle and always float away. The marimo cannot be planted into the soil as it'll not root easily as far as I know.
I originally intended for the lawn to be a fixed shape with the option of lifting it out entirely so I can clean it, so I had it tied to a pre-cut mesh of the desired shape.
Instead of ripping the balls apart, I found that its best if they are just opened up and pulled gently into a large flat carpet of the desired shape. This can then be easily tied to whatever you wish.

[Goththug]

Thank you.
I had also ripped apart a marimo ball at first, similar to what you had done. Bad idea. The smaller tufts are difficult to handle and always float away. The marimo cannot be planted into the soil as it'll not root easily as far as I know.
I originally intended for the lawn to be a fixed shape with the option of lifting it out entirely so I can clean it, so I had it tied to a pre-cut mesh of the desired shape.
Instead of ripping the balls apart, I found that its best if they are just opened up and pulled gently into a large flat carpet of the desired shape. This can then be easily tied to whatever you wish.

Thanks for the reply. Well since i already ripped mine apart, i think i will just observe and see what happens, cause it's currently not floating. Looking forward to future updates of your tank!

[Navanod]

Hi all,

Another long overdued update!



Some changes:

- Upgraded filter from Eheim 2028 to 2078. Flow is much improved! And I love how Eheim managed to move the coarse filter to the top tray. Very clever. Now its easy to clean and any shrimplets that got sucked in can be easily rescued!

- Got rid of the giant CO2 reactor and followed Shadow's recommendation (from his blog) and changed to a Boyu inline diffuser.

Boyu-CD-01_CO2_diff.jpg
Saved alot of space, flow is improved even more, no more CO2 burping from the canister and I'm starting to see HC pearling! And its only $6!!

- Eradicated all BBA and staghorns!!

- Relaid the marimo lawn and did some changes to it to hopefully improve the illusion of depth.

- Got rid of the unknown moss on the rocks. Will stick to US Fissiden and Zipper moss only.

- The "moss on rocks" method seemed to be going well. It covers areas where the HC cannot grow well and hopefully creates a turfs of trees effect on the foreground slope. Holds back erosion as well.

- Will be getting rid of the remaining US fissiden on mesh as there's no more space for them.

- Aggressively culling the shrimp population as well. Its exploding!

Thanks for all the advice and help so far from the gurus. Any thoughts on how to further improve the scape?