JadeIceGreen's Sanzon Iwagumi

[JadeIceGreen]

Bro, your tank is getting nicer liao! Congrats

Thanks!!

expensive version bleach

eah

Yeah I agree.. But I do love ADA.

That is why we can all appreciate his setup more!

Keep it up Jade!

You can appreciate even more if we have a "JadeIceGreen fund" in which the aim is for me to own everything ADA.

Time to "Superge" your rocks too!

Will be seeing some trimming in a week's time.

I like rocks with a little of green algae, makes them look nature. But I do brush them daily as well.

[craftsman]

Very nice bro... Glosso looks a little too big though for your tank and scape.

[Shadow]

Yeah I agree.. But I do love ADA.

I like rocks with a little of green algae, makes them look nature. But I do brush them daily as well.

Me too, love ADA product... have been brain wash by ADA advertisement actually the did not advertise a lot (at least not in Singapore), Amano just make a beautiful scape which is worth more than advertisement.

Have you try phyton-git? wonder if it will remove the green spot algae on the rock.

[vwsj84]

Very nice bro... Glosso looks a little too big though for your tank and scape.

Yeah... I also agree with craftsman that Glosso looks a little big and out of place. Maybe HC would have been better. But I always believe that in aquascaping... everyone will have different perspectives on what is nice and what is not nice. That is what keeps this hobby fresh for everyone. If eveyone had the same ideas on what is nice... this would get real boring real fast.

Anyway... maybe after a few trimmings the glosso will be nice and compact. However I still think the intensity of light from your 3 arcadia lights are not enough to prevent your glossy from growing upwards and becoming leggy.

[JadeIceGreen]

Very nice bro... Glosso looks a little too big though for your tank and scape.

Yeah... I also agree with craftsman that Glosso looks a little big and out of place. Maybe HC would have been better. But I always believe that in aquascaping... everyone will have different perspectives on what is nice and what is not nice. That is what keeps this hobby fresh for everyone. If eveyone had the same ideas on what is nice... this would get real boring real fast.

Anyway... maybe after a few trimmings the glosso will be nice and compact. However I still think the intensity of light from your 3 arcadia lights are not enough to prevent your glossy from growing upwards and becoming leggy.

Yeah, I mentioned in previous posts that glosso may have been the wrong choice. But since I've started it, I am going to keep at it and see what happens. So far, it is not so bad in my opinion.

And I am using 4 Arcadia lights, not 3.

Me too, love ADA product... have been brain wash by ADA advertisement actually the did not advertise a lot (at least not in Singapore), Amano just make a beautiful scape which is worth more than advertisement.

Have you try phyton-git? wonder if it will remove the green spot algae on the rock.

For me, its not so much of the advertisements, but the passion in which ADA researches its products. And the mentality that they have that all equipment must be beautiful as well as being functional. Beautiful equipment to match beautiful scapes.

I am not going to get phyton-git as I really do not want to spend anymore at the moment. As the scape establishes itself, the algae should go away or be minimized. And I will be getting some algae munching fauna and let nature do its work.

[JadeIceGreen]

Test Results for Day 18 (Tuesday, 03/02/2009)

PH – 6.4
GH - Did not test.
KH – 3
NO2 – 0
NH3/NH4 – 0
CO2 level 35.83 ppm approximately

Finally after 18 days, my tank is fully cycled. What was surprising was that NO2 went from 5 to 0 in one day, pretty amazing to me. Now, my only problems are with thread/hair algae which are threatening to become a big problem.

PH has also increased to 6.4 on average with a bubble count of one sec. This is a 0.4 increase from the young days when PH was a common 6 at the same bubble count so things are looking good.

[StanChung]

One SAE should take care of it for you.

[Viper007]

I think one SAE and one oto will be just nice.

[JadeIceGreen]

One SAE should take care of it for you.

I think one SAE and one oto will be just nice.

SAEs grow up to 5 inches so they are too big. I was thinking of otos.. What do you guys think?

[weeyang19]

After being inspired by Jervis and EvolutionZ, I decided to have my first go at the hugely popular iwagumi scape too.

Of all iwagumi styles, I chose the Sanzon Iwagumi style, here is a short description of it.

"The most common iwagumi style is called sanzon iwagumi. Sanzon means "three pillar" in Japanese and these aquascapes make use of three rocks, with two smaller rocks and one larger rock. According to the Japanese Architecture and Art Net Users System , this term was first used in the 11th century Japanese garden treatise "Sakuteiki." The grouping of stones comes from Buddhism; the central stone is called the chuusonskei (or the big Buddha) and the smaller flanking stones are called kyoujiseki (or attendant stones). The kyoujiseki are often tilted or pointed towards the chuusonskei as if bowing down to it. The chuusonskei is almost always positioned according to the Golden Rule."

Credits goes to http://www.aquatic-eden.com/2007/02/...aquariums.html, http://www.aisf.or.jp/~jaanus/deta/s/sanzoniwagumi.htm.


Here are some pictures of my setup.

My tank is an exact replica of ADA Mini M, 36cm x 22cm x 26cm (5mm) made by N30, very good quality and workmanship with minimal silicon. A blue mat that was supplied by N30 is also used to evenly distribute the weight of the tank.



One problem with a tank of this specifications is that normal light sets that are made in 30cm, 45cm, etc spans will not fit, they also look bulky as the tank width is only 22cm and a light set will easily take up half the width. Also, light sets under 60cm are usually "weak" in output as they lack the T5 option.

My main criteria for my light set is to be sleek and powerful, I wanted something in the 20+ wattage range. I enquired about ADA's Mini Solar http://www.adana.com.sg/productsPage/ada_lighting.html, and it cost a whooping $440 so that was out of question. I finally settled for Arcadia which in my opinion is one of the best light makers out there. So I bought 3 Arcadia Arc Pod (9 watts) and they look great! Incidentally, 27 watts is the same wattage as ADA's Mini Solar, and I can assure you, they are extremely bright!







One of my dream items have always been a mini lily pipe set from ADA but for now, they are still out of my reach and so I am using eheim instead. And yes I know, we all hate the green tubes. I always wondered why eheim dun sell optional transparent inlet and outlet tubes, I bet alot of us would get them and they are unbreakable too!

Wah bro ur set up so special like the Lighting Nice Simple,... How much it cost u for the lighting

[Shadow]

SAEs grow up to 5 inches so they are too big. I was thinking of otos.. What do you guys think?

remove it before it grow too big it won't eat algae when they are adult anyway

[JadeIceGreen]

Wah bro ur set up so special like the Lighting Nice Simple,... How much it cost u for the lighting

I PMed you bro! And thanks so much for the tank, superb job.

remove it before it grow too big it won't eat algae when they are adult anyway

Then cannot.. I don't have another tank re-house them when they are bigger, I will have to get otos then.

[Shadow]

Otos only eat limited type of algae, Yamato is much better for hair algae (what algae again in your tank?)

[JadeIceGreen]

Otos only eat limited type of algae, Yamato is much better for hair algae (what algae again in your tank?)

Hair and thread algae. Well, I can't get any fauna until Petmart opens again, they are on a long CNY break.

The good news for today is that the algae did increase in quantities last seen the past 3 days. So hopefully since my tank has cycled, the ecosystem has established itself and all the algae will die.

[Viper007]

Hair and thread algae. Well, I can't get any fauna until Petmart opens again, they are on a long CNY break.

Wah like this you have to wait another week man.

[blue33]

Easy job, dump few Malayan shrimp and in no time, hair algae will be gone. In whole ecosystem different fauna has its job and duties role to play, there's algae and there's sure got shrimp/fauna to do the job, nothing to fear.

[JadeIceGreen]

Wah like this you have to wait another week man.

Not that bad.. I think they reopen this Friday, I hope they do have fauna stocked after being away for 2 weeks.

Easy job, dump few Malayan shrimp and in no time, hair algae will be gone. In whole ecosystem different fauna has its job and duties role to play, there's algae and there's sure got shrimp/fauna to do the job, nothing to fear.

Yup yup, I prefer Yamatos actually and they do not breed. I am still torn between Otos or Yamatos, will decide when Petmart opens again.

[JadeIceGreen]

Did not do any testing today as I had a huge fight with the algae and ended up changing 80% of my tank water at the end of it.

What I do want to update is that changing the photo period to the morning and leaving the room light on at night or switching on the tank lights again to view is working. Stan was right in that plants wake up after pure darkness and search for light to photosynthesize. It does not matter how little the light is but as long as its not pure darkness, they start the process and because of that, my glosso has been leggy when with 10 hours of light later on.

But feeding your plants at first light (pun intended, heh), even with ambient lighting after the photo period, glosso still stays low as the plants had had their fill for the day. As least this is my reasoning and so far it works, so I'm happy.

[JadeIceGreen]

Test Results for Day 20 (Thursday, 05/02/2009)

PH – 6.3
GH - Did not test.
KH – 3
NO2 – 0
NH3/NH4 – 0
CO2 level 45.11 ppm approximately


All the algae I cleared came back this morning..

I didn't want to spend 10 minutes daily clearing the never ending algae so I went to buy 12 yamato shrimps from Seaview.
At first, I only bought 2 yamato shrimps and a nano CO2 diffuser as mine was too big, and this happened.




X ray mode!



My tank is so full of algae that I realised 2 yamato shrimps will not be enough, so I went back to buy 10 more and the nano CO2 diffuser again.


Nice right?



Here is to a clean tank without algae!! Cheers!

[Jervis]

Those 12 Yamatos will work wonders

Time to post latest FTS