# 110l planted tank - Journal



## iq00 (Dec 27, 2021)

I started a 110l tank on the 30th of December 2021.
The tank is 70cm x 35cm x 50cm.
I had some leftover plant soil and some pond soil. First I put in the plant soil which was then covered with the pond soil. The soil was covered with fine granite gravel. The soil thickness is between 1cm at the front and 8cm at the back.

Plants were taken from my old 50l tank, Limnophila Sessiliflora, Cryptocoryne Wendtii, Vesicularia Montagnei Moss, Staurogyne repens, Echinodorus Grisebachii (?) Sword plant, Limnobium Laevigatum Frogbite, Lemna Minor Waterlentils.
I added some new Vallisneria natans and Micranthemum Tweediei "Monte Carlo".

A heater is present, a powerball with a simple sponge (to protect the Rasbora Brigittae and shrimp fry) on low power adds water circulation and some filtering. LED lamps for lighting. An auto feeder is also present.

I let the tank settle for two days while changing water twice, then I added the remaining fish from my old tank (I had absolutely no space for two tanks simultaneously so they lived in a bucket for that time), 6 Trigonostigma Hengeli, 6 Rasbora Brigittae, 4 Amano shrimps, a few Neocaridina Davidii, and three Nerite snails.
A week after starting this tank I got 20 Trigonostigma Hengeli (not true, it was 17 Hengeli and 3 freeloading Espei), 10 Rasbora Brigittae and another 5 Amano shrimp from a shop that was closing and selling off their inventory. Maybe a bit early, but all fish (except two very weak Mosquito Rasbora) did survive so far.

The initial setup on 1st of January 2022, still a bit foggy:









9th of January 2022:









16th of January:









21st of January:









Today, 30th of January 2022:









The Limnophila Sessiliflora and the Sword plant sort of exploded, the Limnophila was cut down two times already. The Vallisneria is spreading and the Cryptocoryne is growing new leafs. The frogbite and water lentils also grow like mad and I have to remove some of them regularly, just as it should be.

Some algae is of course present. It strangely seems to grow exclusively where moss is present. It is not a problem yet, but I have to think about what I do about it if it grows excessively.

The only plant that is slightly suffering is the Monte Carlo Micranthemum, parts are regularly dug out by the snails and then float around. Therefore they struggle to spread, it simply may take some time.

Water has been changed twice in the first two days, then 30% in the first week and second week. Since then only a little bit was added to compensate for evaporation. There was never any NO2 or NO3 detectable with my test strips so far. PH is at around 7, alkalinity at around 10 to 15d and hardness at 14 GH is a bit high, but this is due to the extremely hard water in my area. And of course, these test strips are precision guesswork.

The fish and shrimp seem to do well, the Trigonostigma once in a while show a nice swarming behaviour and the Rasbora Brigittae explore every nook and cranny in this tank. I may add another few Rasbora Brigittae, they are so small that I do not expect them to be much of a bio load.

I am amazed how this tank developed within one month. I hope it gets as stable and low maintenance as my old tank.

This is my little garden to take care of for the future


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## Michael (Jul 20, 2010)

Lovely tank, with or without the Monte Carlo. And you have some of my favorite small fish.


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## Roscoe Richardson (Dec 27, 2021)

Looks great! Very nice growth in a short time.


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

Beautiful tank! You obviously have experience plus a magic touch. 
Folks, here's a tank with driftwood that doesn't have problems. With such explosive plant growth, even if the wood leaches nutrients, the plants can handle it.


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## iq00 (Dec 27, 2021)

Thank you for your nice comments  
I wouldn't call myself experienced, I started this hobby two years ago and this is my second tank that I set up so far. I may just be lucky ... .

The tank is now three months old and has progressed nicely. The algae that was present at the mossy areas is mostly gone now, the moss is getting the upper hand. Unfortunately some thread algae or filamentous algae has appeard. This is mostly growing on the sword plant leaves close to the water surface, but is also present on the Vallisneria leaves at the water surface and is mixing with the water lentils, forming some kind of blobs. But is is not a huge problem so far.

The plants still grow a lot, I cut back every weekend or every second week, sometimes quite hard. The Vallisneria is walking around the whole tank and placing childs everywhere, so I have to remove them once in a while.

As a measure against the thread algae I have reduced the lighting a little bit by shutting off half of the lamps between 12pm and 4pm.

I think my main problem is that I feed to much. I use an Eheim autofeeder and it is really difficult to get a properly small amount of food. The fish are small, therefore need small flakes and a relatively small amount of food. This autofeeder makes it really difficult. I tried to feed twice a day a small amount, but this was obviously to much. So I started to feed only once a day and manually feed a few artemia every once in a while, about 4 times a week.

The reduced lighting and reduced food input seems to slowly reduce the amount of thread algae.

All the fish seem to be fine so far.
I also added a pair of Honey Gourami two weeks ago. They are beautiful, some really interesting fish and they behave peacefully so far. The only downside is that the shrimps are a little bit in hiding mode now, even without being hunted by the Honey Gourami. But they explore constantly and nibble at the plants once in a while, so they are very often approaching the areas where the shrimps graze.

Some weeks I have no time at all to enjoy this tank, then there are days where I work at home, listening to some telecons for hours. I prefer to do this sitting on my sofa, directly next to the tank with my laptop. It is an unexpectedly calming and interesting thing to compensate for work numbness ... .

Have a nice day, Thomas.









4th of February









12th of February









5th of March









18th of March

















26th of March









3rd of April.


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## johnwesley0 (Feb 23, 2021)

We started our tanks at about the same time, maybe a month apart. We are proof positive that you can "scale up" Walstad techniques and apply them to larger sized tanks. I was truly amazed by how quickly 2 kilograms of potting soil could "stabilize" under the proper conditions.

I have the Eheim automatic feeder too. And getting the aperture just right for tiny fish is its biggest difficulty (programming it is not that easy either - but, I'm an old guy.) It helps to have voracious eaters!


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## maico996 (Nov 6, 2016)

I have the Eheim feeder too and found that crushing the flakes before putting them in the feeder allows much more control over how much food gets delivered. 😊


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## spaquarista (Jun 23, 2021)

Wow, it's amazing to see how your tank has evolved so fast!


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## iq00 (Dec 27, 2021)

An update...

The tank has sort of settled and not much is happening.

I had some green thread algae that was growing fast, but has more or less vanished again. Also some green fuzz algae (Oedogonium???) started to grow mainly on the sword plant leaves. This has become less, but I think it damaged the plant. Some Cladophora (???) algea has taken over some moss areas and some of the wood.

The sword plant suffers a little bit, but the Vallisneria is still growing all over the tank. I think it is suppressing the sword plant. I have not decided yet to remove it in this area, I may do so. Or I may cut down the Vallisneria and the sword plant and see that the sword plant recovers.
No algae has been present on the Cryptocoryne Wendtii so far. This is the only plant that seems to be totally immune to algae!

The fish are doing fine so far, one Trigonostigma Hengeli died after two years, I already had it in my old tank. Also another one got injured as it jumped and hit the lid. Someone waved in front of the tank and scared them. The rasbora brigittae went into hiding mode as the honey gourami guy is currently in nest building mode and quite aggressive. Therefore I have no idea how many are still present. I see a few once in a while. The honey gourami pair was indifferent to all the other fish and the shrimps and didn't bother anyone until now. I was away for a week and the male got a testosterone problem since then, he is building nests constantly and is a bit crazy now. Let's see how this develops and if I have to do something about it.

Plants, except the sword plant, still grow a lot and I cut and remove a small bucket of plant material every other week.
Algae removal on the tank glass is only done on the front screen every four to six weeks. There is nearly no algae growing there and the little that appears is mostly taken care of by the snails.
Water is changed 20-30% every four to six weeks.

Apart of that the tank is low maintenance and I can leave it unattended for a week or two if necessary. Feeding is done by an auto feeder.

I enjoy this tank still a lot and I like to come home from work, sit on the couch next to it, listen to some music and just spend half an hour looking into it. And if there is time in between I will often just spend a few minutes looking if all is ok and everyone is still well.

Best regards,

Thomas.









16th of May 2022









14th of June 2022









Today 27th of June 2022 before gardening and water change.









27th of june 2022 after cutting and removing a small bucket of plants. And after changing 30l of water.


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

Your tank looks great. My rasboras don't last longer than 2 years.


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## johnwesley0 (Feb 23, 2021)

You have an astonishing tank. It took off very quickly and hasn't looked back. I started getting hairy algae as I started relying on my automatic feeder for all meals, even when I was home. I'm beginning to wonder if there's a connection?


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

iq00 said:


> An update...
> The tank has sort of settled and not much is happening.
> I enjoy this tank still a lot and I like to come home from work, sit on the couch next to it, listen to some music and just spend half an hour looking into it. And if there is time in between I will often just spend a few minutes looking if all is ok and everyone is still well.


Beautiful, peaceful tank! (It was calming for me to look at your pictures this morning.)

It reminds me to stop fussing over my guppy breeding tanks and take a minute or two to just enjoy them.


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## iq00 (Dec 27, 2021)

And another update.

A few months ago I got a pair of Honey Gourami. They showed a lot of activity, the male was constantly building bubble nests and courting the female, and in general they were very interesting fish. And, very important, they completely ignored all the other fish, the Trigonostigma Hengeli and Boraras Brigittae, as well as the shrimps. It was a peaceful tank.

Well, until about three weeks ago.

Thats when the male suddenly started to chase everyone else in the aquarium without mercy. I lost 3 Trigonostigma and the Chilli Rasbora went into hiding mode, not to be seen again, except during feeding time. 

The male Honey Gourami was nicknamed "Andy", by a friend. We have a colleague who is constantly aggressive and the name stuck.

I caught "Andy" and put him into a small 12 litre planted tank that I have for some shrimps. After two days he had cooled off and I put him back into the main tank. Where he behaved peaceful again for the next two weeks.

Until "Andy" again got aggro a week ago. I came home and except "Andy" no other fish was to be seen. Then I saw him violently chasing and hunting the other fish through the plants, fish getting stuck in some corners, not being able to flee and still being attacked by him until they went belly up. It took me quite some time to catch him and I isolated him again.

I found a few Trigonostigma fish corpse and removed them from the tank. Another few were already being eaten by the shrimps and snails. That is the advantage of having shrimps and snails, they keep the tank clean.

16 Trigonostigma reappeared during the last days, but another 5 fish were killed by "Andy" in one afternoon.

I asked at my fish shop if they would take the Honey Gourami couple back, which they did. "Andy" the killer and his girl are gone.

So, my tank is peaceful again. But all Trigonostigma have damaged fins and one still seems to be injured.
And the Chilli Rasbora are still in hiding mode, but they appear briefly during feeding time.

I lost 8 fish. Hmm, my fault. I shouldn't have bought the Honey Gouramis.

My research before said that Honey Gouramis are peaceful, male Honey Gouramis may defend their bubble nest for a day, but even then they do not harm other tank inhabitants.

My tank size of 110 liters was considered to be sufficient in all the articles that I read and during the discussions with the people in the fish shop.

It is not.









Dead Trigonostigma after attack by the Honey Gourami.









The offender in his single cell... .









The tank a week ago, a day after I removed the male Honey Gourami, only 2 fish came out of hiding.









The tank yesterday evening, 16th of July 2022, with half the lighting already at night mode. The remaining LED will dim during the next half hour. About 16 fish have reappeared during the last week. 8 were lost. And the Chilli Rasbora are still hiding.


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

Wow! What a tale of woe! I checked my tropical fish textbook on Honey Gouramis. They are, indeed, listed as peaceful.
Fish behavior is not "cut and dried," especially when it involves reproduction.


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## spaquarista (Jun 23, 2021)

Speaking of Gouramis, you tale reminded me of mine, thought I'd share! I have an 100 liter tank that has 10 rummynose, 1 Blue gourami and USED to have 5 black tetras which have since been rehomed into my 120 liter tank because my gourami kept chasing the black neon tetras to no end, creating stress on everyone, including the rummynose who would be influenced by the tetras- they would constantly shoal and hide together. By removing the black tetras, the gourami and the rummynose have relaxed!!

So yeah, sometimes space isn't enough but in this case, I think the neon tetras were just too " eye catching" for the gourami, bringing out his territorial side?


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

Who knows what is in the mind of a fish?


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