# Beginner Medium Size Tank (29g)



## geneyoonit (May 19, 2009)

Yep... so I started aquascaping... but I need a lot of pointers... such as other plant recommendations...

I really need a carpet plant.. *sigh... 
looking into the HC 

a mild algae problem (gha i think) if you look close enough...










btw: be nice...


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Nice composition for a first time out; you've got a decent eye.

Various forms of small anubias would look good in the rock work. Any number of mosses might be an idea, too. It looks like your density is already coming along fairly well. For ground cover, I find glossso an easy but nice looking one, it works well with HC.

It looks like you've got more than one kind of algae there. If you post your tank info (parameters, fert dosing, co2, light etc.) I'm sure it's something that can be worked out. Off the top of my head, I'd say a lack of CO2 for the light level.

-Philosophos


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## Fishtory (Jan 21, 2009)

Why are people always telling us to be nice? Are we mean??? 

J/k. I know I hold my breath every time I post pics. It's like holding up your baby and saying rate it.

Your tank looks really nice so far. I tried HC and hairgrass b4 switching to marsilea as a ground cover. You could also try mosses tied around rocks, look on this forum for some examples.


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## geneyoonit (May 19, 2009)

thanks for replying guys 

@Philosophos: Yeah, I was looking into getting me some more anubias.. but aren't mosses really difficult to take care of? From what I've heard, they seem to be very aggressive and can overtake your tank if mishandled.. but I am a beginner at this, so I really don't even know what kind of mosses work better than others... and for glosso i thought you need very very high lighting? My lighting only goes ~2.5 watts/g... which is MAYBE enough but i donno if that penetrates all the way through either...

oh and for specs: what's perameters? LOL (sorry really noob here)... i use Flourish as my fert. dose, and have eco-complete as my bottom substrate, my lighting is ~2.5w/g.. but don't know in terms of lumens or how deep it penetrates by how strong... and I never really checked my co2... which I really should soon... I get about 2 bubbles per second (using DIY yeast recipe), but I know i should know my co2 by ppm by now...

It's mostly just one kind of algae, everything else is being taken care of and completely gone due to my 5 amano shrimp and my 1 SAE... but for some reason neither will touch the algae thats growing on my plants :/

@Fishtory: LOL you guys aren't mean... @ least based on what I found poking around this forum  but yes, like u said, I feel like my baby is so vulnerable out in public o.0

and could I get the scientific name for marsilea please? gonna check it out before I actually purchase a carpet plant... 



thanks for the recommendations!! I really appreciate your feedbacks


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

geneyoonit said:


> @Philosophos: Yeah, I was looking into getting me some more anubias.. but aren't mosses really difficult to take care of? From what I've heard, they seem to be very aggressive and can overtake your tank if mishandled.. but I am a beginner at this, so I really don't even know what kind of mosses work better than others...


Some moss can be tricky as it is slow growing, and limits your use of excel somewhat. Java moss actually takes talent and effort to kill; start there if you want an easy one. I have my hands in the tank at least once a week anyhow, so trimming some moss is no big deal for me.



geneyoonit said:


> and for glosso i thought you need very very high lighting? My lighting only goes ~2.5 watts/g... which is MAYBE enough but i donno if that penetrates all the way through either...


2.5 wpg is fine. Contrary to common myth, you don't need extremely high light to grow plants. High light exists for aesthetics or when you want to play with fast growth. It can help with very dense planting, but spread is still far more important than wattage. Even hemianthus can grow in 50mmol PAR (low light) as is evidenced in Amanos' aquariums. You don't need high light for red, either.



geneyoonit said:


> oh and for specs: what's perameters? LOL (sorry really noob here)... i use Flourish as my fert. dose, and have eco-complete as my bottom substrate,


Parameters would be information about the column. pH/KH/GH/NO2/NO3/NH4/Fe/PO4/K+ etc. Most commonly, the first 3 of these get attention. The rest have their place, but are usually for diagnosing fert and nitrate cycle issues. I would advise keeping the first 6 around, and calibrating them for accuracy.

Flourish on its own is going to advice you to use nutrient amounts that are too low for your lighting levels. The NPK ammount of flourish is negligible enough that I don't even calculate it in to my dosing anymore, and use it as a source for micro nutrients. Long term, it's cheaper and offers superior control to do DIY ferts from powder. I get mine here and haven't looked back. EI is my method of choice, but there's others out there.



geneyoonit said:


> my lighting is ~2.5w/g.. but don't know in terms of lumens or how deep it penetrates by how strong...


2.5wpg of T-8 or CF works well. Lumens won't help much for determining if you have enough light, but can be useful for comparing spread and intensity of bulbs of the same type. The issue with lumens is that they're weighted for the yellow light that the human eye sees, not the spectrum that plants use; PAR. If you want to get fancy, you can pick up a decent quantum PAR meter for about $300, though most do without one. Some clubs buy one and let their members borrow it.



geneyoonit said:


> and I never really checked my co2... which I really should soon... I get about 2 bubbles per second (using DIY yeast recipe), but I know i should know my co2 by ppm by now...


At 2.5wpg, I'd advise getting compressed CO2. It can be done without it, but you'll need a much bigger DIY system and a real love for buying flourish excel. It's cheaper long run to opt for compressed.

Don't use the pH/KH chart to figure out your CO2. Get your self a drop checker for $10 or less. Use 4dKH solution and low range pH test reagent (bromothymol blue) in it. pH/KH charts alone don't take in to account things like iron, nitrates and phosphates, so they have a massive margin of error (200%). Using the same chart on a drop checker yeilds about a 50% margin of error. Even still, don't worry if your drop checker says your CO2 is too high, worry about how the plants look and how your fish stress.

After you work out your initial fert dosing CO2 levels and distribution are going to be your #1 concern. When ever algae appears, repeat the mantra, "It's the CO2"- whether it be diffusion, distribution or flow rate.



geneyoonit said:


> It's mostly just one kind of algae, everything else is being taken care of and completely gone due to my 5 amano shrimp and my 1 SAE... but for some reason neither will touch the algae thats growing on my plants :/


Get your self some good ferts, some compressed CO2 and read up on a good fertilization method. You need non-limiting plant growth to eliminate that algae long-term.

Don't worry about not knowing. You're asking questions, that's good. Many people are willing to give you a hand. If/When you become experienced in planted tank keeping, remember the help you got from the community, and offer the same to those who are just starting.

-Philosophos


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## geneyoonit (May 19, 2009)

Philosophos said:


> Some moss can be tricky as it is slow growing, and limits your use of excel somewhat. Java moss actually takes talent and effort to kill; start there if you want an easy one. I have my hands in the tank at least once a week anyhow, so trimming some moss is no big deal for me.


Java moss sounds good actually, thanks for the recommendation 
yeah, I have my hands in my aquarium once a week trimming and pruning and planting cuttings...



Philosophos said:


> 2.5 wpg is fine. Contrary to common myth, you don't need extremely high light to grow plants. High light exists for aesthetics or when you want to play with fast growth. It can help with very dense planting, but spread is still far more important than wattage. Even hemianthus can grow in 50mmol PAR (low light) as is evidenced in Amanos' aquariums. You don't need high light for red, either.


im glad to know that 2.5 is fine! haha.. I was always thinking "more light.. more light" and was going to purchase a 2nd light for the carpet plant... u mean red as in red plants right? I stayed away from red plants cause I thought/heard they're much difficult to take care of... but i'll look around my local stores to see if they have any nice red plants as well...



Philosophos said:


> Parameters would be information about the column. pH/KH/GH/NO2/NO3/NH4/Fe/PO4/K+ etc. Most commonly, the first 3 of these get attention. The rest have their place, but are usually for diagnosing fert and nitrate cycle issues. I would advise keeping the first 6 around, and calibrating them for accuracy.
> 
> Flourish on its own is going to advice you to use nutrient amounts that are too low for your lighting levels. The NPK ammount of flourish is negligible enough that I don't even calculate it in to my dosing anymore, and use it as a source for micro nutrients. Long term, it's cheaper and offers superior control to do DIY ferts from powder. I get mine here and haven't looked back. EI is my method of choice, but there's others out there.


my parameters are all in the okays... never tested for Fe/PO4 or K+ though... I also regularly give dosages of Fe from the Flourish brand, but i'll definitly look into getting the powder as my micro nutrients now, thanks for the tip!

-- is Barrs GH Booster the product you recommended?



Philosophos said:


> 2.5wpg of T-8 or CF works well. Lumens won't help much for determining if you have enough light, but can be useful for comparing spread and intensity of bulbs of the same type. The issue with lumens is that they're weighted for the yellow light that the human eye sees, not the spectrum that plants use; PAR. If you want to get fancy, you can pick up a decent quantum PAR meter for about $300, though most do without one. Some clubs buy one and let their members borrow it.


I'd rather not.. LOL my aquarium set up is generally low-budget... besides the light bulb, which you most likely know can be pretty costly itself ...



Philosophos said:


> At 2.5wpg, I'd advise getting compressed CO2. It can be done without it, but you'll need a much bigger DIY system and a real love for buying flourish excel. It's cheaper long run to opt for compressed.
> 
> Don't use the pH/KH chart to figure out your CO2. Get your self a drop checker for $10 or less. Use 4dKH solution and low range pH test reagent (bromothymol blue) in it. pH/KH charts alone don't take in to account things like iron, nitrates and phosphates, so they have a massive margin of error (200%). Using the same chart on a drop checker yeilds about a 50% margin of error. Even still, don't worry if your drop checker says your CO2 is too high, worry about how the plants look and how your fish stress.
> 
> After you work out your initial fert dosing CO2 levels and distribution are going to be your #1 concern. When ever algae appears, repeat the mantra, "It's the CO2"- whether it be diffusion, distribution or flow rate.


where/how do you buy a compressed CO2 system and how much do they go for? or are they also DIYs??

and yeah, a drop checker is definitly a prioritiy on my list of things to buy.. that's one of those things that hangs inside your aquarium with a bubble looking thing that turns to different colors to indicate the amount of CO2 right?

Currently I'm using a diffuser as my means of spreading the CO2 around my tank.. but with a compressor system, is a diffuser used or a reactor?



Philosophos said:


> Get your self some good ferts, some compressed CO2 and read up on a good fertilization method. You need non-limiting plant growth to eliminate that algae long-term.
> 
> Don't worry about not knowing. You're asking questions, that's good. Many people are willing to give you a hand. If/When you become experienced in planted tank keeping, remember the help you got from the community, and offer the same to those who are just starting.
> 
> -Philosophos


Thanks again... of course I'm going to help out with whatever I can... but that's still years beyond me.. haha...

thanks again, you've been a great help answering many of my questions


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

geneyoonit said:


> im glad to know that 2.5 is fine! haha.. I was always thinking "more light.. more light" and was going to purchase a 2nd light for the carpet plant... u mean red as in red plants right? I stayed away from red plants cause I thought/heard they're much difficult to take care of... but i'll look around my local stores to see if they have any nice red plants as well...


Hard is relative. If you run a stable fert method, they aren't a problem. If you have high CO2 levels with proper distribution, you'll do fine. If your lighting is well distributed, all the better. I consider cryptocryne a hard plant because it melts; it may be low requirement, but my "advanced" Pogostemon stellatus doesn't turn to moosh after re-planting.



geneyoonit said:


> -- is Barrs GH Booster the product you recommended?


I make it my self by buying what's already in it. Those ingredients are available on the site. If you're starting from nothing, here's what you'll need:

K2SO4
KH2PO4
CaSO4
MgSO4
Iron Chelate

Micronutrients are your call. I use flourish which is low on iron, so I dose it up with iron chelate. If you want, opt for the CSM+B from that site; I'm considering a change over to it. I believe CSM+B has sufficient iron, but you may want to order iron to play with it in the future. Tropica's micro ferts are popular as well.

Get your self access to a scale if you can; if you're in school, I'm sure the science lab would be happy to oblige. I find ferts are easier/more accurate when you mix them up with deionized water and keep them in solid colored bottles. Emptied out hydrogen peroxide bottles work.



geneyoonit said:


> where/how do you buy a compressed CO2 system and how much do they go for? or are they also DIYs??


I'd say about $180 plus drop checker for entry level. There's lots of sources, it can be a couple dollars cheaper to piece it together your self. Here's a reliable ready-made one: Foster and Smith Package 
A 5lb co2 tank to go with it will add on something like $60-$110. Try to borrow a wholesaler ID; maybe ask a home-brew company. I ended up paying only $67 for mine. Drop checkers are about $5-$90 depending on what you buy, a $10 is working for me.



geneyoonit said:


> and yeah, a drop checker is definitly a prioritiy on my list of things to buy.. that's one of those things that hangs inside your aquarium with a bubble looking thing that turns to different colors to indicate the amount of CO2 right?


Ya, it's possibly the only piece of equipment I actually want to have visible in my tank. I find it indicates when I'm too low more than too high.



geneyoonit said:


> Currently I'm using a diffuser as my means of spreading the CO2 around my tank.. but with a compressor system, is a diffuser used or a reactor?


You can pick up a cheap CO2-specific diffuser with a built in bubble counter that uses a disk. Some even have built in back-check valves. From there, reactors, needle wheels with pumps, filter mods and so on exist.

-Philosophos


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## geneyoonit (May 19, 2009)

wow, thank you so much for all the information!

it really helped a lot.. especially what I'm going to need and so on...

i think i'm going to hold out on the "DIY nutrients" for now, as the Flourish package has been working great for me... 

and for the complete compressed Co2, i'm most likely looking at a little over ~$200 if what I read was correct... so gotta save up before I could do that 

but thank you so much for your helpful responses


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## catfishbi (Sep 4, 2008)

wow nice I love your layout


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