[Wet Thumb Forum]-My latest

[Roger Miller]

What do you think?



Plants: Didiplis diandra, Saururus cernuus, Limnophila aromatica, Cyperus helferi, Echinodorus bolivianus, Eleocharis parvulus.

Fish: Mesonata festivum, eight rummy nose tetras, two siamese algae eaters, two otocinclus affinis.

A few months ago I had 15 plants species in this tank. I felt that I could best express a layout by using a minimal number of plants. I reduced the number of plants by describing to myself the role that each plant fulfilled in the aquascape, broadening those roles as much as possible and making sure that only one plant occupied each role. Of the 6 remaining species there are two that I may yet remove. The eleocharis is hardly visible any more because the SAEs took a liking to it and the plants have been waning ever since. The vertical accent provided by the Cyperus doesn't seem to help that much and can probably be replaced by more D. diandra.

How do you all see it?


Roger Miller

[Roger Miller]

What do you think?



Plants: Didiplis diandra, Saururus cernuus, Limnophila aromatica, Cyperus helferi, Echinodorus bolivianus, Eleocharis parvulus.

Fish: Mesonata festivum, eight rummy nose tetras, two siamese algae eaters, two otocinclus affinis.

A few months ago I had 15 plants species in this tank. I felt that I could best express a layout by using a minimal number of plants. I reduced the number of plants by describing to myself the role that each plant fulfilled in the aquascape, broadening those roles as much as possible and making sure that only one plant occupied each role. Of the 6 remaining species there are two that I may yet remove. The eleocharis is hardly visible any more because the SAEs took a liking to it and the plants have been waning ever since. The vertical accent provided by the Cyperus doesn't seem to help that much and can probably be replaced by more D. diandra.

How do you all see it?


Roger Miller

[imported_russell]

nice.

what is the red one in the center on the bottom?

[5380]

Striking tank, many triangles in it, and my favorite I've seen. I think you brought a lot of attention to the L.a. and it should stand up straighter. Also the cyperus gives a sense of height to the terrain, but it becomes airy there don't you think?

The red one is Liminophila armoatica.

[goh]

This is a picturesque layout!
However, I feel that the layout is a little 2- dimensional. Plants seems to be arranged from 1 side to the other. Not enough front to back layers.
Just my view.

[aviel]

Hi Roger,

It's mostly a pleasing sight, nice shape, not too crowded - nice!!

However the Saururus cernuus (is it?) is too tall - it breaks the space, it's too white at the edges while I prefer to see green, dark green and it towers over the aromatica which should have been your red focal point. Mabye it should be placed in the front. Hope you didn't mean to label it's role as "annoying".

Also -

- I agree that it's somewhat two dimensional.

- Too much light when taking the picture provides too much white spots and pale plants.

- Oh, And there's no visible fish.

Aviel.

[imported_pineapple]

The rock selection is elegant and naturally placed (as expected from a geologist designer). The rock colour gives depth allowing the colours of the plants to introduce light into the darkness.

The plant placement has a 1-2 rhythm in a symmetrical manner.

The Didiplis diandra introduces the red colouration at the top of the picture with the main red colouration coming out lower down (an offbeat note).

Other designers might have less modestly placed white silica sand in the foreground instead of the more naturalistic Eleocharis sp. White sand would introduce an interesting effect. Currently the foreground is completely planar. The advantage is that it allows the rock formation to stand out. But, possibly some minor undulation would be interesting.

It is an elegant presentation and I would hope Roger would update this thread with photos as it develops.

Andrew Cribb

[Hawkeye]

Roger, I really don't like commenting on how someone creates their art . Plant used are like brush strokes on a canvas. I can only comment on how it effects me when viewing their art. I find my eye ending up at the rock in front of the Didiplis diandra. My eye doesn't seem to flow it just ends up at the rock. I think that if the rock was moved back to allow the eye to flow along the front to the rock it would help.

I wish I could get Didiplis diandra to grow like yours. My stems all ways turn black and rot. What is the Temp in our tank. I read some where that Didiplis diandra likes cooler water temps.

Hawk

[Robert Hudson]

So many different opinions! I like it. I like the position of the Saururus and they space it provides.

[Roger Miller]

The scatter of opinions is interesting. That may mean that I did something right.

One thing that several people seem to agree on is that the depth is lacking. I forgot to mention that this is a 55 gallon tank. The internal distance front-to-back is only about a foot. The large rock in the left center has a about an inch of clearance in front and about 2 inches in back. There isn't a lot of leeway for adjusting positions.

I made little effort to create a sense of depth in the aquascape -- figuring that if depth is a priority then the aquascape should be built in a deeper tank. Instead I concentrated on using the width and height of the tank to their best advantage.

Here's another shot of the center of the tank, detailing the L. aromatica.



Hawkeye, the tank ran above 80 degrees most of the time for a couple months before the photo was taken. I think trace elements may be an issue with D. diandra. The plants in this photo are actually borderline -- some stems are in great shape and others are not. I don't really want to increase my trace dosage again, so I may try adding a Flourish tab to the substrate below one bunch to see if that helps.

A white sand foreground probably would have worked well in this tank. The foreground was originally intended to be hair grass. That worked -- even providing the appearance of relief -- until the SAEs started mowing the lawn for me. Unfortunately, placing a white sand foreground would have required a complete tank take-down and rebuild -- something that has never happened in the 17 years (or so) that this tank has been set up.


Roger Miller