AaronT

Here are some pictures of a 10 gallon tank I setup in the exact same manner a few days after the 20 gallon tank had been setup.

You can see the fucatas rainbows showing off the each other in this pic.


Here's a shot from above:

treesmcdonald

How is this tank doing? Any up dates? I have been thinking about doing a hybrid tank for a while now so I'm curious to see how your tank is doing.

AaronT

Both of them are doing pretty well. I've found that I cannot dose much at all or I get algae outbreaks. I'm waiting for regrowth from a large trim and then I'll try to remember to post some pics.

DataGuru

That makes sense. In an established NPT, floating plants typically don't do well, but rooted plants do. I'm assuming that's because of a lack of nutrients/etc in the water column.

AaronT

Yup. I've had some potassium deficiencies and have dosed that very moderately. If I dose too much...poof comes the algae again.

Robert Hudson

Well I hope you do not take this the wrong way, and I don't mean anything personal by it, but thats ridiculous. This forum is mostly about using the principals around Diana Walstads book, and the book was not written in the 50s.

Aaron, you have an interesting looking tank, but you have been plagued with algae from the start, and it doesn't look like its ever gotten better. You are adding fertilizer to the water and adding C02. There is nothing "el natural" about your tank. You are using clay and soil. I guess thats why you are calling it natural?

The whole idea of a "natural" tank is to use a soil based substrate to provide minerals, and fish waste to provide NPK, and bacteria in the substrate to provide C02, add nothing to the water column, and do very little water changes. I don't believe you are doing any of those things, right?

The soil you used could be providing NPK and trace minerals. If it contained a large amount of organic material such as manure and compost, it could be releasing large amounts of ammonia. The clay you added adds a source of oxidized iron and silicate to the mix. Oxidized iron will not be used by the plants until it gets into solution. That would require some kind of organic acid or chealate. The silicates would be the cause of some algae problems.

You could have accomplished the same thing with a fired clay gravel instead of messy raw clay. I would speculate if you had used a clay gravel, and soil that was aerated to release ammonia, and a trace amount of peat, you would not have had the algae problems. Get rid of your C02, and then you would have a "El natural" tank, more or less.

AaronT

Easy Robert. I don't mind a little friendly debate, but you've pretty much come in here and called me an idiot. Easy on the tone there please.

What's so unnatural about soil and clay? It doesn't get any more natural than that?
The reason for processing the soil the way I did was to insure that there was very little fertilizer / ammonia available to the water column. Even Diana says that an aired out bag of soil is better than a fresh one. This is essentially what I did. The rinsing and soaking part is to remove any possible fertilizers. As for the clay, that is why you don't need to use much. The clay also serves as a binder allowing the soil to settle back down after being disturbed.

Now who's not being natural? My soil recipe is based off of soil analysis of wetland soils. They generally have some natural clay content and are mineralized.

Patience Daniel Son...patience.

littleguy

Aaron - I think this is an interesting post, and thanks for being honest with your observations. It's easy to tell everyone about success stories, but many of us (myself included) are embarassed to admit algae outbreaks, poor plant growth, etc.

I think one of the cool things about the el natural forum is that there are a lot of unconventional thinkers and experimentalists here. Many folks here aren't penned in by rules and constraints. There are many risks involved with doing it a new way, but to me that's how we learn new things. Diana Walstad's ideas were considered radical before we all started reading her book.

Aaron I'm glad you posted on this board.

AaronT

Thanks. That's the basic idea of it all. I love experimented with new setups. I'm terrible at obeying the 'if it ain't broke' rule of thumb.

ianculescu

Aaron, thanks for sharing the results of your experiments, ultimately we all read this forum to get insight and knowledge.
Not to change the subject, but where did you get the Colorquartz? I'm also in the Washington DC area and I'd appreciate a clue.

Thanks,
Cris.