Hello, I learned about this site from Betty H. aka DataGuru.
I have a 1 gallon bowl that I planted with soil in June. It's been doing OK, but I've had some issues. They are:
-the water turns yellow
-the ramshorn snails die
-the duckweed and water lettuce bleach and die
- brown biofilms develope on older leaves of the sunset hygro and water lettuce roots
-persistant cloudiness (except that suddenly improved this week after months of frustration
)
-the sunset hygro doesn't want to grow tall
Now, the things that are going right with this bowl:
-betta is very happy
-shrimp are happy
-crypts and e. tenellus are very happy
-no nitrogenous waste buildup
I decided to upgrade Twizzler (betta) to a 2 gallon hex tank. I'm going to transplant the crypts and e. tenellus to the new tank and add some wysteria. I have a different soil that hopefully won't turn yellow. For the top of the soil, instead of gravel I was thinking of using Schultz Aquatic Plant soil, which is like little clay (laterite??) granules. Is this OK?
Here are some pics of the current bowl:
Planted Betta Tank 
Threaded Mode
