DUHK

Hey guys,

I currently am running a 10 gallon planted tank. I've been going for the iwagumi look. I guess you could say I roughly achieved it. This is how it looks as of right now:



The question I have is that if I were to try to take everything out and rescape from scratch. Would that mess up the bacteria culture I have in my tank and damage it to where I would have to start to cycle it over? How would I go about trying to rescape it? I want to do something with sand substrate and driftwood. Do you think that's too drastic? How would you be able to plant plants if it's sand substrate? Is that possible? O_o Any nutrients from sand? Or would I have to do something to incorporate my eco-complete in it?

Philosophos

Honestly, if you're trying to keep a tank with picky plants, compressed CO2 and high light, you should be pulling enough water changes and pushing plant density high enough that a cycle shouldn't be an issue.

Use sand for decoration in selected areas if you've got EC sitting around that's been exposed to high column dosing for a while. Your plants will be healthier with good nutrients from both column and substrate.

As for replanting, HC is annoying to start from little plugs shoved into the substrate. A little time in dry start would root the HC better, despite the adaptation stress.

-Philosophos

DUHK

Thanks philosophos! But actually, I wanted to do something like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaQPu4Ljd7g so that's when I wonder if it'll cycle well when all the main plants I have in it now are going to be taken out.

I wonder how the person was able to plant those plants, while it looks like his main substrate was just sand.

Philosophos

Sand isn't impossible to work with; you can still get healthy plants. You just have less padding since it's got no CEC, meaning your plants rely on consistent dosing and they'll degrade faster without it. That doesn't sound like a big deal until the word, "vacation" comes up.

The plants he's got in that setup wouldn't require (probably wouldn't even like) a dry start. Sand wouldn't be a big deal; those plants are large enough to have good roots that'd spread out nicely in the sand. I'm not sure how closely I'd follow the example of that aquarist though; the planting job looks fresh, and one of those plants looks like it isn't even aquatic. Still a nice tank, but you should probably take the time to look into it a bit closer.

You could do eco in the back, sand up front with a layout like that. Some moss, riccia, HC, etc. attached to mats or rocks would make a good visual divider, and you could use what ever your choice is in materials to keep the substrate separated below. Amano has a good article on the finer points of this technique somewhere, though I can't remember where.

-Philosophos