Marty.h

Was browsing Tapatalk and come across this forum recently started a 6ft planted tank so just browsing for ideas and information


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hoppycalif

Welcome to APC! I suggest you take one aspect of doing a planted aquarium at a time, like lighting, and reading a lot of the lighting forum here to see if you can learn what you need to know. Then do the substrate, etc. until you feel more comfortable with the subject and can ask the questions that are left. You could just decide to go with the El Natural type of aquarium and concentrate on that forum and/or buy "the book".

Marty.h

Thanks there where I'm upto so far with it

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hoppycalif

Looks very good! Please, tell us more about it: substrate, light, fertilizing, etc.

Marty.h

Thanks here is some details

6ft 420L tank
Temp 24°c
Oliver knott nature soil substrate
FX5 filter added extra media / 200g of purigen
4 x 54w T5ho bulbs (865) 6500k
Pressurised ista CO2 system
3 x 3500 LPH powerheads
Dosing Ei 100ml staggered

One of my favourite plants cant remember name


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hoppycalif

Do you have a light fixture made for aquariums? What brand, etc? Does the light have good reflectors for each bulb? That information determines how much light you are getting from the bulbs, and that determines how important it is that the CO2 be adjusted to be as high as the fish can tolerate.

Marty.h

The lights are fixed in the hood with reflectors the CO2 drop checker just starts to go yellow at end of running cycle it comes on 2 hours before lights and are on and goes off 1 hour before lights off. The drop checker remains green all through the night. The bubbles from diffuser are sucked up into the FX5 intake so I'm getting good CO2 saturation and PH drops over 1 point during that time.

All stock are fine with no signs of stress or gasping

This was the tank on the 1st of this month


And this is now 27 days later

As you can see the growth has been good

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Michael

Beautiful tank, I like the additional wood.

Marty.h

Thanks I just thought it was lacking height to the scape and adding that extra wood has definitely transformed the tank in my opinion have had to order extra purigen though to make swapping out and re-generating easier to stop bad tannins in the water.

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hoppycalif

It certainly looks like you have everything dialed in just right!