Iceturf

I hate grout. Helped my Dad build his house, we laid all the tile ourselves, etc. I found grout tends to never be the colour advertised. I think grout is a cement based mixture, so I wouldn't recommend it in the aquarium (unless you want hard water). I had a similar idea with the stepping, except using slate. (Slate from Home Depot, 3$/sqft 1/2" thick) In terms of strength, if you estimated how heavy all your stone would be and the glass thickness, I could check strength tables for glass and silicone sealant to guesstimate yay or nah. I would imagine it would be strong enough though - I've watched youtube videos where people stack large stones to fill most of an aquarium, the biggest worry with glass is point load stress. Glass is fairly strong in tension, and somewhat strong in compression, but those point loads are what break glass. I would suggest you apply silicone to the bottom stones, or maybe to the bottom of the tank, to help spread out the force. Some people use foam or something along those lines? Blah.

I checked this morning, amazon is charging the same or slightly more on a number of items compared to a few weeks ago, canister filters included.

Where would a person get Metricide in Edmonton?

Ahh Alberta Government....

Using the mix outlined by Ckmullin, something like this 5-10% peat moss 5% invert gravel 5% vermiculite 5-10% worm poop remainder: dirt (dirt that doesn't have twigs, pesticides, etc in it) Measured by volume in rough amounts. ..... I followed this roughly along these lines. I used nice black dirt from our garden out back - cooked large chunks of dirt for a few hours, to dry it out, and break down the chunks into smaller sizes (when cooked at 450*F it seems to change texture, makes it easier to break apart). Sifted the results, ended up with a fine powder. Then mixed from there. Whatever you prefer, though I recommend cooking the end mixture for a while to sterilize it. This might seem silly, but if you do a dry start you don't want bugs and other things hatching. Definitely sterilize the dirt and the worm castings. FunkSolid - ahh! Gotcha. What kind of research do you do as a biological scientist?

Sigma-Aldrich? I feel like there is an inside joke here, its just not clicking.

6'x2'x1" = 72" * 24" * 1" = 1728 cubic inches = 0.0283 cubic meters. For that small of an amount - just get large bags of the right potting soil from even perhaps Canadian tire - sometimes they have a few bags still in the back, or from any greenhouse center? Or a fraction of a load from Burnco calgary. Landscaping supply stores charge a reasonable amount for dirt, fill, etc. I think I paid a bit less than 200$ for 10 cubic yards (delivered).

Hi, there are a number of knowledgeable people on the forum who can probably answer your question better than I can - so excuse any lapses in my explanation, 1. Chlorophyll located inside plant leaves, absorbs light energy more optimally for certain wavelengths. Colour temperature gives a 'rough' description of how the light energy emitted by the artificial source is distributed between different wavelengths. For example, I'm sure you have heard that plants absorb blue light. A typical light bulb, often orange in colour, is say ~2500k (k for kelvin). 2500 k refers to a light metric associated with sunlight, so you can ignore the specific meaning. For your purposes lower K = more red shift, higher K means more blue shift. Grow lights are generally more blue shift, ~6500k, than red shift. Being blue shift isn't in and of itself good. That is where colour rendering index comes in. You can make full spectrum light with different combinations of red, green and blue. CRI says of those wavelengths used, how do they match "real" sunlight. The theory is, the better the CRI or colour rendering index match, the better the light emulates natural sunlight, hence the better the light. In reality, plant chlorophyll doesn't perfectly match the wavelengths in natural light, so you could make a light source that is 'perfectly' suited for plants, but that is usually of diminishing value. What I've observed is 6500k good, CRI meh. Hopefully that gives you a little basis that someone else can build on to help you.

You have access to a Par meter? Does that only give you light intensity, or does it also give you spectrum breakdown?

Oh! Yea I think I experienced something similar.

Dry start is the way to go.

Are the marineland canisterfilters any good - or are they total crap waiting to happen? Anyone have any experiences? Online reviews for these seem to oscillate widely.

I like the look of ADA small black round pieces, but I haven't found any inert gravel substitute - the closest thing I've found is black Flourite. However, I've heard that Flourite is bad for bottom dwellers - is that true?

Won't the moss survive the winter? I'm curious why you would want to compost it?

Such crisp photos! Your plants are so very healthy!

I would recommend that if you are going to the effort to change substrates, you try the dirt method that has been recommended. I've tried it with two tanks, zero fert dosing and high growth. I personally think black substrate looks better, I've tried light sand with mixed results.

You can add sand on top, but don't add too thick of a layer.

Isn't granite calcium based? Would granite be a problem for water hardness?

What is a slab of granite like when a shop gets it in? What I mean, I see a lot of shows where the home owners buy a square slab of granite and just get it cut to length, but I've never seen anyplace that sells just prefabbed rectangular blocks of granite (not tiles, like large countertop style slabs)

Any updates?

Endlers?

I haven't tried the other two mentioned to know. Mini Hairgrass grows slow, develops good roots, looks nice (in my opinion) and otherwise doesn't need any attention.

Mini Hairgrass

Any recent photos?

-Eleocharis sp. mini -S. Repens -Anubias Nana Petite