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The UG is really really really easy to grow emersed. To be honest you don't even have to plant it. You can simply lay it on the substrate and it will root and stand up itself. Here's a pic of my emersed 2.5 which I had planned on filling but ended up with the 3.5 now. There's also some moss and HC mixed in there.

It is the stealth pro that has problems. I would stay away from them as well. On The Planted Tank and Aquatic Plant Central you can find accounts of the Stealth Pro exploding and shattering portions of tanks causing massive disasters. If you are running a canister filter the Hydor External Thermal Heaters are a nice option becaues they are not in the tank. I use one on my 20g.

I agree with you Iceturf. The red doesn't fit in. I tried to get the darkest lava rock I could find but the red still shows. Especially after I broke it. I'm not going to use the lava rock but I am definitely interested in the rock that rayfong has. Is it possible you could post a pic of the rock either here or in a PM rayfong? As for the Fluval Plant Stratum I think every PJ's pets carries it now. IIRC It cost about 20 bucks for the bag. I am hoping it will be comparable to the ADA Amazonia. I would have like to use the ADA but its so expensive +shipping.

Thanks! I am really pleased with it as well. I think I am going to stick with it and possibly try to tweak it a little bit. Now time to transplant the UG from the 2.5g emersed!

Hmm I'm sure your filter can handle the bioload for those fish, but I'm not sure what they prefer for flow. If they seem happy I don't think you *NEED* to upgrade. An Eheim pro 3 series sure would be nice though! A school of 50 or more neons sure would be a spectacular sight. Personally I am a fan of many small fish as opposed to few larger fish. To each their own though.

Haha ok I'll give you first dibs. I'm really diggin this one.

Thanks for the offer BFM but I would really like some dark rocks. Almost black. Unfortunately I haven't seen any around in the LFS. More then likely I will have a bunch of this wood left over once I decide to go with something final and you are welcome to have some for quite cheap or possibly something to trade? Here are 2 more scapes I came up with. So far I'm liking this last one the most. But again I would like to incorporate the use of some rocks.

I'm kind of diggin this type of scape. It would definitely need some tweaking though, and I think some different type of rocks.

That makes a lot of sense. I will definitely play around with your idea and see how it is. Thanks for the input BFM!

WOW those are extremely beautiful fish. This pains me to look at because it makes me want SW really bad LOL.

WOW! Scaping a tank this small is extremely hard. Especially with wood. The footprint of the tank is only 31cm x 18cm. For some reason I find it really hard to make a nice layout with wood. So far these are the only 2 I could come up with that I like at all. What do you all think? Suggestions and CC are welcome. I really want this thing to look good. I'm really scared of messin around too much and having the substrate fall apart alot. It is basically like little semi hard dirt pellets that you can crush with your fingers or wood and rocks. I'm thinking maybe somehow try to incorporate some rock into here. Or something like this. Maybe the use of more or different rocks around the base of the wood. Please forgive the lame photography. :P

Cool. I didn't know that HM could be grown emersed. I guess most aquarium plants can. Did you use Mineralized Top Soil or just regular soil? Does the HM send out roots along the stock when grown emersed? If so you could multiply that bunch to an extreme amount.

I use a spraybar in my planted tank. I keep it aimed at the surface for a little bit of agitation to combat the surface film that seems to always develop in my tank. Your tank is 90 Gal how many GPH is your filter rated at?and is it planted or not? I think the recommended is 5-10x per hour so you will want something with around 450 gph if it is not planted and up to 900 gph if it is planted. THe xp3 is rated at 350 gph so maybe a second filter? What kind of fish do you keep?

LOL BFM that's because I spent the money on aquarium stuff instead of food!

Hi! This project has been a long time coming. I have wanted to do it for quite some time but finding proper lighting at a reasonable price was always difficult. I then recently discovered that Aqua Forest Aquariums made an alternative to the ADA Solar Mini S as it is ridiculously priced at 200 USD. It does look awesome though. The new model doesn't look as sleek but it houses the exact same bulb and only cost roughly $65 USD. If I had the money I would buy the ADA one, but I don't lol. I already spent way too much on this project and hobby in the first place.... but don't we all? So I received almost everything in the mail on January 11, but the light bulb was broken. I took a picture and emailed it to Steven at AFA and he quickly agreed to replace the bulb for free because it should not have been broken. It was inside the light housing, inside a little box, inside a bigger box with the tank and filter which was bubble wrapped and had a lining of sealed bags of air around the whole inside of the box. This wasn't much of a biggie because the stock bulb was 10,000k which is not the best for plants. So I ordered a replacement 6500k bulb. I got the bulb in the mail yesterday! YAY! It has felt like FOREVER! Now I finally get to tinker with it. This is funner then lego was when I was young. I have no experience with planted nano tanks so I have no clue how this is going to go. I'm hoping it will go as smoothly as the 20g is going so far, but who knows. These tiny systems have much less room for error then a large tank. I'm going to document the good, the bad and the ugly. I plan on having a grassy woodland type of setup using a couple different types of moss and Utricularia graminifolia for the carpet and possibly a stem like plant for a bush effect. I bought a really nice clump of fissidens from Blake which I plan to use in here. Possibly some of the Hemianthus micranthemoides from my 20g or some downoi. I really want to make this tank look like you can't really tell it's a 3.5g. I also find it extremely difficult to scape with wood so maybe I will be posting different hardscape options and hopefully get some of your opinions. I will be starting it emeresed and transferring over the UG I have in my 2.5g. Here are some pictures: A shot of most everything. The tank and the light. The ultra small and awesome Eheim 2211. The CO2 system and glassware. I kind of regret buying this system because it's long term 1 year cost will be around the same as a regular 5lb setup. We'll see how it goes. I still need to get the nice glass lily pipes. Unfortunately they are currently sold out at the moment. The hardscape materials. I might also use some small pieces of dark lava rock. The Fluval Stratum which I am hoping will be comparable to the ADA Aquasoil Amazonia. .... and the pfertz. Yes they are in my fridge. LOL hopefully more updates to come later today.

The female will develop a gravid spot when she is preggers. The back of her belly near her anus will develop a black spot inside which is quite visible. If you google gravid spot I'm sure you can find some good pictures.

Hi James welcome to AA. Kijiji is a good place to check as well as the buy and sell section here. What size are you looking to go?

Jan. 24, 2011 - I got lazy last sunday and didn't take any pics or do any updates. That week I had been dosing 1.5x EI to try and combat algae and feeding about 4x as much as normal because there was a runt in the 6 rainbows I recently added and I wanted him to get enough food. I consequently lost 2 shrimp and one of my rainbows had half of a fin rot away and another one had a damage to his dorsal fin. Last sunday I did a large water change and only dosed about half the amount as usual during this week. The fin has healed up druing this week and is looking much better now. I wont be 1.5x dosing anymore nor overfeeding like that. Also one more shrimp looks like he's on his last days. He is all cloudy and milky lookin kind of like how they look after they die, but it is still alive. I took a chunk of the HC out of the center and spread it around the outsides a little so it will fill in faster. I sold some of the downoi because I wanted to make room for another kind of stem plant. I added some Diplis diandra from an aquaflora nurseries tub. I have read mixed reviews about the plant and it's difficulty to grow but I decided to give it a shot. It seems to be doing good so far. The HM is growing ever so slowly but sure is lookin nice. I can't wait till it is very bushy. Here is the updated pic taken just a few minutes ago. I got lazy again and didn't do my water change today cuz I was a little busy. I will do it tomorrow early in the morning.

Hey welcome to Alberta Aquatica! I'm sure many of us would love to see pictures of your fish and/or breeding grounds.

Very interesting fish. Those apistogramma sunset's are beautiful!

Hahah that's really funny. Maybe it's a disgruntled LFS employee that is sick of ignoramus' coming in there to buy stuff not knowing anything so he decided to have fun with it.

This is the light I will be using but I will be changing out the bulb to a 6700k. http://www.adana-usa...products_id=450 I think I will be starting a Journal for that as well.

Thanks Iceturf. I'm not gonna be using the fissidens in there but in the high tech nano I am going to be setting up soon. Just waiting on the bulb in the mail and I'm good to go.

Endlers!

That's a great idea. I never thought about that. Does it really vary that much around the tank?