jamesbarr

So Ive been pretty interested in dry start method for a while but the fact that the plants that are typically put into one are so high maintenance and tend to need co2 and expensive lighting, I havent tried it out. Im a low maintenance hobbyist both by choice and by budget. I have been reading lately however about people being able to keep higher maintenance plants in there with no co2, only high light. Im wondering if this is true or not. I have no experience with this and I suspect that there are folks in here that do. I would love to make a nano iwagumi tank if this is true.

mine too now that you mention it. In the summer I didnt have this problem....wierd

im from a small town, what do you guys think of my wrapping the end with floss and putting an elastic around the it?

can you link a recipe or something? I like that idea

ok, ill have to go for it then. Thanks again for the advice

What parameter sticks do you recommend? 20-20-20?

I put a powerhead in there, just because I was in need of one. It kicked up some junk from the stagnant areas of the tank. Hopefully the extra movement gets more junk to the filter and clears things up some. we will see.

thats a neat gizmo jay. I do sit rather close to my tank....perhaps I should move away a bit lol.

it looks to me like when dust floats in the air near a sunny window. just little...things I guess.

Do you mean products like 'clarity' or the like? Im not sure, Im wondering where they are coming from as well. Ive always used carbon in my filters before and have recently stopped. Im under the impression that carbon only really helps with yellowing in the water, am I wrong? Im also nearing the top end of the limit on the filter, perhaps its not big enough?

seems that its quick question week here at the barr house. heres round 2 I have particulate in my water, I run an XP2 on my 60 gallon tank. The filter is rated to 75 gal with a 300gph. I have 3 bags of bio media, a 20ppm and a 30 ppm sponge specific to the brand and model, then I have 4 layers of floss cut to size. Any recommendations? I look in there and I see tiny floaties in there and it drives me nuts. Ive been doing water changes regularly as well recently to 30% trying to get rid of it.....

nice. ill have to see what happens, but I may end up checking those out caine. Although I may just update my bulb in my t8 as its very old and supplement it with the leds. thanks

+1 creekbottom My romas this summer did this, and my mother in laws had nearly no leaves at all on her sub-arctic variety. It was also a great summer for heat and moisture.

this is a similar product to what I ordered. Thanks for the input, I feel better knowing that someone had some success with a similar thing..

just a quick question, if I put led lights on my tank, could I do it with just a kitchen fixture, or are there spectrums in the leds as well?

I'm planning on setting up a tank, cycling it and planting it first. I want my nitrates to read zero on the tank prior to my experiment. If I dont do this I wont be able to determine where the nitrates are coming from. I'm not planning on any plants that require ferts for life either, knowing that the low maintenance plants still show visible differences when fertilized. I don't want to have any foreign substance to wean my plants off of either. This also means that I will continue to use plain play sand in my tank which is void of any additives. I intend to do this with a 5 gallon tank set up that I have here. Faster to fill with plants and cheaper if it bombs. Not to mention that an HOB is a great place to hide my 'tea bag'. I intend to add the compost in increments, likely by the tbsp and by the week, to determine where the threshold is in a heavily planted 5 gallon would be roughly, then translate that to a per gallon dose. If this works for an undetermined amount of time in the 5 gallon, I will expand this into the 20 gallon I intend to set up for my son. Likely to be a bit til I can get into the city for a test kit, so Ill post a thread later for those who are interested to follow the progress. Thanks for the input guys. I think that Ill opt for the nutrafin as long as the price isnt too outrageous so that I will have to option of testing more parameters.

Is there a reason you switched?

What are you planning? Tilapia? Im planning on an experimental tank which I fertilize with vermicompost. I dont think that it would be any kind of 'scientific' experiment without some numbers to put out for everyone. I guess as long as I use the same test kit throughout I can call that a control in my experiment. I just would like my kit to be as accurate as possible for my dollar, if thats a feasible thing. Im primarily concerned about a nitrate/nitrite spike in the tank since I would by all definitions be adding decaying organic matter to my tank. As a secondary concern, I would like to know how much calcium the egg shells I was putting in the compost will become available in the water column. Along with some of the other measurable trace minerals.

Looking for recommendations for test kits in a reasonable range. Id prefer info on the vial test kits rather then the strips. I have no idea what to get but I will need one relatively soon. Thanks AA

some tomatoes need more heat than others. Your light may be fine. Have you tried making the plant warmer? People have been saying that tomatoes do best in 20 plus temps. Just a thought. Do you test you water parameters? I am curious about how well the plants clean the water up for you. Sweet set up, keep it up

I found my worms on kijiji. I paid 20 bucks for mine, was a combo finished compost and worms and eggs. I also find that they really get through the food fast. It took me awhile to get the culture going in my bin as I think that I didnt get a pile of worms when I bought but now that they have gotten going I used the top layer from my bin to seed a new one and they are just going at it. Found this on calgary kijiji. There was also some adds for fishing worms on there as well. http://calgary.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-sell-hobbies-crafts-vermiculture-Worms-W0QQAdIdZ431173768 Im kind of hesitant as well, which is why I will be doing the experiment on a tank I havent spent a lot of money on. My compost is vegetable waste only, so Im a little more confident using it than I would be using traditional compost with yard waste in it as well. Another thing that brings up confidence for me is that my worms are really healthy. If finished compost is used than I hypothesize that nitrate levels shouldnt spike as the decomposition is very nearly complete. Ill have to buy a test kit and monitor this thing pretty well.

Super cool. I love hearing about low tech tanks doing well, since Im an aqua hobbiest on a budget Where do you source your castings from? I have a couple of worm bins running in my house at the moment. I am told that if a person lets the bin sit for a while when its full that the worms will eliminate all the compost in the bin and leave behind only castings.

I gave my stock list above. Would you classify any of my stock as sensitive? Im not really sure but I think that most are hardy. When you did this in your tank, did you use commercial compost or was it your own? Some compost in stores are also supplemented with ferts. Just curious. Did you continue dosing the tea after the shrimp cratered? Any notable gains or loses (aside from shrimp) in your tanks productivity? I think that I will set up an experimental tank for this. I have a 5 gallon set up here just getting dusty, Ill try it in that first and see what the results are and possibly expand from there to a 20 gallon tank I have set aside for my son. I think he would love it if his tank had more plant growth in it than Dads Ive never played around with substrates too much. My best results have come from playsand so far.

Hey everyone. Just curious about what peoples opinions are about this idea Ive been having for my tank. I have been reading that some folks put compost in their tanks substrate mixture at set up to boost growth in their tanks. This made me curious about the idea of using compost tea instead. If you arent familiar with the idea of compost tea you can find details quite readily if you Google it, however the concept is pretty simple. Put compost in a muslin bag, tie it off and hang it in a bucket of water. This allows the nutrients from the compost along with its trace mineral content to be released into the water, later to be used by gardeners as an organic replacement to chemical fertilizers. I want to skip the bucket step and just hang the bag over the side of my tank. I have a worm bin composter in my home that I have been using over the course of several months. The compost is made up only of vegetable waste from our home along with coffee and tea ground and egg shell for to neutralize pH. I suspect that my compost may have a low pH from the coffee grounds. However I think that this would be a non issue being that there would be only small amounts of compost in the bag. While definitive parameters of the compost in terms of TM, NP K are unavailable due to the drastic quantity of variables (foods introduced, amount of off gassing for N, so on) Its been consistently shown that vermiculite has a lot of minerals in it that are freed by the decomposition of plant matter and the digestion process of the worms. I like to ere on the side of natural as opposed to chemical treatment for my plants/fish. At the moment I rely on my fish to produce enough waste to feed my plants, however (as I'm sure that you all know) my growth is very slow. I have a 60 gallon tank but probably only enough stock for a 40 gal. I'm not interested in buying a bunch of fancy equipment or fancy ferts. Stock list: 7 serpea tetras 10 (approx) white cloud minnows 3 Rainbows (not sure type) 10 burma/zebra danios 3-4 random orphan fish 3 albino corys 2 albino hifin pleco Plants: Anubius Nana Anubius Barteri (I think Im right on those two) Cryptocoryne Pygmy chain swords jungle vals (languishing) moneywort java fern I think I have it all covered. So what do you think? Would you try it?

looking great!