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Walstad method large planted tank Build PICTURES

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  • #1

    Walstad method large planted tank Build PICTURES

    So I got a big tall tank and had done some reading on the walstad method and thought her why not give it a shot so I started on thursday getting the tank

    100gpt.jpg

    Then I went and got the potting soil that was recommended with some gravel I found attractive.
    Added an inch of soil and an inch of gravel.
    soilgravel.jpg

    On Friday morning I went to Bluemonkey's house and picked up a ton of plants from him then went to city pets picked up some more and fish gallery and picked up some more. Added three inches of water and started planting. Just so everyone knows planting a 32 inch high tank is a PITA for real. Looked like this before water.

    someplants.jpg
    Then I filled it up half full with water to see what it looked like make sure stuff was planted firmly enough. looked like this
    halffull.jpg
    Bare bones were is the excitement right just plants and water boo. So i grabbed some sticks from my other tank and placed them in this one. The wood on the right side of the tank is all one piece even if it looks like two.
    fullwithwood.jpg

    I had gotten some scissor tail fishes of some type in here as testers to see if they would survive the weekend since it is supposed to be an instant set up type deal. When I got home the fish were still alive but the water had gotten cloudy and the ammonia was high and the nitrate was a little high this is what it looked like when i got home.
    gothome.jpg

    So i drained 50% of the water and replanted a few of the plants that came up while I was gone and I added a few more and filled her back up. Now it looks like this.
    waterchangemoreplant.jpg

    My plans for this tank is to make it a mixed rainbow tank with some type of inverts crawling around on the bottom not 100% sure yet still want to make sure that the tank doesn't bomb before I fill it up with fish and stuff. I will keep this updated as I go along with it.
    130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
    125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
    100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
    55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
    55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
    30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
    30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
    10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed
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  • #2
    Re: Walstad method large planted tank Build PICTURES

    Dude. Jump on that skull creek rainbow fish group buy and do a species only tank. That'd be baller. Those things look awesome. Imagine a whole bunch of them schooling. Plus they're uncommon!

    Sent from my spaceship using Tapatalk 2.

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    • #3
      I am on the fence about those guys I WANT THE GERTUDAE as well. I already have some blue eyed forktailed furcata. I also have a trio of millennium red rainbow fish. Chances are though that I will end up getting a few probably not a "whole bunch" lol but maybe 6 or so.
      130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
      125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
      100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
      55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
      55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
      30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
      30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
      10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

      Comment

      • #4
        Re: Walstad method large planted tank Build PICTURES

        Weak! Lol. If only I had a spare 40gal+! I would have hopped on that group buy and load that sucker up with them then hope they breed! By far the coolest rainbow fish I've seen (only seen about 10 types though lmao).

        Sent from my spaceship using Tapatalk 2.

        Comment

        • #5
          Just realized my gravel is to big for this lol so it is back to the begging got to get some finer gravel take this stuff out replant everthing weeeeeeeeeeeeeee.
          130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
          125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
          100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
          55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
          55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
          30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
          30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
          10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

          Comment

          • #6
            Walstead's book recommends covering all but about 10% of the substrate with plants and it looks like you're not quite there. Get some hornwort or other fast growing floater or stem plants to add plant mass until the tank stabilizes. For these to work well, the initial planting needs to be very very dense and you just don't seem to be there yet for that size of tank.

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            • #7
              Re: Walstad method large planted tank Build PICTURES

              Originally posted by Astex View Post
              Walstead's book recommends covering all but about 10% of the substrate with plants and it looks like you're not quite there. Get some hornwort or other fast growing floater or stem plants to add plant mass until the tank stabilizes. For these to work well, the initial planting needs to be very very dense and you just don't seem to be there yet for that size of tank.
              He just started the tank

              Sent from my spaceship using Tapatalk 2.

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              • #8
                Adding that much plants can be tricky until you have a collection you can draw from. I have seen some folks do a grow out kiddie pool in the back yard with a bag or two of eco-complete.
                In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
                Desiderius Erasmus
                GHAC President

                Comment

                • #9
                  I completely broke it down because i had to change the grave.l The gravel was just way to big and in the long run it wouldn't have properly worked out. So now i am trying to get a friend over to help me carry the beast outside to give a good rinsing out so i can start a new.
                  130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                  125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                  100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                  55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                  55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                  30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                  30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                  10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                  Comment

                  • #10
                    Ok so here we go again long day of un-planting cleaning re doing everything
                    so starting again.
                    tryagain.jpg
                    There it is empty and here it is with the soil and proper sized gravel in it.
                    soilgravel.jpg
                    Here is a shot of it right after I planted it.
                    plants2ndplant.jpg
                    Here it is half full of water I wanted to see the planting lay out and density while still able to add plants if need be.
                    2halffull.jpg
                    So again I guess not enough plants more than before so i grabbed a few more clippings out of a couple of my other planted tanks and planted a few more in there added the wood and filled it with water. To make the density higher I spread the plants out instead of having them in tight bunches like they were before.
                    2fullwithwood.jpg
                    The substrate came from one of my tanks that has been up and running for years so it is well established I am hoping this helps the process out as well There are a lot of plants in here I have a few others I can add if need be, but I am kind of happy with the tanks they are in lol. Let me know what y'all think of it this time ha.
                    130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                    125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                    100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                    55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                    55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                    30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                    30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                    10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                    Comment

                    • #11
                      I guess the plants are happy as of now at least lots of pearling going on in the tank so at least I know they are still alive and are photosynthesizing.
                      pearlingplant.JPG
                      130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                      125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                      100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                      55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                      55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                      30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                      30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                      10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                      Comment

                      • #12
                        So the tank has been going for a month as I presumed going through one hell of a cycle and had a rather large diatom bloom and is still having some problems but it is expected. I Have been doing some regular water changes since the original bad bloom and it has helped out. The good news is the plants are growing pretty quickly and actually out of the three tanks I have plants planted in they are growing the fastest. A lot of the lower leaves have melted but new growth has started at the top and now some new growth has started at the base of some of the plants. A few of the grassy type plants )I don't know what they are called) I think have finally taken root and have started to recover I didn't think they were going to make it for a while. lI will post pictures in a bit just in case some one is interested.
                        130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                        125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                        100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                        55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                        55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                        30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                        30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                        10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                        Comment

                        • #13
                          Waitiing for those pictures.
                          Nothing Kills Evil Like a Sharp Stick...

                          Comment

                          • #14
                            Sorry about the delay I will take a couple when the lights come on.
                            130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                            125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                            100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                            55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                            55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                            30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                            30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                            10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                            Comment

                            • #15
                              walstad.jpg here's a quick picture
                              130 gallon lake malawi breeding community tank red zebra with true blue male, Mosobo "deep", Rusties, Taiwan reef.
                              125 gallon with Carl the crappie and Mrs. C the crawdad
                              100 gallon tall Walstad method planted tank
                              55 gallon tropical mixture of guppies, platy's, clown loaches
                              55 gallon pea puffer planted tank
                              30 gallon Cichlid fry tank
                              30 gallon planted snowball shrimp tank.
                              10 gallon Killi fish australe orange planted tank trying to breed

                              Comment

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