135 Gallon Tank + Digging Fish, need help making some decisions

[GDominy]

Well the topic pretty much spells it out. I keep SEVERAL loach species in my 135 gallon tank so I have to overcome many hurdles when keeping plants in this tank.

1.) High temperature - This tank sits at around 86 degree's so many plants have difficulty surviving, let alone surviving. I have been able to keep Crypts, Hygro., certain anubias (although they suffer badly)

2.) Loaches - Love to "taste" leaves, so many plants are out (amazon swords are a favorite plant to nibble on).

3.) Substrate - The loaches also tend to dig up the substrate a great deal, so I can't use many root tabs effectively. I use soil in many of my other tanks as an underlaying substrate, but once again, the loaches would stir this up quite badly.

Lighting is not a problem, I have 480 watts of VHO over this tank (where most of the heat comes from) and I will be adding CO2 as soon as I can afford to buy the rest of the components I need (I have too many outstanding debts to do this for about a month or so).

I would like to increase the plant mass in this tank but I need to address the obvious problems first.

1.) On stem plants like Hygro. They grow very fast (and large!) but I tend to lose the leaves on the bottom 6" of the stem. Is this due to shading from the leave above, or are my fish more likely "pruning" them off? I am hiding the obvious "bald" stems by clustering medium height crypts around and amongst the "thicket"

2.) Anubias and other slow growers (Java Fern) seem to grow miserably slowly so the leaves become encusted in algae before new leaves are formed. I suspect they simply can't compete for nutrients and are starving (I'll probably end up removing them)

3.) Crypts in direct light don't throw off that many leaves, wheras the crypts in "shaded" area''s tend to do better (although not by much), am I damaging the plant in too much light, or could this be coincedental and they are suffering from nutrient defficiency as well (like the Anubias).


Any suggestions? I think I just need a fresh brain to think this through with me (I'm getting a little frustrated but I'm still venturing forward).

I think a lot of the problems will go away when I add the CO2 and work on a more strict fert. regiment but I'm open to any ideas

[Mr.Jingles]

lower the temp to around 76

I dont understand why any fish would ever need a tank at 86. to be honest, to spend the energy and money keeping a tank that hot is pointless. Fish dont need it that hot, even if people think they do.

on top of that, a tank with at that temp will not be able to hold gases half as well as a tank at 76. You might as well kiss CO2 goodbye as a universal solvent untill you lower the temp.

so drop it 10 degrees or so.

then, cut down on lighting. You have low light plants. Anubias, Crypt, and Java dont need 3.5 watts per gallon, especially when there is no CO2. The hygro will fair well enough, cause they are generally hardy. I have a 55 gallon with year old NO Flou bulbs in and they grow fine ("160" watts).

so cut it down to 2 watts per gallon.

next, add a deeper layer of substrate. This should make it more difficult for the loaches to move things around that are imbedded into the gravel.

finally, add CO2!!! When you can, add CO2 at anytime. CO2 will help alot. If you have an imbalance of nutrients, algae will grow. My method of riddence: wait it out. I dont mess with the chemistry of nutrients, cause I dont know about nutrients that well, other than alot of nutrients in the bottle can be found in fish food and poop that gets broken down and then get released. That takes a longer time than the bottle, but I dont mess with anything else. Anyways, so wait it out, the algae and growing plants will use the nutrients untill the plants can start outcompeting the algae. My 50 went through a hair algae, green algae, and fuzz algae stage. Im happy to say, that I didn't stress over it, and the algae is down to the green algae on the glass.

so use CO2 ASAP. Then dont screw with nutrients unless you know what you are doing.

once you understand this, up your lighting, CO2, and maybe nutrients if you get that figured out and LOAD your tank with fast growing plants, including those that the loaches "sample." If the plants are healthy, they will keep growing even after they get eaten a bit.

edit: prune hygro and plant near base of grouping in order to maintain the full effect of the leaves. when they grow too tall, they cut off access leaves in order to help the top get more energy to grow. I dont like java fern, it just turns brown on me too fast and I never found a good landscaping place for it. I personally like crypt better, cause they have lots of species, some that look like java fern, and they are alot easier to keep than java fern (imo).

[inxs]

86 is an overkill, even discus would fare well at 80-82.
I ran my tank at 80+ with good growth but as jingles said - most of your plants are low light. Your light is too strong for them .

If you plan on getting some highlight plants then keep the light otherwise I would cut them back.

As far as the digging goes you can put the plants in pots or put pieces of slate around the base of the plants

[GDominy]

You dont understand, I "can't" lower the temp, if I could I would.

The house is that hot so the tank cant cool off.

[GDominy]

Originally posted by Mr.Jingles
lower the temp to around 76

then, cut down on lighting. You have low light plants. Anubias, Crypt, and Java dont need 3.5 watts per gallon, especially when there is no CO2. The hygro will fair well enough, cause they are generally hardy. I have a 55 gallon with year old NO Flou bulbs in and they grow fine ("160" watts).

so cut it down to 2 watts per gallon.

next, add a deeper layer of substrate. This should make it more difficult for the loaches to move things around that are imbedded into the gravel.

finally, add CO2!!! When you can, add CO2 at anytime. CO2 will help alot. If you have an imbalance of nutrients, algae will grow. My method of riddence: wait it out. I dont mess with the chemistry of nutrients, cause I dont know about nutrients that well, other than alot of nutrients in the bottle can be found in fish food and poop that gets broken down and then get released. That takes a longer time than the bottle, but I dont mess with anything else. Anyways, so wait it out, the algae and growing plants will use the nutrients untill the plants can start outcompeting the algae. My 50 went through a hair algae, green algae, and fuzz algae stage. Im happy to say, that I didn't stress over it, and the algae is down to the green algae on the glass.

so use CO2 ASAP. Then dont screw with nutrients unless you know what you are doing.

once you understand this, up your lighting, CO2, and maybe nutrients if you get that figured out and LOAD your tank with fast growing plants, including those that the loaches "sample." If the plants are healthy, they will keep growing even after they get eaten a bit.

edit: prune hygro and plant near base of grouping in order to maintain the full effect of the leaves. when they grow too tall, they cut off access leaves in order to help the top get more energy to grow. I dont like java fern, it just turns brown on me too fast and I never found a good landscaping place for it. I personally like crypt better, cause they have lots of species, some that look like java fern, and they are alot easier to keep than java fern (imo).


I no longer have the low light plants, I should have been more clear. I will be adding CO2 in a couple of weeks with any luck, I'm just trying to get the money together.

If this is simply how the hygro grows then I'm not too worried, the stuff is growing over an inch a day so It's pretty easy going. I've been planting all sorts of cuttings in bare patches now so it looks pretty good.

As far as substrate is concerned, I have tried depths from 3" to 6" and the loaches churn it up the same. They looooove to dig. They also move the slate around when they feel like it so I need to keep plants with heavy root systems too keep them anchored.

So given my choices are pretty limited I'm sure things will take a turn for hte better when I add CO2.

By the way, this is not my first planted tank, its simply my largest. I have a 7.5, 22, 32, 45, 90 and 135 gallon tank that are all planted, this one is simply a challenge due to my fish choices and the heat (I can cool the other tanks easily, they dont have jumping fish in them so evaporation and air movement takes care of most of it). This tank has been running for a year now and the annoying spot algae still lurks. I suspect it too will fade once the CO2 is in place (the hygro is already sucking nutrients like mad)

[GDominy]

http://aquafiend.plantedtank.net/images/May1803/hygro.jpg

Here is some of the hygro. If you look carefully you can see some of the annoying spot algae on the anubias and the slate.

[Mr.Jingles]

oh!!

that tank. so you have some big buggers.

um...when I had my acaras, they would dig, and my brother took a rock, tied the bunch of plants to it, and burried the rock. that worked!

as for the top, get a screen. make one, buy one. do something with a screen. also, if your house is so frigidy hot, open a window. you live in British Columbia. Isnt that in canada? maybe I need to pull out a map or something.

I dont understand how your tank can get that hot.

btw, most algae competes with the plants. like you said, when they are outcompeted, they go away. My hard algae was real annoying. but it went away after my plants started out competing the algae. As did all the other algae. besides whats on the glass. it just takes time for the algae to go away.

btw, dont be afraid to prune anubias leaves off. It helps with the algae situation to rid the plant of plagued leaves.

good luck

[GDominy]

Originally posted by Mr.Jingles
oh!!

as for the top, get a screen. make one, buy one. do something with a screen. also, if your house is so frigidy hot, open a window. you live in British Columbia. Isnt that in canada? maybe I need to pull out a map or something.

I dont understand how your tank can get that hot.


I cant have the tank open top as my cats can and do try to climb in so I have a glass lid and a fan cooled wooden canopy, although its only about 4.5-5 cubic feet of airspace. The windows are open, in fact I have fans moving cool air in and hot air out. Its really simple as to my heat problems, Too many high light tanks, too many computers and other electronic equipment in a space only 950 square feet (ah the life of a techie...)

You can only move so much heat without actively cooling some of it .

Yes BC is in canada, but it doesnt turn to a polar icecap above the border :). My appartment is above 20 degrees F above the outside temperature during peak heat throughout the day (34 degree's F). All but my 7.5 gallon tank are in a single room about 12 feet by 12 feet.

I'm looking at buying a couple of 8000 BTU Air conditioners to take care of the situation, it should help a lot.

[Mantis_22]

Originally posted by GDominy
You dont understand, I "can't" lower the temp, if I could I would.

The house is that hot so the tank cant cool off.

Get a chiller!!!!!!!!!!

[GDominy]

Getting the pair of air conditioners will be cheaper then a chiller by far, I've already priced it out. Getting a chiller for a tank this size that can cool up to 10 degree's is really, really expensive (starting at $1200). I can get two air conditioners for cheaper (around $800)