How to light a 3' deep tank?

[Geeky1]

I'm going to be buying a 10' long x 3' deep tank (30" or 36" front to back), which will be a freshwater planted aquarium. I haven't decided exactly what I'm going to keep in it yet, although Discus are a possibility. Anyhow, the manufacturer of the tank recommended that I light it with 4 24" compact fluorescent lights, which he said he thought were 96w apiece. As far as I know, the only CF bulbs that'll fit under a 24" hood are 65w or less, so I'm assuming they're 65w apiece, which works out to 260w. 260w seems awfully low for a 3 foot deep tank with live plants in it...

I was looking at substituting either 2 48" or 3 36" lights with the following specifications:

2x 400w 6500k Halides
2x 95/110w Actinic VHO

Keep in mind that those specifications are per unit, so the total wattage would be 2040w for 2 48" units or 2970 for 3 36" units...

What do you guys recommend?

[Gomer]

That is some serious light!..for a serious tank!!!

You might want to consider AHsupply.com
You should be able to save a bit of $$ that rought.

[plantbrain]

10ft x 36" deep=> I would use 35" 96 w powercompacts from A&H.

You'll need about 8-12 of them. See how much this cost.

These will light the tank well at this depth.
You'll need a lot of substrate, large pump and a good easy pre plumbed water changing set up, a sump would be ideal and CO2 gas would also help a great deal if it's planted.

Slower growers and driftwood will make the maintenance much easier. Rocks also. See some of the larger Amano tanks and Jeff's over at Aquatic designs in TX.
Crypts and Anubias and ferns on driftwood look nice and are easy.
Regards,
Tom Barr

[Geeky1]

The substrate will be 2-4" of gravel and/or fluorite with 400-600w of undergravel heaters. The filtration consists of 3 separate circuits:

Circuit 1:
Iwaki 70RLT
Ocean Clear 317 Triple Micron Polystrand Mechanical
Ocean Clear 340 40sq ft. Pleated Mechanical/Biological
Ocean Clear 320 Carbon filter

Circuit 2:
Iwaki 70RLT
Ocean Clear 317 Triple Micron Polystrand Mechanical
Ocean Clear 340 40sq ft. Pleated Mechanical/Biological
AquaUV 40w UV Sterilizer
Ocean Clear 320 Carbon filter

Circuit 3:
Acrylic Tank Manufacturing custom trickle filter

Also, the tank will use a fireplug external heater in addition to the under gravel heaters, and it will have Co2...

So you think 960w is enough for a tank this size then? It will be very densely planted (e.g. similar to Amano's "Nature Aquariums") so...

I just saw a spectacular 8' reef tank in an aquarium magazine (can't remember which one offhand) that was 3' deep... that thing had a good 2000-odd watts of light on it, and the coral was doing very, very well... since the coral and freshwater aquarium plants are from the same general latitude, shouldn't they do well with around 1000w/square meter, which is what this reef tank has?

[superjohnny]

It really depends on the kinds of plants you have. I'm with Tom on crypts & anubias. Go with medium to low light plants because this is going to be a public aquarium. You don't want to battle constant algae problems.

Lots of cardinal tetras, some large loaches, & groumi's (sp?) would be my choice.

Think low maintenance Geeky1. Keep it simple to start with. Read lots of Amano books :)

Please tell me you're in the Portland, Oregon area so I can come check it out.

[Geeky1]

You're right, I don't want to battle algae constantly. However, I have what may be at least a partial solution to that- baby plecs seem to do a better job than anything else at eating algae. Then at about 4-5" (which is the largest I'll let them get in my 10g) they get lazy, and they tend to start uprooting things...

I've got the last volume in Amano's series, but I haven't got the first two (yet). When I get home today I'll have to see what he's using on his tanks; I know there are some 10' tanks in that book...

Speaking of loaches, I haven't had any luck with clowns... ever. Of course I can't keep fancy guppies alive either. But I kept baby discus in a 10g for months (sold them) and they were dead easy. Never checked the water quality, and I put them in the tank when it was 2 weeks old (the setup, not the fish) so they got to finish cycling the tank too... never had a problem with them. Took flake food right from the start, etc. Figures- I can keep Discus but I can't keep guppies... :rolleyes:

Define "area". I suppose the tank could be in the Portland area, if you have a very, very broad definition of the word. It's in Castroville, California (artichoke capital of the world!). My grandparents own a precision machining company and they just had an 86,000 square foot building built in Castroville, and the tank is going in the lobby...

[Pink Pat]

G1,

While you are busy working out how to light a 3' deep aquarium, have you figured out how you are going to clean it?

PP

[Geeky1]

Not really, but most likely it will involve a snorkel :D

[plantbrain]

Plan on a bit more substrate than this. Flourite is very good.

Filter is fine. I much prefer sumps but this will work. I would also plan on a CO2 reactor PVC tube on each circuit(roughly a 3" x 24 " with a gas inlet).

UV, don't bother using except for about 1 day after a water change or if in the rare case you get green water.

I will say 12 x 96 w is enough, I set up a 440 gal tank with 8 x96 and it was plenty. Remember that the reflectors are awesome, plus the amount of light froma T-5 with an electronic ballast also increases the amount of light vs an old watt per gal rule.
900-1100 watts is enough.

You can opt for the MH's, I'd use 250's, 5-6 of them.
Have a good lighting person professionally install them built in if you chose this route.

Plan to aquascape so that you are able to hide all components.
Use wood, rock, plants etc to do this.

Also, don't bother with the heating cables thing, it's help is insignificant and it's cost is high. It won't hurt but ifI had all the $, I still would not use them in any of my personal tanks, and yes, I've used them over long periods and I have used 3 brands, dupla, sandpoint and zoom med plus have built several of my own from raw parts. Spend the $ on the substrae instead.

Also, get a couple of bags of ground peat and add this to the bottom of the substrate along with some old filthy mulm from severval vacuumed established tanks from the LFS, decant off the clear supernatant, save the detritus on the bottom, add this to the bottom layer with the peat and mix with about 1" worth of flourite. Top with 2-5 inches of flourite, also feed some of this into the filter also.

You now have cycled your tank.

Reef tanks need more light than any planted tank does, at least SPS tanks do, soft corals etc can get by with less etc, but more light is not better, you can learn the hard way if you so choose.

You will also want to get KNO3, K2SO4, KH2PO4 and some traces, like plantex CMS etc.
You can buy the fert's from agriculure grass lawn turf wholesalers for about 20-30$ per 50lbs.
The plantex will be about 35-45$ for 5lbs of dry and this should last a few years.

20 to 50lb CO2 bottles will be needed.

Driftwood, I have wood that is similar to Amano's big 12ft x 6ft x 6ft monster tank here and we have tons of it. See the Book of ADA.

Very beautiful. Redwood stumps are also a prime idea locally.

If you can see this tank, note how the Anubias are used in the lower reaches along with crytps etc.

C c. variety balansae is great since it gets about 24-30 inches long and is a nice grassy bright green metallic sheen.

Much of the wood is planted with narrow leaf java fern or Bolbitus(easy to get at).

The general layout is based with a central mound of rocks supporting the wood with some open space along the front/sides of the glass.

It is much better to be in the lower end of the light with good CO2
and nutrients as this is the best overall combo for work load and over all look and presentation for an aquascape of this size that you plan on keeping looking good for any length of time. Less glass algae also.

More light will => more work.
Your "customer" and plants will also be pleased with this amount.

I am in the bay area often(permanently next year) and there is an excellent friend of mine from the Monterey Aquarium who does excellent contract/consulting work if you are interested as I do on ocassion.

He's _the_ best person in the world for jellyfish tank. He has a very nice Discus 250 gallon tank running at the present time which he maintains and is one of the nicest Discus tanks I've seen to date, certain within the USA.

Pleco's are tough to catch in a large tank later.
I'd opt for another algae eater, also, don't depend/rely on algae eaters to solve your algae issues, they are only icing on the cake.
Amano shrimps in mass are good, but costly and may prove tough in this large tank(Get loss in the over flow, Discus eating them etc after they get good sized etc).
You'd need 500+ of them or so which would be about 300-400$.

I can recommend some great local Discus breeders for the stock.


Regards,
Tom Barr

[Geeky1]

Thanks for all the help...

Couple more questions (want to make sure I get this right!)

How deep of a substrate would you recommend?

The wet/dry filter ATM is building has a sump (albiet a small one). What would I use a sump for, other than the float valve for the water level maintenance and as a place to drain/fill the tank?

They (ATM) threw the UV in there (most likely because they wanted to sell one to me...) but it seems like a good idea to me. Putting it before the carbon should stop any free radicals that may be generated... is there any reason NOT to use one?

I'll go with your recommendation on the lighting. However, whether I go with CFs or MHs depends on finding someone to build the hoods... this tank is going in the lobby of the new building that my grandparents just had built for their business... I don't have the time to build a hood myself, unfortunately, so I'm going to have to get someone to do it. Right now I'm looking at the PFO/IceCap units from MarineDepot, which are MH/CF or VHO combinations. I was going to use 6500k MH bulbs if I use MHs, but I was also going to use some actinic fluorescents to balance out the color a bit. Any comments/suggestions on that?

Thanks for the heads up on the heating cables... I'll skip those then.

About the peat: if I go with something other than Discus, something that likes a somewhat higher pH, I assume I shouldn't use the peat since it'll tend to lower the pH... I'll probably vacuum my 10g and my dad's 29g and use the stuff from that. I'd like to use the stuff from a LFS, but I don't want to risk introducing diseases into the tank...

In terms of fertilizers, I was going to use a combination of SeaChem's Flourish tablets and the Flourish liquid... would those be sufficient?

Regarding the Co2, I was actually going to use those big 1A cylinders... those small Co2 tanks are expensive, and the 1A should last me a long, long time...

In terms of planting, I'd really like to go with a large variety of stuff. I know next to nothing about aquatic plants, but I would like to keep some of the species that (I think) require higher light levels, e.g. Cabomba caroliniana (sp?)

What would you recommend as algae eaters other than Plecs? The shrimp sound like a possibility, but as you said, they'll probably be eaten by just about anything I put in there. Since I'm considering schools of smaller barbs (Tiger, Cherry, Checkered, Zebra Danios, Giant Danios, etc.) they'd probably be picked to death, while if I keep Discus, they'll probably be eaten outright... Also, I'm not terribly fond of inverts. I don't mind them, but outside of Octopus, I'm not really a big fan of them... A few big Plecs would take care of the algae, but they'll cause more problems than they'll solve if they're big... How about using Clown Plecs or other smaller species? Otocinclus could be used, but they never seem to do very well at all- I usually loose all the ones I put in my 10g within 2 weeks...

I may have to take you up on those offers... thanks!

Oh, one other thing- do you know of anywhere to get fluorite relatively cheap? Dolphin Pet Village, which is my LFS, has it for like $20/15kg, and by the time I pay shipping from Big Al's or That Fish Place, I might as well just buy it locally...

[plantbrain]

2" in the front sloping up to about 6-8" in the rear no viewable side(s).

The sump will need an auto top off for such a large tank, evapration will be high and a small sump will not be able to keep up.
It's a good place for heaters, CO2 reactors, auto top etc.

Free radicals have nothing to do with keeping plants and is a buzz word. I have no idea why they brought that up.

You do NOT use carbon with a planted tank at all.
For lighting color temps, 5000-6500K is what you should stick with, do NOT use atinics, these are for deep water corals.

Peat is good for any planted tank, you are not using much relative to the entire tank and it's in the bottom of the gravel.

Fert's:
Get what I told you to get.
You can use the SeaChem stuff but the cost will be around 100-200$ a month, vs 10$ a month for what I suggested.
It's your/their $. If you want to add water to the dry salts, it's no different.

Flourish and flourish tabs will NOT be enough to supply the needs of the plants. You'll need the fert's I mentioned. The SeaChem stuff is no more difficult to use than the stuff I mention, just add 4 things, 3 of them -2x a week.

An A1 CO2 cylinder is perfect.

As far as plants:
Cabomba grows like wildfire, you can have some if you plan on trimming every week or two.
I'd place somewhere easy to get at and prune.

I'd also highly suggest you consider keeping the number of species low, the tank will look much better.
Be careful on the design and plant types.

Clown pleco's , bull dog, rubber's Peaklotia sp, Ancistrus, bushy nose's etc Farawella, Otto cats all of these are good, stay away from reg/tiger pleco's.
Otto's are wimpy but the ones that do make it live for a long time after the first 3 weeks or so at a LFS.

Concerning the Flourite, Email Doug Hill at SeaChem directly about the size of your tank and they will make an arrangement with you through the LFS for a quantity buy special price.

It should be a good deal, better than anywhere else.

If you go with the 3x3x10 ft size, a dosing routine would look like this:

Sunday: 30-40% water change
Add 2 tablespoons of K2SO4
Add 2 table spoons of KNO3
Add 1/2 teaspoon of KH2PO4
Add 150mls of trace mix

Tues:
2 tablespoons KNO3
1/2 teasp KH2PO4
150 mls of trace

Friday:
2 tablespoons KNO3
1/2 teaspoon KH2PO4
150mls of trace

Repeat on Sunday

Gets to be old hat fast.

Your fish choices are good, but not for Discus, barbs are not a good mix IMO. But Barbs are good for polanted tanks IMO, but they do rip up things like Cabomba, moss, any fuzzy looking plants, this also includes hair algae.

Rosey barbs look nice, chery barbs also. A big school would look neat. Also consider cardinals, maybe 1000 of them + Discus.

Bing Seto is one of the USA's best breeder's and is over in the east bay. Mark Faulkner is the fellow from the Monterey Aquarium and I can have him contact you off list if you wish.

I have a price as well but I'm more the consultant and will be in the bay area off and on till next summer when I'm permenantly back. I'll do set ups for large planted tanks(or small ones) and consulting, but day to day mainteance is always best done by the owners(dosing, Flipping on the UV, water changes etc.). I or Mark etc can do monthly prunings etc so that keeps the cost down.
Generally I try to show folks how to and then let them enjoy it.
In the long run this works bst for all involved and is not difficult.

If you get a chance, take a look at Amano's big Tank, some one here has a link to it somewhere so you can see it on line. Try a search and I'll see if I can hunt down the link.

If you like wood like that or want an open top/or a closed top with neat wood, I have plenty(It's located in Florida though but is available).
Redwood is also a good wood but not as branchy or as dense as the eastern southern cedar.

Email off list for further info.

Some of Mark's 500 gallon Discus tanks(the 250 looks much better IMO)
See here:
www.sfbaaps.com under "gallery" under "Mark".
Tanks this size we both have experience on.
Mark I believe even lives right there in your town.

Mark and I have worked together on projects in the past as well and can take the tank where ever your goal is.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[Geeky1]

Thanks. I actually wasn't considering barbs and discus, but barbs or discus... the barbs would shred the discus.

I'm not concerned with free radicals impacting the plants, but the fish are another matter...

[plantbrain]

So what/which free radicals are going to cause harm to the fish?

A UV is not going to cause much in the way of free radicals enough to harm the fish, someone is blowing smoke up your.....
to sell you a UV and a carbon post.

Plenty of folks use UV's 24/7 and raise breeders/fry and other fish that would be very sensitive to something like a super oxide radical or others. Free radicals are quite diluted in a large volume of water and would react quickly rendering it benign. Internally, we/fish/critter posses enyzmes to convert free radicals to benign chemical states. Vitamins/trace metals are co factors for many of these enyzmes such as super oxide dimutase which deals with the radical such as this example.

Go elsewhere if someone told you this.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[Geeky1]

Well you see, my dad mentioned free radicals and what they can do... he's got a Ph.D in Zoology, and worked for NASA and Lockheed Martin for 20-odd years developing life support sytems. Unfortunately, he doesn't always give relevant info- he told me they CAN cause all sorts of problems, but couldn't say for sure if the amount coming off a UV could cause a problem or not... so, I figured I'd be safe and use the carbon. But, if they aren't going to be a problem, I'll skip it...

[plantbrain]

I have degrees in biochem and plant & aquatic bio and have 30 years in this hobby so I too know what I'm talking about.
Precisely fish, algae and plants.

Show me some references on free radical production from UV's on fish growth rates/toxicity tolerances.
Then include something about the plant nutrients/trace metals effect with UV's and chelators.

He's correct that they can cause all sorts of issues, namely internal issues when a cell cannot produce the enzymes to handle these radicals or a pathway is blocked. But does this apply to a planted tank?

Otherwise it's speculation. And it'd be a real dent to all the UV makers in the hobby(fish) if it's true. Ozone users do use carbon post to remove all the O3 before returning it to the tank etc. But I've never heard nor seen anything about UV production of free radical production in a tank that might cause any fish related issues.

If he finds some references, please post them. He's trying to be helpful certainly and playing it safe but consider the sun's UV and the world's water bodies.
In any event, having seen a number of Discus breed in my and other's tanks, I'd expect they were not in too sorry of shape from all the free radicals:)
I don't use UV's anylonger unless doing work with green water and other phytoplankton but have used them for a few years.

You would be in very lonely company using carbon on a planted tank. It is never recommend except prehaps in the first weeks and then as bio media later after it's "spent" and no longer active.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[superjohnny]

When it comes to aquaria few people could beat Tom head to head.

If I were doing a project of this magnitude I would definitely hire a consultant. It will cost a few hundred, but they can help you figure out the aquascape and maintenance and that, in my opinion, is very worth the time and expense. It's the difference between a tank that makes you say "cool tank" and "OMG, Wow."

[Geeky1]

Tom; I hope I didn't insult you at all. I suppose I may have come across as a bit irritable...

Anyhow, I can see just from your posts in this thread that you know a great deal about this, so I'm going to revise the setup so it's more in line with your suggestions. I was at the LFS yesterday, and I saw some bottles in their fertilizer/water conditioner aisle, and they were labeled with some of the formulas you mentioned earlier (e.g. KNO3). Were you referring to an actual product that's using the formulas as the name, or were you just referring to the chemicals themselves? I would assume the product in question (wish I'd had time to look at it more closely) contains the substance that it's label has printed on it... So yeah- were you talking about buying the substances in bulk from a scientific/industrial supply company, or were you talking about some kind of aquarium-specific product?

[plantbrain]

You and most folks here get free advice, folks often charge a fair penny for this alone and the amount of cash I've saved you thus far is substantial, not to mention many other aquarist all over creation I've tried to help. Operating cost and ease of long term operation and blending the whole thing together is the key.
But ultimately folks will do what they want, it's their project, their money etc. But if they want advice/set up etc, then they are asking for experience/help. My goal is simple: cheap long term operating cost + a nice healthy planted tank. Simple is good. Less cost and easy to fix.
I am professional in my work/advice, like I said, I do not do this for the money, I have a job and am not groveling for $ to keep an account/get a client. I do not operate that way. I do work with people to finish a project and a goal

Just the bulk sacks o fertilzer down at the farm supply places.
KH2PO4 is often called KEEP. Potash of sulfur= K2SO4.
KNO3 is sold sometimes under stump remover in smaller amounts but they have this also in the 50lb bags, should run about 20-40$. Get the fine grain, not the granular, it dissolved faster. Don't monkey with making stock solutions with water etc.

There, just save you(or the folks/client etc) a few grand in operating cost per year. Contancting SeaChem for flourite will save you some $ as well.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[Geeky1]

Question about the peat... I picked up some the other day because I'm in the process of tearing down my 10g and I figured I'd try your suggestion. I bought both the granular and the fibrous fluval stuff, since that's all the LFS had. The granular stuff is "highly concentrated" and they say that you should "monitor your pH on a regular basis when using it". What kind of effect on the pH will the peat have? I know it'll bring it down, but how low? The reason I ask is I've got dwarf and celebes rainbowfish that I'm keeping in there, and they prefer hard water with a pH of 7.5+, and the celebes especially are sensitive to soft, acid water... which, of course, is exactly what the peat does to the water...

[plantbrain]

I use the garden Scott's brand, about 2$ for a 10lb+ bag. Ground peat.

I add about a handful per sq ft to the bottom layer, so about a handful is all you'd add to a 10 gal. Peat will soften the water, but it does not keep doing this forever and you are adding only a small amount relative to the tank volume and you are also placing it where there is the lowest water flow passing by.

50% weekly water changes also prevent it from doing much, til the next week's changes takes place adding the hardness back.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[bmarcus]

Its 6 am and i dont feel like reading all of this, but they made 24" 96 watt PCs now. I think Coralife makes them, but i've seen them somewhere.

[Geeky1]

Tom; I can't seem to find Mr. Hill's e-mail address. Is there any way you could PM it to me or something? Thanks.

Also, I created a spreadsheet using the data in the 3rd volume of Amano's Nature Aquarium series to see if I could find any kind of a trend in the way he's lighting his tanks. Unfortunately, I didn't find anything that indicated some kind of a "formula" for lighting the tanks. However, one of my favorite tanks is on the higher end of the scale, and to get about that much light in my tank, I'd need about what you suggested- 900-1000w, so I'm going to go with that...

This is the chart, if you're interested:
http://www.angelfire.com/pro/geeky1/tanks.htm

[plantbrain]

Why ask me?
Try asking SeaChem directly.

Here's Mark's info:

http://www.sfbaaps.com/reference/faulkner_01_01.shtml

Regards,
Tom Barr

[GulfCstAquarian]

Interesting read! This is going to be an impressive setup. Here is a picture of that big Amano tank I think you guys are talking about...

http://home.earthlink.net/~ponjican/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/big_amano_thumb.jpg (http://home.earthlink.net/~ponjican/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/big_amano.jpg)
click on image to enlarge

[plantbrain]

Thanks GCA, that's similar to the wood I might send to CA shortly. Albany Aquarium might buy a large amount if we can get a good deal on a number of roots.

But this is a similar to what my own tank design is like, the wood protrudes above the water level. I had MH's but I did not like the globe fixtures. I would have preferred the HQI double ended MH lights w/electronic ballast and very small fixtures but that's costly for me at the moment so I went with a low profile PC FL light on raised feet. The pieces I choose only came out of the back 6 inches of the tank and flair outward from the water's surface. Terrestrial plants can be added to the wood giving a sense of lush growth both in/out of the tank.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[superjohnny]

Interesting chart. Did you really not see any pattern? Look at the w/gallon. Given that all tanks are suited to different lighting conditions I see a distinct pattern... 3 2 1. The w/g ratio decreases as tank size increases.

Tanks 180-650L he uses about 2-3 wpg. 700-1,000L tanks he uses about 2 wpg. Larger than 1,000L he uses ~1wpg.

Keep that up, that's very useful info.

From this you can see you'll need roughly 0.6-0.8wpg or 420-560 watts of light (700G tank right?). If you want an Amano style tank that is...