View Full Version : starting my 55 over as a planted tank.
My fish all died recently when my cats unplugged my filters and the heat ramained on so the water heated up alot and the fish ran out of oxygen. So i get to start it over. I want to plan it but it will have to be a completely cost efficiant diy job. I want to build my own hood and use light fixtures i already have. I plan to use two four foot fourty watt bulbs and two fifteen watt bulbs,it will be exactly two watts per gallon,The fixtures and bulbs are just shop lights,will they work alright or will they just cuz my tanks to grow lots of algae? Can i get aquarium lights that will fit the fixtures and not brake the bank?
Now i need to know how much gravle i will need? I cant get any of the special substrates up here and i really dont have the money to order them,will most plants grow ok with a couple inches of smaller gravle and liquid fertalizers? Is there anything i can do cheaply to help the plants grow better? I also have no money to buy a co2 difuser so i will be doing the 2 litre bottle trick with two 2 litre bottles. Will this supply sufficiant co2? What other thigns am i overlooking that i will need? Will this even work or will my plants simply live and not grow and flurish?
There are plenty of low-cost DIY solutions which should not break the bank and are available all but universally.
You can use the shop lights for the low-light tank without problems. Home Depot (in your area?) has low cost tubes which work fine. Either GE sp50s (sleeve label "Sunshine" grow plants quite well, as do Phillips 6500/6700K tubes (I've forgetten the exact K rating and the label name, but it is one of the tubes my HD handles now and I like the color better than the GE sp50s).
To your fine gravel (not pea gravel, it is too big to be easy), you can add 1/2 to 2/3 cup per square foot (so 2- 2 2/3 cups measured in your tank) of Canadian sphagnum peat moss to the bottom inch of gravel, mix it in gently, then top with another two inches (total three inches) of plain gravel. If you haven't broken down the tank yet, preserve the bottom layer of the existing gravel with its mulm (sludge/dirt/whatever - it is valuable stuff for plants), just add the peat to that and top with rinsed gravel. Fill the tank gently to avoid disturbing the deep layer.
Pick low to moderate light plants (Swords, val, Crinums, Crypts, etc.), add you DIY CO2 (alternate replenishing the bottles, use one brand of supplements (I prefer Seachem, but go with what is available to you) and don't overdo the additions. See:
http://www.brainyday.com/jared/aquarium/info.htm
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/
http://www.sfbaaps.com/referencelist.aspx
On all of those, remember that you are going low-tech, so do not add at high light/high CO2/high supplement levels, but at much reduced levels.
Thanks for all the great info. Any idea how much those bulbs will run me? The tank had sand in it not gravle so it doesnt have much mulm in it,is it still worth leaving a little in there? Where do i get the peat and how much will it cost? I dont have a home depot around here but we have several stores like it that will most likely carry the items you've mentioned. As for the co2,i have never seen the kits around here but i found a recipet using,i think starch,sugar,and water,and it seemed to work reasonably well on my old 35 gallon when it had plants in it.
Will any additional fetalizers still be beneficial or will they just help me grow algae? 2wpg is low light? Thanks again.
Lots of folks divide NO fluorescent lighted tanks as low (1.5-2W/gal), medium or moderate (2-3W/gal) and high light (3W/gal and up).
That does not quite work for me as in my tanks there is break point about 2.5W/gal (say a range of 2.4-2.7W/gal., depending on the tank). Below that I can do what I consider "low light, low tech" and add very little in the was of supplements - normally just water changes and fish feeding, with occasional Jobe's spike pieces pushed deep under the heavy feeders(Swords, Crinum, or established, dense stands of Crypts). Above that light level I need carbon, potassium, traces, etc. supplemented fairly routinely, sometimes I need nitrate or iron as well.
Part of the variation will be in your water supply, part in your fish load and feeding practices, part on the plants chosen and the depth of the tank and density of planting. My tanks either have laterite or Flourite in the substrate, commonly set with the peat mentioned earlier as well when first set. But my tanks are not overstocked, or really even normally stocked. I have fairly light to moderate fish loads, although highly visible ones - I'm into schools at the moment, most display tanks are one schooling species plus cleaning crew of Amano or other shrimp, otos, etc.
The canadian sphagnum peat is standard garden center stuff, no additives, available in bales (4-6 cubic feet) or smaller packages. I use the stuff outdoors as a soil additive, so get large bales, but if you are not an outdoor gardener, you will want something much smaller.
The tubes I mentioned before are standard mass-market tubes, not expensive, say +/- $5 each. I confess that I do use some absurdly expensive tubes in some display tanks, I still like Tritons ($$20-30 per tube), but I have a hard time justifying the cost to myself sometimes.